Designing for Civil Society

Bridging the people-technology divide ... with a few bits of paper

Last night I witnessed an impressive example of the power of collective intelligence at work on how social media and other technologies can  change people's lives and benefit local communities.
The setting was not a high-tech lab or forum of Web 2.0 developers ... it was a community centre in Bristol, and the experts combining their wisdom were local residents.
We got together to help the city council develop its bid to win the Digital Challenge, a competition among ten finalists to show the UK Government how well they are improving online services and ensuring all citizens benefit from the Net.
As part of the bid - due in January - the finalists have to include storyboards showing how the wireless networks, access centres, e-learning, e-democracy, e-commerce ... e-whatever projects will be used by different people in their area.

The difficulty in doing this exercise  is combining two areas of expertise, and two groups ... those who understand the technology, and those who understand people and their everyday lives. There isn't always enough overlap.

Last night we started from the people side, and offered the local experts of Lawrence Hill, meeting at Community at Heart , some props to help them get to grips with the technical. We didn't say so at the beginning, but it was the first time that Drew Mackie and I had tried out the workshop game we've developed for the Digital Challenge project team. Here's how it worked.
Before the event, we assembled a set of over 30 cards which represented the range of projects that any Digital Challenger might consider in their bid. You can download the cards as a pdf here.
Kevin O'Malley and Steve Parry, who are working on Bristol's bid, pulled out ones that most matched their ideas. They included community access, wireless networks, mapping linked to social media, storytelling and a content aggregator.
Then after an introduction to the Digital Challenge and the purpose of the game, the locals split into two groups to work with Steve and Kevin.
We gave each group a set of cards split into the pre-determined "must haves", plus optional extras. We also provided a cast of fictional characters - download here.
The first task was to review the characters - who should benefit from the Challenge programme - and make sure there was a possible match between their needs and the ideas on the cards. Additional ideas could be added.
Then came the creative part. In smaller groups of three or four, our local experts developed storyboards showing how the character they had chosen - or invented - could use the technology. Just to liven things up - and add to the rising tide of giggles and laughter - Drew threw in a few personal crises or opportunities that might crop up for the characters ....serious illness ... offer of a college place ...
It worked really well. Not only did everyone manage to understand enough of the technical options to contribute, they were able to turn these into life-enhancing stories any of their neighbours could understand too.
The secret, of course, was conversation. People could fill in gaps of understanding for each other, and spark ideas.
We only had two hours for the whole exercise, so the stories were outlines. Given more time, perhaps on another day after time for reflection, I'm sure we could have filled them out substantially ... and the local Connecting Bristol team will continue the discussion. I asked two people how they thought the event had gone.
Local artist  Jenny Sheehan (left) said she felt that the exercise helped to make a connection between technologies and people, and trigger thinking about how it could really help transform people's lives. A collaborative, community approach meant there was scope to bring costs down, to create a resource bank, and encourage skill sharing.
Kevin O'Malley (right) is one of those responsible for developing the Bristol bid, and he said that so far a lot of the bid development had, inevitably, been technical. The evening's exercise provided a way of bring this work into the realm of real people, with real issues, in a real community. Drew and I felt some satisfaction that a low-tech set of props (bits of paper) had help bridge the people-technology divide.
We'll revise the game in the light of helpful suggestions from the players - who said they didn't mind being first testers - and post it to our Usefulgames site with results from Bristol and revised instructions. I'll provide an update here too. In January we are running a session in Manchester.
Update 1. Drew has now transcribed the stories, and you can download the sheets as a pdf here.
Update 2. More discussion about the game over on the Connecting Bristol site and Straight Outta Easton

On neighbourliness, real and virtual

There's quite a few things I've got scattered around to blog about, and I'm not going to get them done properly before going away for a week shortly ... so at least I'll put down some markers and plan to return later. Maybe a strand will emerge. Here goes.
My friend Kevin Harris now has Respect in the Neighbourhood published  - trailed here and here on his blog. He and the other contributors spell out why neighbourliness matters:

What happens if people stop recognising and talking to their neighbours? Why do nods across the street and comments about the weather matter? Ideas and evidence in this book suggest that if people stop being civil to one another where they live, a perceived crisis of respect in wider society will probably follow.

