Infographic of collective intelligence.. #collcons

Are we getting better at using technology for collective intelligence..? Does this fit with the ideas of collaborative consumption and pro-sumers..?

Are there stages of grief in public service decommissioning..?

The public don't know what's hit it yet but at best this year we'll have:

1. the hardest debates over the services middle class people use


2. the expectation that universal services won't exist any more 


3. the role of the state solely being around targeting problems


4. an expectation that the third sector will deal with problems, (not the extras the state would never pay for..)

Can we win the prevention argument using control groups?

Can we win the prevention argument using control groups?

1.       take two cities of relative size & deprivation

2.       exclude one from access to voluntary groups support

3.       control for the variables

4.       compare & contrast

5.       win the argument with a monetary figure of certain types of support..?

Obviously it’s not this simple but it’s been done in other parts of the world where these differentials are naturally occurring – (see video on comparing success rates of various malaria preventions).

So if a city has an Age Concern are there 2% fewer hospital admissions than a city without an Age Concern..?

Are new job roles needed for organising in the new millennium..? (from @podnosh)

The kids waving their A-levels certificates this week will still be working in 2050. What kind of jobs might they be doing..? what skills will they need..?

I liked these new key job roles as a starter for ten in organising from @podnosh..

1. Storyteller, communicating stories of how new worlds of local public support might be envisioned in the absence of existing blueprints;


2. Weaver, making creative use of existing resources to generate something new and useful for service users and citizens;


3. Architect, constructing coherent local systems of public support from the myriad of public, private, third sector and other resources; and


4. Navigator, guiding citizens and service users around the range of possibilities that migth be available in a system of Local Public Support.

From being a service to being a system..?

We’re being told that the NHS will move from being a service to being a system. That it won’t deliver things, it will set the framework through which things happen. This sounds a lot like community empowerment but the costly, professional driven days of the Community Empowerment Networks seem to be over. Ideas like People Powered Change might change the emphasis, but even costly programmes like the Big Local Trust seem a bit artificial in these heady days of self organising.. Particularly as the news always seems to be over once they announce the successful schemes.. All our other statutory animals are changing beyond all recognition as we speak, changing shape, changing cost and the direction of travel will not change in 4 years time..

So - lets imagine for two minutes that the VCS were one animal. How would it look..? 

What would a system for social change look like..? How would individuals be able to enable their own personal change? How would groups for an drive social justice..? 

This is my best guess from an infrastructure point of view - for the transforming infrastructure programme..

Transforming Infrastructure - York CVS thoughts and ideas.. on Prezi

Is it charity or philanthropy..?

Here's the words of EBay’s Founder:

• “When I use the word “charity,” I think of what’s needed to alleviate immediate suffering. It’s just pure generosity driven by compassion, and it’s important but never-ending work—there will always be more suffering. Charity is inherently not self-sustaining, but there are problems in the world, such as natural disasters, that require charity.


• Philanthropy is much more. It comes from the Latin for “love of humanity.” Philanthropy is a desire to improve the state of humanity and the world. It requires thinking about the root causes of issues so that we can prevent tomorrow’s suffering.”

What do you think? And how does it react to the changing third sector landscape..?

Clay Shirky on institutions vs. collaboration - what does this mean for infrastructure..?

This is everything I've been talking about for Transforming Infrastructure organisations and self organising - neatly encapsulated by Clay Shirky..

So what does this mean for infrastructure..? Do we protect what we have because that's how its done, or because it's our jobs, or because change is difficult, or we're giving up power..?
I think its possible to coordinate more activity with lower costs - the interesting question is the values we use to get there..

Peace or justice - localism and potential for change..?

It’s a simple question, but i’d suggest that peace & justice are mutually exclusive.

• Peace = status quo
• Justice = change 

It's normally those who who have won who are asking for a ceasefire. Those who still see inequality want justice, which means redressing an issue, which means change..? To if the issue is building more houses, or a youth club - does the power of protest and localism lead to conservatism in decision making..? In which case, Britain - broken or not, how is it going to change..?

The voluntary sector - from private to public ownership..

We have 637 charities registered in York. Imagine these as boats in a harbour, all privately owned, all doing their own thing.. Now imagine replacing all that with 4 large pontoons in the bay..?

