RSA team sets out ideas for network development

The team developing the RSA networks programme has now produced a briefing for the workshop this Thursday, November 22.
You can find it on the OpenRSA wiki or download as a pdf. There's also an item on the RSA Networks blog, with a promise of more there too.
The paper asks Fellows broadly whether they want a deeper engagement with the RSA, and what they would like to change about interactions between themselves and the organisation.
Following earlier statements from chief executive Matthew Taylor there is a strong presumption in the paper that centrally-resourced interaction will be around networks that focus on the development of civic innovation projects.
Ten possible major project ideas are offered, ranging from reviving market town high streets to a debate on the proposed Severn Barrage, and a Speakers Corner in 20 cities across the UK.
Project development will require innovative thinking and action, and the paper explains that substantial use will be made of an online system a bit like that proposed for the Innovation Exchange. (Details of the RSA prototype have been outline here).
The prototype will be demonstrated on the 22nd. The aim is that it will be:

... a marketplace for new ideas, a space where Fellows can post new project ideas and a chance to tap into the collective wisdom and connections of a diverse and thoughtful group of people. In other words, the Fellowship will become more ‘searchable’, more visible and more accessible.
Through this, we hope that the Fellowship begins to understand itself as a complex, innovative network, powered through online tools as well as offline get- togethers, buzzing with ideas.
We also know that in order to strengthen the connections between busy Fellows, we can help by offering tools and techniques for those of you wishing to do work together as a network. Tools might include ‘routemaps’ or ‘guidebooks’, designed to share learning around popular Fellows’ causes, for example how to influence planning decisions in your local area. These could be published online, so that Fellows can work together to improve them.

The paper adds that central support could be available:

RSA staff as facilitators and brokers

Above and beyond the online resources outlined above, we could create a ‘field team’ of regional facilitators, sometimes Fellows themselves; sometimes staff, whose primary role is to support, challenge and develop emergent networks. This team would be ably supported by core staff at RSA headquarters, whose primary role would be to provide research support and a form of ‘concierge’ or brokerage service. That brokerage service would connect networks together if they had not already done so themselves, as well as building partnerships between networks and other key institutions and organisations.

The RSA as a Fellow-led ‘clearing house’ for ideas, and co-created projects

Much as it is now, but perhaps more explicitly, the content of the RSA’s research programme could be shaped to reflect the concerns and enthusiasms of the Fellowship, tapping into the energy and commitment amongst Fellows for action. Fellows could be involved as co-designers and project team members in areas identified by Fellows as priorities for RSA work. We could see Fellows forming ‘self-organised’ networks; networks which are connected to more substantial resources (such as funding, venues, or expertise); or even networks which formed the basis of a RSA research programme. Fellows could generate ideas for new projects at regular national and regional network symposia, working together with RSA staff to decide how to prioritise the allocation of resources and support.

The paper emphasises that the aim is to develop ideas and plans jointly between staff and Fellows. What are the implications, asks the paper?

First and foremost, we know that a networked model of change is about much more than ‘networking’ alone. Networks need both processes and content. Extensive research about such models – in technology, education and elsewhere – shows that really powerful networks have the following assets and qualities:

• A well-articulated and shared set of goals, and a plan for how to meet those goals.
• All members feel able and encouraged to participate – which in turn requires accessible, open channels of communication online and offline.
• All network members perceive themselves to have an active role in doing work - between meetings and dialogue – so that the network does not become a talking shop.
• A good balance of network leadership (sometimes shared by people) and facilitation that is designed to maintain momentum and provide challenge.

So, to make this model come alive, the Fellows involved in networks will themselves need to do a good deal of the work. However it is also true that if this is where the RSA networks project takes us, it will have implications for the staff roles at the RSA as well.

As noted above, you can read the paper here in full, and also download. There may be discussion on the RSA Networks blog, or do of course comment here.

Matthew fills out the vision

RSA chief executive Matthew Taylor has now filled out his vision of how RSA Networks might develop, and what sort of projects might result from discussions on November 22:

I am looking forward to the event on the 22nd, but not because I have a plan that I want to see unfold. It is because I suspect that it is only in being part of 200 plus Fellows and staff working hard at the tough issues for a whole day that we will really get a sense of the potential of RSA Networks.

There are three questions to which I hope I will be closer to having my own answer by the evening of the 22nd.

First, what really are the potential synergies between the RSA's research programmes and the Fellowship? Will developing a Fellowship engagement aspect to major projects help us develop powerful and distinctive projects? Will it simply be a feel-good exercise, or could it be a pointless distraction?

Second, what might be the characteristics of RSA Networks that make them stand out from other initiatives?

