Shenstone Group

Notes of the meeting on 18 November 2016

Illuminating the Way

The Shenstone Group met for a special session on Friday 18 November 2016 at County Hall

Participating were: Mike Ashton, Michael Clarke, Sue Harris, Phil Dutton, David Farmer, Simon Geraghty,

Adrian Gregson, Ian Hardiman, Richard Nichol, Richard Quallington, Linda Robinson, Richard Soper and

Nathan Travis.

Supporting the Group were: Caroline Yates and Roger Britton.

This was a short session to hear the results of research by Dr Rob Worrall which involved the Shenstone

Group as one of three case studies. The presentation was entitles Transforming People, Transforming

Minds, Transforming Place.

The context for the work was:

Era of Paradox

• Public spending squeeze

• Rising expectations on state to support citizens & businesses

UK Government Policy Shift

• More localised and differentiated approach to the delivery of public services and tackling

intransigent social problems has gained momentum in the era of financial crisis and austerity

Leadership Paradigm Challenge

• From the individual to the collective

• From the intra-personal to the inter-personal

• Little theoretical understanding of the process by which collective leadership development

evolves

The conceptual map of place-based leadership is very complex!

Traditional Public

Bureaucracy

Politicians lead (decide), Public servants implement policy

Hierarchical structure/order/ bounded

Urban /Town Planning Urban &

regional

policy

Physical

regeneration

Limits of

Bureaucratic

solutions?

Statutory partnerships (LSPs)

Separate functions &

professional silos

CDRP

Housing

Increasing complexity

Regionalism

Audit &

inspection

glocalisation

ICT

revolution

Rising

expectations

Access to information

Communities of place, interest, issue

Crisis of

leadership?

Notion of place -

fixed or emerging?

Leadership Academies

Trad. Approach (bureaucracy) (teach how to...)

Regional ldshp

Investment

mme

ntent

Investment

Society

Place Based

Leadership

development

Ideology Public sector

Collaboration

Economic Development

Health &

community well

being

Giddens 3rd Way Communitarianism

Xian Socialism

Networked

Governance

Holistic (JUG)

Government

Local Govt leading

Community well being duty /coercion

(Big Government)

Deserving Poor

Broken Society

Re-establish social and moral values

Rights & responsibili ties

Big Society

Rewarded for

knowledge

Ldr Dev.

Structure/ Process / Order

Classrm based

Imp. of

auth. y

New approach (fragmented)

(learn by doing)

Case

studies

Netwkd / Inter-connected

Hierarchy/

layered

PSL theory based on armed forces

Comm.&

Control

.

Heroic leader

order

Relational theories of ldshp

Common

provision – 1 size fits all

Ldshp

Dev. (collective provision\0

Fragmented power & auth.

In the field/ problem solving

Structured but

networked

Apply learning back in wk place

Sets vision & routemap for

followers

Learning as a reflective by product of being and doing

Helping others to see the “what” and works with them to define the ”how”

Sense &

sense making

Diverse needs, solutions and

provision

Real

world

problems

Prof. Knowledge/silo

By geography/location; issues/policy area- /

cross boundary

Traditional Approach – structured

Emergent organic collaborative approach

Theory of Collaborative Advantage – R.E. Kanter (Strategic Alliances) & Huxham & Vangen (collaborative thuggery) etc.

Reproduces (inter) organisational hierarchy

Local Strategic Partnership (LSP) artificial construct Perverse

funding incentives – leads to territorial spats

Hierarchical ldshp Chief Exec. level (& politic ians )- Exec. Ctees (locus of power)

Series of policy/task sub -grps

Output focused

Locality based – but stove-piped and

contradictory

Outcome focused

Naturally networked- individuals

Problem/ wicked issue focused

Collective solution focused – incl. P riv and 3rd sec tor

ambiguity

Clear Performance

Framework

Clear governance & accy fwk

Shifting sands – in terms of how to achieve desired outcome

Local government in lead – 1st amongst equals – public sector dominant

Leadership emerges naturally from doing

Nodes

NPM

Managerialism

Efficiency

VFM

Outputs

Diverse.ageing

Population/

needs

Social chaos -

worklessness

CONCEPTUAL MAP Government Public services Leadership

Development Practice Sector

specific

Silo-ed

This model formed the framework for the research which posed three questions:

1. What phenomena co-exist exist with the social process of place-based leadership development and

how do they relate to each other?

2. What are the implications for our theoretical understanding of these Collaboratives?

3. What are the practical and policy implications for the design, delivery and evaluation of the

Collaboratives?

One of the first and fundamental challenges though is to be clear what is meant by “place”, including “non-

place places” – “spaces of transience that do not hold enough significance to be regarded as "places”

Auge, 1995.