Kevin is one of too few people I know who manages to combine grass-roots insights, from his community development work and everyday life, with rigourous research and conviviality. You can trust the guy knows what he is talking about.
On a rather different front I'm trying to keep up with the growing flood of stuff about how nonprofits can use social media, because I'm putting together a guide for the NCVO Foresight team.  Fortunately the second (or something) law of internet research and sharing is kicking in ... which means that if you leave something for a bit someone else will do it for you. So Michelle Martin of the Bamboo Project Blog has started a Web2.0 and Nonprofits Best Practices Wiki which Beth Kanter has promised to contribute to. I've got the beginnings of wiki started too, and Beth and I are doing a workshop in January, so it should all join up.
Dave Pollard, who I interviewed when he was in the UK recently, has now posted a summary of the presentation he gave when in London, showing which social networking tools work best for what.
Nancy White is such a rich resource I know if I miss something on social media and online communities I can always go and find it with accompanying wisdom on her blog. She's looking at roles and is going to start tagging technology stewardship which, as I've mentioned before sort-of ties in with my ideas on being a social reporter.  I noted recently that Nancy is starting some work with Shawn at Anecdote (another favourite place) on three types of collaboration - team, community and network. I'm particularly interested in the idea of network collaboration which, as Nancy says:

... steps beyond the relationship centric nature of team and community collaboration. And this is where it gets interesting. Network collaboration starts in individual action and self interest and accrues to the network. Membership and timelines are open and unbounded. There are no explicit roles. Members most likely do not know all the other members. Power is distributed. This form of collaboration has been busted wide open with the advent of new online tools, a response to the overwhelming volume of information we are creating and number of people we can connect with. The tools both expose us to possibility, remind us of the overwhelming volume and offer us ways to share the task of coping with that volume.

Definitely messy, but potentially really rewarding if fresh insights and creativity come from crossing over boundaries and doing stuff with new people. My friends and I at Policy Unplugged are planning a series of events and online activities next year to do just that, so I'm delighted Nancy and Shawn are working on it. By the time we need it, they'll have worked it out.
I hope network collaboration will also be one of the practices that Bev Trayner and I will be developing on projects following on from some initial transnational work here. Bev is starting a new company called Eudaimonia for reasons that she explains here:

Although some people have translated Eudaimonia as happiness, it means much more than that. It's about flourishing and a complete life, manifesting in characteristics like courage, honesty, pride, friendliness and wittiness. It also includes friendships and intellectual knowledge. It connects human nature with reason, emotion, perception, and action in an ensouled body.

... which promises well for any network collaboration.

Meanwhile Nick Booth alerts me to something completely different on his Podnosh blog ... a competition to win a Sony PS3 and support young homeless people. Nick says it isn't his usual interest, but came from an acquaintance he wants to help, and it will in mysterious way drive traffic to our blogs by getting more attention for the competition link. Nick is another social reporter type, so I'm glad to help out even if I'm not too sure how it works.

I've also been meaning to check what happened to another fundraising project Nick mentioned, where Micki in New Zealand set up a blog called Volunteer Evolution.

She is using it to ask people to help her raise $20,000 dollars to allow her to stop paid work and instead volunteer for a year in her local community (wherever she happens to be).