I don't think that we can be entirely new and different, but we need a consistent story about the value added the RSA brings. I suspect this will involve elements such as our multi-disciplinarity, our pragmatism (we are not tied like some NGOs to a single account of how best to impact on the world), our non-affiliation to a fixed political ideology and our commitment to a model of change that combines, on the one hand, research and action and, on the other, ideas about public policy, with a commitment to fostering individual and collective action.

Third - and hardest of all - is there really the commitment and the capacity at the RSA (HQ and Fellows) to develop effective experiments and models of civic innovation? This, I have said in previous blog posts, is about combining willing with insight and team working. Maybe it's the three C's; commitment, cleverness and collaboration.

He then gives examples of possible projects including Speakers Corners in cities, a debate on the proposed Severn Barrage, and "a high profile attitude-shifting debate about how young people can get on better together, driving violence out of their relationships?"

Mark's model for a civic innovation network

RSA Fellow Mark Gray has been critical of the lack of detail available about the RSA re-invention programme, as you can see from his comments on the RSA Networks blog. However, in a comment on one post there he has provided his ideas for a model of network and project development - and agreed they should be republished here.

Mark writes:

I said earlier that I'd shut up on this topic, but I can't help trying to be positive. Here are some thoughts scribbled down last on a train journey.

For some time now I’ve been calling in a variety of places for some more concrete sense of what this vision of an RSA as a ‘network for civic innovation’ actually means. I can’t, for all the pages of blogs, columns of the Journal or emails from the RSA discern what it is we are being offered as an alternative model for our Society. I keep hearing that Fellows will steer this through consultation – but consultation on what, precisely?

Instead of grumbling I thought I’d try to get the ball rolling by suggesting what I would like to see if – as I’m told is the case – there is a desperate desire among the Fellowship to turn itself into something different. What I’ll present below is my version of what such a network might be. It is not complete, not the final word – but it is a model on which one can reasonably expect others to have opinions and thereby (through discussion, challenge and improvement) shape a better model.

1. The ‘core’

For me, the RSA remains a great network of individuals – individuals connected with and interested in the historic themes of the Society. There are things we may not agree on (for example now that the executive of the Society has deemed that we are ‘working to remove the barriers to social progress’, many of us will have different views of what that little word ‘progress’ means. That broad church, unaligned, multidisciplinary network has real advantages and, at the core of my model, the scope for individual discussion, the generation of new ideas, sharing of best practice and the facilitation of debate remain as key elements. I want these to be supported by the RSA directly – but I recognise that this is the hardest element of my model to put in place. After all, while the RSA might use indirect means of ‘pairing’ off interested Fellows (using a more detailed version of the current Directory to match those with interests and invite them to meet each other at John Adam Street) it can hardly force them to engage in purposeful individual discussion, let alone take that one-on-one meeting to the point of promoting ‘civic innovation’, whatever that might mean. I think that this core of the RSA’s activities needs to be thought about with the Fellowship, but with some concrete options. Here are some of mine for the core:

(a) ‘One-on-one meetings’ as an obligation of Fellowship – to keep your Fellowship you have to make contact with at least one (more?) other Fellows and together propose an activity to an activity ‘pool’.
(b) A seminar (not lecture) programme that fits with the reality of the Fellowships structure – that more Fellows don’t get to John Adam Street than do. That means more non face-to-face meetings facilitated by other means. Webcasting of seminars which would be of shorter length; fewer discussants, and more time for Fellows to exchange thoughts online or by other means (even post, with the results posted on the website after).
(c) A means of disseminating best practice by means of an annual conference – with expert summaries of the evidence for what works in areas related to RSA projects. I am not suggesting here a series of ‘talking heads’ meetings so much as an annual practitioners meeting in which, for example, we review what actually seems to work (globally, based on best evidence) in the area of enabling a capable population. The more refined, focused and purposeful the topic the better.
(d) Open debates based on extensions to the RSA Fellows Forum, which is underused. Methods of improving usage include – better external links to it; more use of the Forum to hold documents from RSA projects and to carry comments on them from Fellows; more project work groups to be offered space on the Forum for open discussion of their projects; more use of the Forum (possibly, but not sure about this) for RSA-affiliated projects to conduct their work and discuss their activities.

I could add a lot more here (slide galleries for PP slides from seminars; data sets from projects; white papers from organisations working with the RSA….) but in essence the ‘core’ element of the model is there to facilitate exchange and discussion. It supports the traditional purpose of the RSA – that is, to network people involved in the development of the arts, commerce and manufacture and the relationship of these themes to the trajectory of society.