The voluntary sector - from private to public ownership on Prezi

Now if you were a person looking to put your energy into increasing social justice, and not spending your time to keep the boat going; the money collected is used to maintain the boat, volunteer hours are used to maintain the status quo, when everyone really wants to focus on change..?

I want us to focus on the difficult things. I want to make things uncomfortable. i want to dive down deep.
I think changing the way we think about social justice (and not just changing the brilliant orgs that have struggled into existence - and that don't exist in many part of the world).
I think this is a good place to start..

Why i love twitter for infrastructure orgs - process change & behavioural change..

I've just bought the networked non profit but we've got a session at @YorkCVS next week about opening up communications and I've been doing the presentation.. (also credit to Clay Shirky organising without organisations which throws down the gauntlet to infrastructure orgs unwilling to change)

I think it can revolutionise the core function of a support and development organisation:

1. Development work - never type the same advice email again, and build a community of people on the same journey. 


2. Campaigning - topical recently, but also the changing power balance of small local orgs (eg mass localism by nesta) by retweeting their words.


3. Networking - new creative and disruptive working groups to get ideas beyond our own shores


4. Consultations - let's collect the info small groups are sending out rather than asking them to bow to our will.


5. Accountable representation - no mixed messages only direct communication, open and transparent and full of ways of groups representing themselves (or at least telling us when we're getting it wrong)..

So that's the logistics, but maybe the behavioural change is even more important..?

Is choice the opposite of collectivism..?

Reforms to the public sector focus on choice. And choice is based on individualism. So choice is the opposite of collectivism right..?

I'm not too sure.

As someone who was born not long before Thatcher came into power I have a core of individualism that i'm pretty unhappy to sweep away. I also think some of the best innovation, change, decisions, things and interesting people are out there on their own. They have not compromised. They have not changed their decision based on others. They are stubborn and obstinate.

I am still holding out for some sort of 'collective-individualism' that would marry these things. In the meantime we'll have to hold every decision about public sector reform on its own merit.. And have a watch of this..

The medicalisation of our sink estates..

Hull's unemployment rate is going to hit 15% soon. You also have 20% of the working population on incapacity benefit.
You have a large % of public sector jobs, and you have declining industries. you have depression and low education.

Getting over the dubious core cities argument (that we shouldn't prop up dying dying areas of the country any more than we should prop up dying industries), we have essentially paid these areas off to contain their problems and leave us alone.

We have offered Hull prosac and told it to keep its mouth shut. We now have cuts to benefits, services and jobs.
Wherever you put your line on personal responsibility and the nanny state - the cold turkey is going to be horrific..

We spent the last 10 years outsourcing our problems to professionals..

We spent the last 10 years outsourcing our problems to professionals in the third sector or public sector. I don't think the answer is more family intervention projects (good as they are) but mechanisms for a collective response. I also don't think we need to be too negative and there's certainly no need to demonise people. .. its time to take them back in-house and have a proper look at what society actually means.

We need an individual response to collectivism. We need to build new worlds. We need to build strong new connections in the areas where we live..
#thatisall

What can the RAC tell us about public service delivery..?

Many local authorities all over the country are in the process of changing the way they deliver public services. They only really have two options:

1. stop delivering services
2. deliver services differently

• Option 1 is libraries, youth work, neighbourhood services - stuff that isn;t statutory (its a surprising list of what is statutory, incl libraries)
• Option 2 is innovation

So what would happen if the RAC delivered free public services (like before they existed and horses broke down), and what would happen if that we taken away..?

• Would people pay a subscription for premium public services?
• What would happen if we give people choice over what they take out of the system? 
• Would we have fewer breakdowns..?

The value of relationships in co-producing & commissioning..

Local authorities are very good at seeing the value of processes. What they are less good at is seeing the value of relationships, yet the entire fabric of the social contract is based on transactional relationships.

1. When older people ask for meals on wheels - do they want food or companionship?
2. When people go to the doctor do they always want a pill, or do they want recognition? 
3. how do service users contribute to the service? do they only walk through the door when there is something wrong?
4. are there enough cracks to allow people to see ways in which they could help?