Nick contributed a month ago, wondering if he was being a virtual mug. Hmmm. Micki says only £80 raised, but 40 volunteers hours logged, so I leave a donation and encouraging message because ... well, I couldn't do what Micki is trying and the blog is getting interesting.
On the other hand the previously-mentioned Beth Kanter, prolific blogger and parent to two Cambodian orphans, has more than succeeded in a fund-raising campaign to provide a college education for Leng Sopharath through the Sharing Foundation. I guess the lesson is that networks work. Congratulations Beth ... and let me have your Getting Things Done tips sometime.
I should also report that I had the promised lunchtime conversation with staff at the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, about how social media could help them tap the collective intelligence of their 26,000 Fellows. A great whirl of conversation about, well, promoting conversations in many different ways. Good things are going to happen, particularly around the Carbon Limited campaign that challenges us to reduce our carbon footprint not least by reducing use of home energy, cars and flying.
Phew. Writing up those different strands makes me feel better. Why? A few references made to friends I felt were due ... a few lines thrown out that may bring back comments ... a few things ticked-off the to-do list. There's so many reasons to blog - which reminded me of an item at Bamboo on Why Blog that led to the graphic here (click to enlarge)and a fuller report at CK's Blog. Those that responded to her survey were mainly marketers - but the central theme is finding a Voice which I can relate to. Who was it said that I don't really know what I think until I write about it? Me certainly. Or maybe, as Kevin might say, it's just about being neighbourly in the online world.
Update: I couldn't let this go ... the latest Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants has a round-up of Web 2.0 How-Tos and Examples. The Carnivals are a great way of pulling together good blog posts on a subject. There's a request for posts, you pitch yours in, the host filters the best. Unlike physical bring and buy, for example, no money changes hands, you keep what you give. You could just wait for the next one to come around to solve your research needs ... but on the other hand a good post might get you in the window. Another example of how the online neighbourhood works.

Intellipedia tests the shadow side of wikis

Last year I got an email from someone working in a US intelligence agency, saying that their centralised knowledge systems were hopeless for sharing intelligence about global terrorist threats, and that what was needed were internal blogs and wikis.
I wondered if it was for real, but my correspondent Matthew Burton turned out to be serious enough to get his ideas published in the CIA's journal. Now Matthew alerts me to a lengthy article on Open Source Spying in the New York Times citing his work and that of others promoting decentralised intelligence gathering. Apparently there's now an Intellipedia, a wiki that any intelligence employee with classified clearance can read and contribute to, and serious talk about blogs.
The article is fascinating in exploring the challenges of sharing sensitive data, and who in management is likely to be resistant or supportive. It has particular resonance with Lloyd Davis's observation that social media may work best in the shadow side of organisations. How much more shadowy can you get?
Understandably some people are now getting worried about their personal information floating around spy blogs or wikis. David Weinberger, fellow at the Harvard Berkman Center for the Internet and Society, is quoted as saying:

I don’t want the N.S.A. passing on information about innocent Americans to local cops in San Diego. Those laws exist for good reasons.

I think this is a good one to toss into the Gurteen Forum where knowledge management experts are currently discussing the uses of blogs, wikis and other Web 2.0 tools inside organisations, proactively facilitated by Ed Mitchell. As an aside, it is reminding me how well the old email list can work with this kind of care and attention.
Ed wrote recently on the issue of gaining acceptance of new tools:

Also along this line - one way of convincing management that it is worth adopting blogs/wikis is to find some clear case studies - successful and not - new technlogy isn't always worth adopting if it isn't right for the problem... so it's a case of identifying what types of problem a blog or a wiki or an RSS agregator would help solve perhaps?

Clearly worth taking a look a look across the pond.
Update: In a comment below Paul Diperna points to an article where he relates Intellipedia to the development of Wikipedia.

Social media supports the shadow side

Faced with questions about why blogs and other social media can make a difference to the way organisations work I haven't got much beyond they challenge hierarchies internally if people share information informally, and they punch a hole in the membrane between the organisation and members or customers. They also encourage conversations and storytelling ... help people find a voice and new roles.
These issues were discussed a lot at the recent Gurteen Knowledge cafe and continue to be raised on the Gurteen forum.
What I have lacked is some ways of tying these ideas together - now neatly provided by Lloyd Davis in It's Social Stupid. It's all about the shadow. He reports he had a moment of clarity last week while holding an open space at Online - and I think it's worth quoting at length: 