2. The ‘satellite’ activities

I envisage four ‘satellite’ activities of this core – the spokes of what will inevitably be seen as a ‘hub and spoke’ model. My spokes here are four in number. Each extends work in the core but does so in greater depth and with specific tools and audiences. They are,

(i) An exchange/’trading’ facility for organisations engaged in activities related to the themes of the RSA

The RSA would create an (electronic) ‘market place’ to enable organisations and individual Fellows to ‘gift’, share, swap or (in effect) sell services that would enable specific projects to get off the ground. There could be, in my view, no room here for commercial sales (although I could be persuaded otherwise) but the sort of exchange I am thinking of would certainly support Fellow A in Winchester who wanted access to data on the number of house-bound disabled pensioners in Hampshire in order to make a case for funding by publicising her need and getting Fellows who knew where such data was to provide it. Equally, though, Fellow A’s charity might be in need of some tax advice on a particular point, which it might be willing to ‘swap’ for some redundant office equipment; it might also offer the skills of its staff for hire at the margin. Clearly there is much to be thought about here, but the idea of a purposeful exchange facility is one that would, in the most concrete way imaginable, support projects, individuals and agencies interested in work in the theme areas of the RSA. The facility might, for example, allow charities or community groups to come together to co-purchase equipment or services and secure discounts thereby.

(ii) A ‘best practice bank’

Modelled on the Cochrane Collaboration and related programmes for the codification of best evidence and systematic review of the evidence of what works, the RSA could work – possibly with the Cabinet Office which has been developing work along these lines for the public sector – to create for 3rd sector organisations and public sector organisations as library of best practice evidence. This would NOT – I repeat not – consist of project reports from every RSA related project, but commissioned and researched (maybe even borrowed?) systematic reviews of the best evidence in themed areas. For example, what seems to work in raising school attendance? What seems to work in encouraging better design in small and medium sized businesses? The range of areas covered would need some definition, but that should be shaped by the Fellows and (very importantly) external collaborators. The venue for discussion of the evidence would be back in the ‘core’ area of the RSA.

(iii) A ‘matching service’ for new projects

The ‘exchange’ facility above would support projects and activities that are in play, but what about the support of new ventures? The need for some sort of match-making service, ferreting out the scope for partnership between individuals, agencies, public and third sector bodies and business to pursue practical projects would enhance the role of the RSA. Such a matching service could begin by asking for Fellows/organisations to commit to ‘clusters’ of activity, and to provide information about their particular skills, resources and capabilities. The ‘service’ would consist of the active and human (i.e. not computer-generated) winnowing of this information and the negotiation of, and support for, projects or project areas. The RSA could then help and assist from the same team by providing information on funding sources, legal and procedural requirements and advice – or call on that from the ‘exchange’ service.

(iv) Solution clinics

The RSA can assist the development, and the longevity, of Fellows’ projects by sponsoring what is in effect a set of face-to-face, online, virtual world or other (posted newsletter?) ‘solution clinics’. For example, my hypothetical Fellow in Bournemouth is now well on her way to providing services to the house-bound elderly disabled in Hampshire, but she has encountered a problem: how does she deal with getting parking restrictions relaxed for her vehicles? She could post/mail/ask such a question and the Fellowship could supply solutions. The solutions would have to be quality assured and checked – and that would be another role for the RSA executive team

Four ‘spokes’ and a ‘core’. The model aims to provide support for all stages of the development of innovative projects – whether they are to design better housing, provide services for disadvantaged teenagers, improve the aesthetic pleasure of urban streets, or network isolated cottagers in the rural highlands.

This is not a complete model, and certainly not the best. But it is a start.

Challenges to it, and better still suggestions on concrete ways to improve it and make it more certain are welcome.

What is the RSA re-invention plan?

It is difficult to find one statement of what is planned - however there are a number of articles and blog posts.

• Email from Matthew Taylor to RSA Fellows says "In essence, our aim is that the RSA becomes a network for civic innovation, empowering both Fellows and staff to develop new initiatives that promote and deliver progress in society. We want to make it easier for any Fellow who wants to get involved to connect with other like-minded Fellows and to develop initiatives that seek to remove barriers to progress, working locally, in professional groups or simply among people who share interests and enthusiasms."
• Q and A on Matthew's blog about the initiative
• Journal article by Sophia Parker says Civic innovation will only realise its full potential once citizens are involved in setting the agenda and the terms of engagement.
• NESTA provides £100,000 funding for the programme
• Sophia Parker on the RSA Networks blog: Effective engagement is a learning process
• From these items it seems that the vision is for Fellows to work together, and with RSA staff to develop projects for civic innovation. There will be some process by which choices will be made over projects to be supoported.

Update: the RSA Networks team have now produced a briefing for the workshop on November 22. Blog item here