Discipline Themes

Human geography The bonds that form between humans and geographical locations

Political geography Location: where: Locale: walls in a room; streets in a city Sense of place: personal and emotional attachment (rootedness, place identity

Environmental psychology (psycho-social)

Person: sense of self, identity and socialization processes Place: physical and geographical aspects; Process: how groups and individuals relate to place

Economic and social development

Geographical localities – rather than just being managed – they can be re-shaped through managerial, community and political leadership (of place)

The notion of leadership development is critical:

• Inter-Organizational Relations (IOR) Research

• (Cropper, Ebers and Huxham 2008)

• Leader & Leadership Development

• (Day, 2000; Day and Harrison, 2007)

• Demand for new leadership theories – reflecting complexity of working across

boundaries with varied groups & interests

• Collective Leadership (relational, shared, distributed)

• (Pearce & Conger, 2003; Bennett et al, 2003; Uhl-Bien, 2006)

• Public Integrative Leadership / Place-Based Leadership/

• (Drath, 2003; Bryson & Crosby, 2005; Bolden, 2007, Brookes & Grint, 2010;)

With the polarity of individual or collective leadership being pivotal and situational:

Leader development (singular)

Leader

Intrapersonal

Human Capital

Cause

Leadership development (plural)

Leadership

Interpersonal

Social Capital (social and relational construct)

Effect

The conceptual model emergent from the research was:

Stage Description Manifestation Understanding

others’ perspectives Being open to seeing more than one world view, a

more globally-oriented perspective when considering

what the causes of particular issues are, and how they

should respond.

A movement away from perceived assumptions

about people and organisations and a

movement towards a different perspective, and

appreciation of a different way of seeing things Mindset A collective awareness of the need for leadership to

be construed and enacted in a different way and

being comfortable with having values and

assumptions challenged.

Positive collective response to a disturbance in

the system

Common (social)

purpose A coming together, a common agreement of what

the social purpose of the collaborative actually is and

what it is seeking to achieve beyond furthering the

common good and by what means.

Clear individual statements on common

purpose.

Sense making Seeing the main social issues from different

perspectives and creating a shared understanding of

what the problem is and potential approaches to

resolve it.

The telling of similar stories/descriptions from

shared experiences.

Collaborative space This is about the potential use of the initiative as a

thinking laboratory. The flow of ideas could lead to

the incubation of new initiatives and potential spin off

activities which would not have happened otherwise.

The reporting of new activities which happened

because of connections made within the

collaborative

Creating social

capital The move from common agreement to common

action which has led to increased shared capability to

address issues.

There may have been significant benefits and/or

added value from working together. This

collaboration may have also had an influence on

the development of other social initiatives. Creating a narrative

of collective

leadership

This is about the development of a common

understanding of how leadership is construed, what

its objectives should be and how it manifests itself.

Development of a common language in terms of

how leadership is described potentially with

shared metaphors or illustrative examples

The conceptual flow from the Worcestershire Case Study was as follows:

The core themes represent a series of paradoxical tensions within self, between self and other(s),

between self and organization, and in relation to wider place:

Narrow versus wider focus

On self, self interest and self development

On collective, collective interest (common good) and collective development

One or many place(s) Open acceptance of other perspectives

Unconscious or deliberate rejection of other perspectives

Approach to addressing issues

Linear, quantitative and controllable, cause and effect, similarity, uni-dimensional response

Multi-layered, chaotic, qualitative, multiple causes and effects. Novelty. Difference and mutli-dimensional response

He emergent conceptual framework is:

Cluster I - Ownership and Direction

1a Degrees of dependence

The extent to which the sustainability of a Collaborative is dependent on or independent from its

commissioner/founder or its facilitator

1b Direction

The extent to which dominant founders have a negative or positive influence on a Collaborative’s

direction,

Cluster II – Purpose and Identity

2a Purpose

The challenge of balancing a focus in individual participants’ development with wider development for

the common good.

2b Identity

The tension between the Collaborative being - as a think-tank and influencer and doing – taking

direction action for improvement

3a Effectiveness & Transparency

The tension between being selective to ensure effectiveness and having an open and transparent

selection process.

3b. Representativeness & Accountability

The degree to which Collaboratives participants are and should be representative and accountable to

wider place or just representing self

Cluster III – Process and Experience

4. Differentiated Place

Tension between traditional hierarchical silo-ed management and the ambiguous and shared

boundaries responsibilities of leading across complex, messy and multiple places.

5. Re-humanizing Place

The more rational, logical and controlled approach to development counterbalanced by a more

emotionally connected, visceral and human response.

6. Influencing and Being Influenced

The extent to which people experience the Collaborative as a means of influencing the external world or

that they themselves are influenced by it.

7. Where and Who Enacts Leadership

The extent to which the Collaboratives are about the enactment of leadership development or have a

direct role in the enactment of leadership itself.

Cluster IV - Outcomes

8. Creating Value

How value is defined and created through relational connections, difference and from intangible

outcomes creating the conditions for more tangible ones.

9. Collaborative Disadvantage

The more critical and negative outcomes and impact of the Collaborative.

The key tenants of practice emergent from this are:

With/not to

Development versus Training

Critical reflection

Creating space

Bearing witness

Action learning

Rob Worrall went on to describe the way in which the learning was being applied in Nakuru,

Kenya.

The full thesis is available at http://arro.anglia.ac.uk/700620/

The slide set from the session will be circulated shortly.

THE NEXT MEETING OF THE SHENSTONE GROUP IS ON FRIDAY 20 JANUARY 2017

The Paradoxes and Tensions of PBL