I think a resurgence of neighbourhood resilience is needed for all of this (separate post about voluntary orgs as the 4th emergency service) but it rests on a basic premise - are networks strong enough to realise this? 

Focusing on where the online and offline world meeting is quite a good metaphor for joining the old world with the new..

Nesta Creative Councils – Catching the Wave

Yesterday I read catching the wave a collation of the application to on innovative leadership through @nesta_uk’s #creativecouncil  bids..

The thing that worried me most is that 70% of local authorities who applied to the programme think they already have all the skills they need for social innovation. I wonder where they have all been hiding? Either they’ve been squashed by bureaucracy and just need freeing, or else they don’t realise they don’t have skills (Donald Rumsfeld’s unknown unknowns).

A few quick things I think are really important:

1.       People in positions of power no longer have the answers.

2.       Service design needs to be done by those who use services.

3.       Even if they did have the answers, implementing themselves on behalf of service users will lead to rejection (like organ transplant rejection)

4.       They need to be asking for help from outside of their normal circles.

5.       They need to be open to suggestions that they have already considered and dismissed.

Social leadership is by definition social. I hope we hear a few more doors opening because I’ve heard very little coming from the councils that Nesta selected.

What constitutes failure in local neighbourhoods..?

We have been talking a lot about failure in the last months. There has been a sense from government that everyone is failing to live up to expectation and that we should all be doing more. In part I agree some critical reflection is needed, and a refocusing on social purpose helps us stay sharp, but I’m getting a bit worn down now.

So lets have a simple checklist on failure:

1. It is impossible to live without failure unless you live cautiously.
2. Life is not a checklist of achievements
3. Life is complicated and the ability to control it won’t get us very far
4. Imagination is needed to see how something could be different

So let’s take joy in the fact that millions of good people are doing excellent things – exactly the sort of things that government think that people should think about (but don’t realise they’re already being done).

So let’s ask people in power to accept risk and failure (such as local government).. ok?

What can the third sector learn from hack events..?

We in the third sector could really benefit from get together's on specific topics to make sure we're still doing them in the best way.

• #leedshack today was one such example. 
• Another is Mike Chitty's Leeds Child Poverty innovation camp on the 19th October 2011.

So i'm going to get on with inviting people from outside the voluntary sector to the York voluntary sector strategic forum and have an overnight hack-athon on social issues. Existing orgs would buy pizza and provide a room & broadband for £50 - it would be like the fairness commission but a proper discussion.

• We could take it further and use it to genuinely design new services with the people who use them.
• We could invite people from local government not as representatives of anything, but as human beings wishing to service the public.

York CVS's work so far with the business community shows me there needs to be much better understanding, and it needs to be built on equal footings. No one has to say that what exists right now is the best that is could possibly be, and problems are going up and capability is going down.
Anyone who wants to be part of the solution should be welcomed..? No one can do this on their own..

Clore social leadership thoughts PT2

I’ve been thinking a lot about social leadership. And I’ve begin separating the two words:

1. Leadership – Harvard business school; tips, tactic, business acumen etc. (You can add Alan Sugar, commencement speech videos by steve jobs, jk rowling or oprah, and books about moving cheese..)
2. Social  - more difficult. Towards a notion of society (a post individual notion of society – no going back to 1950s nostalgia), but also social as in shared (collaborative consumption, shared ownership and production etc).

So why is social media good but social housing is bad? I think it’s about obligation. I hate the fact that Thatcher made waiting at the bus stop a small defeat (and why local gov has to spend millions on trams to get us to ride busses).

I hate the fact we’ve been taught to view ourselves in some sort of social hierarchy (on costs of trainers, or klout score).

I think we can do something about it. In fact it leaps up as the only thing to do. And so blindingly simple, but brilliant it has to work.

• I think it’s perfectly possible to recreate leisure time with a purpose. We spend on ave 3 hours a day watching telly which neither gratifies nor does anything.
• I think the third sector can give people this - 
• Of course we can get too utilitarian about these things (everyone needs to explore pointless things) but .