I hesitate to call it an "ah-ha" moment.  It's more of a "well....duuuhhh!" moment. Hold Tight!
All organisations have formal systems and informal systems.  You know the formal bits because formal usually means explicit - the org structure diagram, job descriptions, line (or matrix) management structures, written policies, mission statements, value statements and vision statements and the group and individual objectives (supposedly) derived from them and the behaviours that go with them - making a request, filling in a form, going to see the right person in facilities management, appraising staff performance, project and programme reporting.  They also have formal links with customers, suppliers and other organisations - official channels.  This is the bureaucracy.
The informal or shadow systems are the links between people that may have nothing to do with their official roles or structures.  This shadow organisation arises because the formal systems cannot be efficient or effective outside of certain limits.  Ralph Stacey in Strategic Management & Organisational Dynamics (dreadful title - great summary and important critique of the development of modern strategic management) points out that there are two main reasons for bureaucratic control failing to produce what it's supposed to: the adverse human reaction to bureaucracy (Yup! as I typed that previous paragraph I shuddered at ever having to be part of one again) leading to alienation, passive dependence, work without significance, deskilling and provocation of undesired or unintended behaviour.  In addition, formal systems can't deal well with ambiguity or uncertainty.  So these informal groups, unofficial ways of behaving, doing business through social activities and networking grow up to allow the organisation to operate more effectively and efficiently.  Remember too that unlike the formal part of the organisation, the boundaries of the shadow systems are permeable and always changing, making new contacts in "the industry" or "the sector" as and when opportunities arise.
Furthermore, it has been pointed out that the shadow organisation is the place where innovation and creativity are allowed to flourish.  You can't make new stuff effectively within a formal process.  Creativity requires messiness, mistakes and flexibility around time.  Innovations happen in the informal world - and, from time to time, when they are useful to the formal world, they become systematised and turned into policy or else they remain "the way we do things around here".  Note also that the organisation as a whole is the same bunch of people - just that they move over time between formal and informal modes and activities, however, my experience has been that there are people who feel more at home in the informal systems (cool dudes like me - heh!) and others who spend most of their time formally (tight-arsed pen-pushers - natch!)
Now, what came to me on Monday with a thud was that it's these informal groups and activities that are supported by "social software"  Blogs give people the opportunity to say what they want and talk about it, outside of any established order - just talk about what's on your mind.  Wikis allow for a meritocracy in collaborative documentation and policy/decision making.  Social networking tools allow you to find and foster new connections outside of the org chart.

Lloyd then explains the resistance to introducing new tools. It isn't just technophobia.

So when we take social software or social media and try to sell it (through formal channels) as a part of the bureacracy - to replace something formal, it's not surprising that we get asked about ROI and metrics and to prove "what's in it for me".  And when we just take a risk and start something as an experiment that then just works, these questions get asked less and less.

I think the shadow organisation using social media (face-to-face or online) is a great metaphor. Can't wait to hear Lloyd's sales pitch to the chief exec about supporting the darker side...

Bristol shows how to collaborate to compete

What strikes me about Connecting Bristol is not so much the content - probably of limited interest to those outside the City - but the fact that it is there at all. The blog is being run in conjunction with Bristol's bid to win the UK Government's Digital Challenge, under which 10 finalists, led by local councils, are competing for several million pounds worth of Government funding, matched by private investors.
In one sense it is a pretty obvious idea to have a blog ... the aim of the challenge is to improve public services, promote inclusion of those not so far benefiting from social media and other technologies, and share experience.
However, as far as I can see none of the other competitors - except Manchester - has anything interactive. One has a a page with a form saying fill this in if you are interested .... Maybe they don't want to give away their best ideas.
Bristol, on the other hand, is not only reporting what it is doing towards its bid, but is also opening the blog up to non-council people who want to contribute. It's part of the bottom-up approach explained in a recent interview with Bristol e-democracy project manager Carol Hayward and in line with other projects.
I met up with Clare Reddington and some of the other bloggers yesterday when they ran a skills exchange to introduce new contributors, share ideas on how to work together well, learn from other bloggers ... and of course, socialise. Stephen Hilton, Kevin O'Malley and Steve Parry were there from the Digital Challenge team chipping in with everyone else. They do have the advantage of an excellent venue in the Watershed Media Centre which has free wifi, great bars, cafes, cinemas and so on ... plus committed staff to help drive the blogging forward. Sometimes out-of-London seems particularly attractive.
I know there are lots of other collaborations between councils and other local interests - as I reported from Newham the other day. But it is particularly interesting to see in the context of a national competition, and blogged.
The ten finalists have said they are all collaborating so there is no one "winner" - but actions speak louder etc.
I'll be back in Bristol next week with Drew Mackie helping run a Digital Challenge game, funded by the central challenge team to help further involve local interests. Invitation here.
Then in the New Year we'll be running a workshop In Manchester with Dave Carter of the Manchester Digital Development Agency, and Gary Copitch of the Manchester Community Information Network who both have enviable track records in community tech.
Hmm - checking into their blog I find they are being pretty open about developments too. I've no doubt I'll find wonderful things happening in Manchester when I visit. That's the great thing about this social technology - you meet such interest people.

