1. Collaboration 201 Faster Alone, Farther Together
Going the First Steps
Alberta Association of Services for Children and Families
Edmonton, May 25, 2010
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement

2. Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement
Today
Introduce key concepts, lenses and evidence related to inter-agency collaboration.
Begin creating a broad description for collaboration in your sector.
Experience tools used in the important ‘exploration’ phase.
Develop a ‘draft intent’ statement for collaboration.
Identify and explore emerging questions. ? ? ?
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement

3. Collaboration 101
Some Basics

4. Find a Colleague Think (5 minutes, alone)
What are three hopes about collaboration? Three fears?
Pair
(10 minutes together)
Listen to your colleague. Write down ONE idea per ‘sticky pad’ sheet (a total of six). Switch Roles
Share
Get ready to share with the group.

5. Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement
Definition
Co’labore (Latin) – to strive or labor together.
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement

6. The Working Together Continuum
Looser
Tighter
Compete
Co-exist
Consult
Cooperate
Coordinate
Collaborate
Merge
Purpose
Members
Structure & Process
Communicate
Resources
Environment
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement

7. The Working Together Continuum
Compete: compete for limited clients, staff, resources, etc.
Co-exist: work in isolation and without affecting others.
Consult: share information and ideas.
Cooperate: carry out some join independent projects.
Coordinate: align organizational activities with others.
Collaborate: share decision-making, risk and rewards.

8. The Purpose
What are the outcomes we are trying to achieve through our work?
Perspectives
Clients
Agency Manager
Agency Line Worker
Funder/Contractor
Other

9. The Possibilities
In what ways can we ‘collaborate’ to achieve these outcomes?

10. Common Areas for Inter-Agency Collaboration
Policy & Advocacy
Changing public policies or behaviors in big systems related to a common issue.
Service delivery.
Planning and delivering services to clients (e.g. outreach, intake, referrals, services, evaluation).
Back Office system consolidation.
Focus on improving effectiveness or efficiency of issues like HR or IT or space.
Social marketing or awareness campaigns.
Changing behaviors of people (e.g. anti-smoking) or raising awareness (e.g. poverty).

11. Benefit-Cost of Collaboration
Possible Benefits
Access resources
Share resources.
Reduce costs.
Streamline services.
Tap into diverse perspectives and networks for new or better service.
Protect programming.
Likely Costs
Time & resources intensive.
Reconciling self-interest and group interest.
Power imbalances.
Inequitable benefits.
Unpredictable.

12. Success Factors Genuine motivation to collaborate.
The right people & organizations (e.g. knowledge, authority, diversity, skills)
Alignment of personal and organizational interests.
Trustful relationships.
Supportive environment (credibility of players, etc.).
Power Issues addressed head on.
Appropriate, clear, responsive structure and process.
Effective (in)formal communication.
Coordination capacity (e.g. people, financial resources).
Progress

13. The Journey and Outcomes
Collaboration 101
The Journey and Outcomes

14. Renewal Conservation Creative Destruction Exploitation
The birth, growth, destruction and renewal of a forest
Renewal
Conservation
Creative Destruction
Exploitation

15. Nested Eco-Cycles
Cross Scale Dynamics

16. From Lifecycle to Ecocycle
The Performance Loop
The Renewal Loop
Source:

17. crisis choice expand possibilities & buy-in conserve new thinking
EXPLORATION
MATURITY
New Ideas: Creative * Messy * Uncertain*
First hand insights * Outside ideas * Multiple
Perspectives * Flat structure & process *
Probes & Little Experiments * Options
Productivity: Efficiency * Certainty * Stability *
Hierarchical structure & process * Clear Tasks,
Rules, Policies & Procedures * Standardization
* Specialists * Fast Returns * Low Risk Tolerance
expand
possibilities
& buy-in
conserve
new
thinking
declining
EROI
place
bets
manage
crisis
choice
sustain
& grow
broad direction
birth
confusion
develop &
adapt
shared vision
refine
reconnect
Effectiveness: Entrepreneurial * Generalists *
Roles * Adaptive structure and process *
Prototypes & Pilot Projects * Variation * Lag times
Flexible funding * Flexible rules * Tolerance for
Risk * Dead ends * Emerging Practice
Vision: Charismatic * Unraveling * Chaotic *
Loss, Anger, Blame, Conflict * Little structure
or process * Reflection * Relationships * Essence *
Values * Principles * New Energy & Urgency
DEVELOPMENT
CREATIVE DESTRUCTION

18. MATURITY
EXPLORATION
rigidity
trap
chronic
disaster trap
developing
possibilities
& buy-in
manage &
conserve
choice
shared vision
new direction
sustain
& grow
crisis
birth
develop
& resource
commitment
confusion
scarcity
trap
parasitic
trap
CREATIVE
DESTRUCTION
DEVELOPMENT

19. Four Transitional Traps
Description
Typical Challenges
SCARCITY
People struggle to ‘birth’ something likely to lead to outcomes and garners the support of the larger community.
The ideas are not compelling. Underdeveloped decision-making process & criteria. Members disagree on which options to pursue. Members have insufficient credibility. Energy spread too thin across many directions.
PARASITIC
People seem unable to sustain or grow their work because it is ‘parasitic’ on the host(s) that gave it birth.
Over reliance on key – often founding – members of the group. Dependence on start-up pool of resources. Approach works well only at a certain scale or in unique context.
RIGIDITY
People are unable or unwilling to change or dismantle an approach that no longer fits the evolving context in which they operate.
Psyche of immediate return. Fear of uncertainty. Self-Interest. Lack of clear exit rules. Concern about perception of failure. Pressure to continue by entrenched constituency (e.g. ‘too big to fail’).
CHRONIC DISASTER
People find themselves ‘spinning’ and unable to get traction on a compelling new vision, values and intent for moving forward.
Inability to let go of the past. Weak trust amongst members. Difficulty in agreeing on shared vision and values. Volatile environment.
Four Transitional Traps

20. Benefit-Cost of Collaboration
Possible Benefits
Access resources
Share resources.
Reduce costs.
Streamline services.
Tap into diverse perspectives and networks for new or better service.
Protect programming.
Likely Costs
Time & resources intensive.
Reconciling self-interest and group interest.
Power imbalances.
Inequitable benefits.
Unpredictable.