Some say we had to burn the ashes of Europe in a world war before we could unify. Some say we have to push towards the extremes before we can work back. I think a new model of social interaction based on social values – call it a social contract if you will – is the only way to move on from blame. The people who are part of the problem are also part of the solution..

J.K. Rowling Speaks at Harvard Commencement..

J.K. Rowling Speaks at Harvard Commencement from Harvard Magazine on Vimeo.

Its up to the mainstream to include the excluded..

I'm not going to write about the riots, but it’s pretty clear there's a lot to think about:

• we have reached a political consensus now on how to run a modern first world country, and nothing will deviate us from that. The new politics will be red or blue but it won’t make much difference.
• Hoodies don’t vote, but retired people have a loud voice.
• Membership is at an all-time low, of political parties, of churches, of anything. We dip in and out, no-one has a hold on us.
• It’s pointless blaming other people for binge drinking (no one like to be reminded the biggest binge drinkers are over 50s right?)
• Consumerism hasn’t got us very far – not happy, not proud, not satisfied.

(btw - I have realised recently how fragile my connections are with males. i think there is something in my bonding which is not quite right - i'll have to think about this one, but it comes from being a generation of men raised by women.)

So what to do?:

• If we want to live in a society where people feel included, then we must include them.
• We have been outsourcing our social problems to specialists, or housing estates, or doctors or charities, but in fact isolating them has only made it worse.
• We want people to care about things, we have to care about them ourselves.

Concrete steps?:

• we need to create new social interaction points outside our bubbles (why not have a regular match at the park, a volunteer to coordinate and let people get on with it – you only need to set these things up once.)
• we need to involve the mainstream who feel powerless in doing something. We’ve spent too long talking.
• we need to make it easier for people to ask for help by asking for help ourselves (self-sufficiency has gone too far) by making batches saying ‘could do with a hand’ or ‘tired legs’ or on the hedge saying ‘needs haircut’
• we need to develop a feedback mechanism so that positive behaviour is reinforce and people who do something don’t feel cheapened after it (volunteering has a danger of doing this initially)

Forget politics. It’s not that it isn’t important - but it’s irrelevant to this question.

neighbourhood blogs and digital voices in York

Neighbourhood blogs and digital voices in York - a few things going on..

1.      Media Trust recently got some lottery money to do neighbourhood blogs or campaigns: http://peoplepoweredchange.org.uk/2011/05/25/big-grant-opens-up-community-news-journalism-networks  and they’re doing an event At @yorkcvs in September: http://yorkcvs.org.uk/content/does-your-group-need-marketing-advice

2.      Here’s a good presentation on the Digital inclusion strategy for York: http://prezi.com/lngy608pkgjn/technology-and-change-an-update

3.      Local TV bid from York: http://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/business/news/9186757.York___s_hopes_of_having_own_TV_station_a_step_closer

co-producing social outcomes

This is a draft of some of the diagrams i am doing for the @cloresocial leadership interview next month. Let me see if i can get the papershow pen working properly..

Why would anyone want to read a 13 year olds blog..?

Marcus Romer (@MarcusRomer) 05/08/2011 22:38 After sorting my dad's funeral out, I come home and find that my 13 year old has started a blog. I then sit down read ...http://millieromer.posterous.com/

On twitter yesterday there was a very touchingly human in itself from MarcusRomer. Touching in itelf, but it got me thinking about working with voluntary orgs on communicating their mission. Many orgs, particularly small ones, simply see what they do as, well, what they do. Nothing special. mundane. boring even.

But these people from all walks of live are sat on information that is hugely valuable, to policy makers, to people who could help, to people who need to understand, to everyone. And its in the mundane that the gems happen. The case studies are all about large changes, but i prefer the small minute changes in thoughts in normal people as they realise what is happening all around us. Millie's blog had 700 views on the first night so must have touched some people. The things we take for granted changes everything. the minute we realise there is not enough money in the cash machines if we all withdraw it, or enough food in the British isles if we all go buy it, or enough police on the streets if we all decide to go looting..

So if you have a few minutes have a look at the list of York voluntary orgs on twitter, and maybe follow them to make them realise what they are doing is brilliant and important. And maybe they'll stop you every once in a while, and you'l realise that something mundane is actually quite special. That something you've overlooked hundred of times could actually be important. That something everyday could be something.... like the 13 year old's blog last night, did for me..