The secret of entrepreneurial success: look (and listen) around

As I wrote earlier, discussion at the Edge Foundation awards highlighted the potential for storytelling to change young people's attitudes to working in the construction industry.
For those with an entrepreneurial streak there was a great story from  Alexander Amosu, who explained how three (musical) notes became the basis for a multi-million pound business and the world's first free mobile download website.
Alex tells how his first mobile phone had the ability to create a sequence of three notes. He played around with that, his younger brother was fascinated, and took the phone to school. That evening Alex made £21 by selling his brother's friends ringtones at £1 each.... and went on to set up the first UK ringtone site. He is now developing Mobsvideo, billed as the world's first free mobile download website. He says it is just like YouTube except you can upload and download video to and from your phone.
I asked what general lessons his story offered. Partly it is be in the right place at the right time, and spot the gap in the market. Partly is is believing that there is business to be done if you just look around. Or listen carefully.
Update: as soon as I wrote this, and emailed the links to Alex and Scott, I wondered whether Scott's storytelling apprentices might use phones to show what they do at work. Would their friends think that cool?

Apprentice joiners turn story-tellers to tackle skills shortages

The power of  story telling is a theme that comes up a lot in engagement, marketing, knowledge management ... but I didn't expect it to emerge as a way of tackling skills shortages in the construction industry. My mistake.
The occasion was a roundtable discussion organised by the Edge Foundation before their annual awards ceremony. The foundation is dedicated to raising the status of vocational learning, which means helping young people develop practical skills through apprenticeships or other means. Government and the education industry is more inclined towards university degrees.
The roundtable I was facilitating was discussing how to deal with the predicted problem that 348,000 more employees will be needed in the construction industry by 2010. Will the 87,000 new recruits each year be home grown, or come from Poland, Romania, and Bulgaria for example?
Participants from the Foundation, and firms that had already won regional awards, could tell plenty of stories that brought reality to the figures. Young people didn't see engineering and construction as sexy, cool places to work and learn on the job. Graduates coming into the industries often lacked practical skills.
Any new mechanisms Government and colleges put in place to address this wouldn't work if young people and their parents weren't convinced. So who could solve that problem? At that stage I tried a little pro-active facilitation, and suggested that maybe those young people already in the industry might have something to contribute. They will be the experts on what appeals and what doesn't to other young people.
At this point Scott Sharkey really lit up. Scott had earlier explained that he had come up via "the gladiatorial route" from joiner to CEO of the Edinburgh-based  firm bearing his name. When Margaret Thatcher urged everyone to go self-employed, and companies shed their apprenticeship schemes, Scott went the other way and set up the Sharkey Academy, where more than 40 young people learn the trade and gain qualifications.
As you can hear in the interview, Scott's plans for expansion have been cramped by recruitmernt problems - and he thinks the industry is facing a disaster unless something can be done. After our discussion he's going to ask his apprentices what they think.

Never mind us clever dicks trying to think of it - the reality is that the young guys and gals have got the soluition. I'm  going to go back, get all the solutions from them and implement it. They can tell the stories to the wider audience, and young people, and tell them it is a sexy industry, a place to be ... and they can replicate what I have done from young apprentice joiner to company CEO.

At which point I could suggest workshops to think it through, blogs to tell the stories ... but somehow I think that Scott and his colleagues will work out some new directions pretty quickly. If they need a wider audience, the Edge is shortly launching a social networking site called The Horses Mouth. It will offer peer mentoring, features, articles, reports and reference materials. Good stories too, I hope.