21. Success Factors Genuine motivation to collaborate.
The right people & organizations (e.g. knowledge, authority, diversity, skills)
Alignment of personal and organizational interests.
Trustful relationships.
Supportive environment (credibility of players, etc.).
Power Issues addressed head on.
Appropriate, clear, responsive structure and process.
Effective (in)formal communication.
Coordination capacity (e.g. people, financial resources).
Progress

22. Resiliency/Sustainability
Outcomes
Outcomes
Anecdotal and mixed evidence on:
Policy & Advocacy
Service Planning and Delivery
Quantitative and more positive evidence on:
Back Office Consolidation
Social Marketing and awareness campaigns.
Resiliency/Sustainability
5 out of 10 collaborations in the health services sector have serious implementation problems.
3 out of 10 business networks achieve their stated objectives.
Spontaneous agency-driven collaborative efforts have greater chances than funder induced collaborations.

23. Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement
Seven Big Ideas
The Importance of Entire Eco-Cycle: the performance and renewal phases are important to the overall health of the collaborative effort.
Resilient – Versus Sustainable – Collaborative Efforts: the importance of continually adapting – rather than sustaining – the manifestation of the collaboration to reflect the demands of different phases and internal and external changes.
Robust Collaborative: not all collaborative efforts are robust enough to make it through the entire eco-cycle. The challenge is to improve the probabilities of their evolution, but to ‘let go’ when necessary in order to release energy for new manifestations.
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement

24. Seven Big Ideas continued
Situational Leadership: the need to use leadership styles and culture that ‘fit’ the unique phase or area of work.
Patch Dynamics: collaborative efforts are more resilient when they are partly operating in all four phases or area of the eco-cycle.
Enabling Environment: the opportunity to strengthen the policy and investment environment to appropriately support all four phases of the eco-cycle.
Collaboration if necessary – but necessarily collaboration: sometimes co-existence and competition is more productive than collaboration.
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement

25. Find a colleague at your table
Find a colleague at your table. Each take 5 minutes to share your answers to the following questions:
In which areas of the ‘eco-cycle’ do you feel most comfortable and energized? Least comfortable and energized?
Describe a project or activity that illustrates each answer.
Preferences!

26. Lunch

27. The Exploration Phase
First Steps

28. Collaboration Strategic Intent
A strategic intent is a high level statement about how to achieve a vision or outcome.
It is meant to make an idea more explicit and shared ‘early on’ in the discovery process so that the process can be shared but not so detailed as to limit creativity and the participation of others.
In the increasingly popular design approach to change, people refer to a strategic intent as a “design brief”.
Elements of
Collaboration Strategic Intent
What is the outcome(s) we are seeking?
What are the key features of our idea to make this happen?
Who else needs to be involved in this exploration?
What are the options for moving this idea forward?
Is this idea likely to be
What questions emerge as we discuss this idea?
See:

29. Three Entry Points to Any Idea
Stakeholders
Options
Problem or
Issue
What are the options for action?
Who are the stakeholders affected by a situation or with the capacity to intervene?
What are the characteristics of the problem or issue we face?

30. Stakeholders Moderately Influencing Least Influencing Most Influencing
United
Way
Parents
Kids
Most
Affected
Most
Affected
Moderately
Affected
Least
Affected
Least
Affected
Moderately
Affected

31. Problem or Issue

32. Characteristics of Complex Issues
It is difficult to frame.
The cause and effect relationships are unclear.
There are diverse stakeholders.
Each experience is unique.
Complex issues evolve.
Solutions are not obviously right or wrong.
There is no objective measure of success.

33. Many Community Issues Overlap
Far
Chaos
Political
Zone of Complexity
Agreement
Simple
Complicated
Close
Close
Certainty
Far

34. Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement
Reflection
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement

35. Think, Pair & Share Think (5 minutes, alone)
What ‘ahas’ – if any – have you had this morning?
What new questions emerge?
Pair & Share (10 minutes)
Find a colleague and take a few minutes to share your responses with them.
Think, Pair
& Share

36. Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement
Today Revisited
Introduce key concepts, lenses and evidence related to inter-agency collaboration.
Begin creating a broad description for collaboration in your sector.
Experience tools used in the important ‘exploration’ phase.
Develop a ‘draft intent’ statement for collaboration.
Identify and explore emerging questions. ? ? ?
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement 36

37. Collaboration Resources
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement

38. Collaboration Aides

39. Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement
Eco-Cycle Lenses
Brenda Zimmerman. From Lifecycle to Cecile
Crisis & Renewal.
David Hurst
The Upside of Down.
Thomas Homer-Dixon
Getting to Maybe.
Frances Wesley
Brenda Zimmerman
Michael Quinn Patton
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement

40. Collaboration 201 Faster Alone, Farther Together
Going the First Steps
Alberta Association of Services for Children and Families
Edmonton, May 25, 2010
Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement 40