The Social Media Effect

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If the richest 10% are now international - why not everyone else..?

Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett authors of The Spirit Level are hopefully coming to do our AGM in Sept, and are heavily involved with the Fairness Commission in York. So inequality is high on the agenda so let’s take it one step further:

Here is a map of absolute poverty internationally:

Social justice can no longer a national issue. If we take Britain alone our:

1. the relative poverty line is static (as it moves with income inequality)  and
2. prison population is static (at 0.00147%)
3. every local authority has a unactioned plan to ‘reduce the gap’.

If we internationalise our plans we would be jointly tackling more difficult trade and migration issues on an international scale. No longer would Beeston, Brent or Burnley be our problem places. They wouldn’t be in the bottom 10%, they would now be in the top 10% internationally. I wonder what they would change and what leadership they would take on social justice internationally.

So if the richest 10% are international - why not everyone else..? A academic change of perceptions could see change from unlikely sources where our leaders have been failing..?

We need to provide less, and make more available..

What's the subtle difference between sending out information & people finding it for themselves..? 

Well - One smacks of obligation, and the other of…discovery, creativity, and innovation..?

What's people's recall rate of information provided in an email, versus providing a snippet and a link? By finding things people have already invested a bit of themselves in what they're reading, even if its only clicking a link. So what's important is not what has been produced, it's what has been found..

Yesterday from the YorkCVS Twitter account I tweeter our monthly update newsletter:

• ×          In two hours it had been retweeted to 1,600 people, and
• ×          89 people had downloaded it

This probably isn’t as important as the 200 people who have asked for print copies, nor the 600+ people who request the ebulletin. But it is important. It opens up an easy route for people into the brilliant voluntary sector, to realize that others are taking control of their lives and to have examples of other people doing things that other realise are possible.

We need the cracks in our organizations in order for others to come in. We need our public services to need our help before we can provide it. We need to provide less, and make more available.. 

The chinks in the armour is where the light gets in..

Crowdsourcing my Clore Social Leadership interview..

I found out yesterday that i got an interview for the @CloreSocial leadership programme with @nesta_uk on the 19th of september. I have decided to share my notes and thinking, drawing my ideas and posting the pictures, of working up concepts around:

• The use of Third Space in the contract between councils and citizens (in particular how the online and offline worlds meet)

At the same time the 17 Creative Councils have been announced and York has been selected through to the next stage. I think there's a lot to look at here with a cooperative council, a Fairness Commission, rapid change in York Council and potential or pitfalls at every corner. Twitter will be crowdsourcing the process..

Creative Council's bid - York

City of York Council

created Jul. 28, 2011

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Meeting Community and Economic Needs through Open Innovation

The problem

The idea

Local government faces severe challenges with reducing budgets and increasing expectations. Traditional approaches have focussed on improving efficiencies: this is no longer sustainable and is bringing forward diminishing returns. The way forward is to focus on effectiveness and transformation which has innovation as its core. Traditional ways of generating ideas within a Council are myopic. Innovation should not be a closed process and the principal role of the Council’s Leader or Chief Executive. But innovation will not happen organically: it needs to be made to happen and CYC wish to take advantage of ideas whatever their source. In business digital communications has facilitated a shift in boundaries, with an increase in the number of partners involved in the innovation process andwith a new focus on the cross fertilisation of ideas. Proctor and Gamble is on record suggesting that over 50 percent of its new innovations will come from external sources. Of the private sector models for introducing innovation the "Open Innovation" approach appears to offer the greatest potential built on the principle of “opening up” the innovation process to parties outside their organisation. The City of York Council wishes to seek transformational opportunities by opening up innovation to outside the council and outside the extended “Council family”. Using "Open Innovation" would be a first amongst the local government community.

Through a series of Open Innovation workshops we are seeking to innovate upto 5 major transformational projects/ products or processes which would also:

a) promote new methods of engagement with residents and businesses;

b) Result in the saving of resources and/ or time;

c) Be sustainable; and significantly;

d) Be the driver for the introduction of new “thinking outside the box” culture within a public bureaucracy.

What we need