Most distinctive about the OEP is its focus on organizational teams able to champion organizational changes and innovations, its unique approach of Appreciative Inquiry, and the ongoing learning relationships between participants and GEM as fostered through the multiple phases of preparation work, a residential institute, and follow-up consultation. Moreover, for many participating organizations, the OEP has served as a gateway to a longer-term partnership with GEM for the co-creation and conduct of other GEM programs.
Taking part in this second OEP was the most geographically diverse and largest group (97) of participants to date: four (NGOs) from Egypt including the Association for the Protection of the Environment, Assuit Disabled Child Care & Development Association, Caritas-Egypt, and the Coptic Evangelical organization for Social Services (CEOSS); an NGO from Peru, Alternativa Centro de Investigacion Social y Educacion Popular; a pan-African federation of NGOs, the Forum of African Voluntary Development organizations (FAVDO); and four PVOs based in the U.S. and working abroad, including Americans for Better Communities; Operation Blessing International Relief and Development Corporation; The Adoption Exchange; and TechnoServe, Inc.
On January 7-13, 1996, these participants gathered at Mohonk Mountain House in New Paltz, New York for the residential PVO and NGO Organizational Excellence Institute. The global diversity of participants was readily mirrored by an Institute staff of organizational development trainers from Egypt, seasoned international development professionals, SIGMA faculty and doctoral students, and guest speakers expert on special areas such as fund raising. Before attending the Institute, the participating teams had conducted appreciative interviews with their staff and stakeholders to learn about the most constructive trends from their organizational histories, the important challenges and opportunities of the present, and the promising possibilities for the future. The central work of the Institute, then, involved the team sharing and analysis of this data and work towards a vision statement that, based on the input of these larger circles of stakeholders, could position the PVO or NGO for a more valued and vital future.
Over the course of the week, this work was accomplished in small groups, interagency pairings, and open plenary sessions. The content areas included:
* Community Building: A celebration of the rich diversity of participants, introduction to the work of the Institute, and first steps toward building a learning community;
* Global Image For The 21st Century: An opportunity for the community to reflect upon global trends of the past several decades and build a global vision of our world and our organizations in the 21st century;
* Continuity & Change: A session on the important task of valuing core traditions, values, beliefs, and best practices amid change, where teams reviewed their data and shared stories of their organization's history;
* Shifting Paradigms: An introduction to our unique ways of looking at the world and the potential breakthroughs that can occur through reframing our individual and collective experiences;
* Creative Construction of the Future: An exploration of the logic underlying Appreciative Inquiry and the premise that human beings create the future they imagine; teams develop propositions for the future of their organizations and their visions of ultimate impact;
* Building Partnerships & Alliances: An inter-agency exercise exploring the creative possibilities opened up by partnerships and alliances among PVOs and NGOs;
* Appreciative Fundraising: An overview of the opportunity to view fundraising as a "philanthropic quest" to elicit the meaningful involvement and commitment of donors to the organization's values and mission;
* Social Architecture: An opportunity for teams to design their organizational arrangements to better live out their core values and shared aspirations;
* Leadership For Change. A sharing of stories from participants of types of "relational leadership" that foster shared vision, trust, and meaning for positive change; and,
* Transition Planning: A comprehensive planning session for translating the visions enacted during the Institute into innovations and concrete changes for the larger organization.
Present throughout these OEP sessions were four questions of organizational learning and analysis and core tasks of Appreciative Inquiry 1) to discover "what gives life" to the organization by appreciating the best of "what is"; 2) to dream about "what might be" by asking what the world is calling for and envisioning impact; 3) to design "what should be" the ideal organization; and, 4) to deliver and sustain the life-giving organization through ways to empower, learn and improvise over time.
Within and across all ten PVOs and NGOs the inquiry process accelerated organizational learning, transformed strategic planning processes, fostered new organizational designs, and led to a dramatic revisioning of their capacity for impact, contribution, and service, as illustrated below:
* FAVDO committed to strengthening its role as a pan-African forum for the empowerment and full voice of community-based NGOs that are linked locally, regionally and globally. During the Institute the team saw that the survival of African grassroots NGOs largely depends upon the "image of Africa," that is, the African peoples' and the world's view of the capacities and potentialities of Africans. They proposed a series of bold new initiatives to inquire into and craft positive images of Africa with those actors who most influence the development process across the continent, including NGOs, government, local and international donors and media.
* Representatives of eight urban and community development organizations from around the U.S. met together for the first time at Mohonk to explore the possibilities of forming a collaborative alliance. The week-long inquiry into common values and aspirations, stories of accomplishment, and ideal models of partnership gave birth to Americans for Better Communities, an alliance and "cooperative space" for the interchange of ideas and resources to collectively support the development of human capital in urban communities both in the U.S. and abroad. This will be accomplished through innovations such as a community development capital investment fund, "community learning institutes," a "Wisdom Bank" of success stories and best practices, and an electronic network.
* The Association for the Protection of the Environment (APE), an NGO working in the Mokattam hills outside of Cairo devoted to recycling and health education activities, took stock of their accomplishments around garbage separation and environmental and health education in the Cairo area and planned a dramatic expansion into other Egyptian cities for a new level of second-generation impacts. Seeking to make garbage separation and recycling a reality throughout all of Egypt, APE planned out how it will grow into a new role as a training organization to transfer skills, education and experience to other communities, and to further their partnerships with governments, NGOs, PVOs, universities, businesses and international agencies to enact policies and programs that support sustainable environmental development in Egypt.
* Facing a period of executive succession as its founder and CEO was retiring, the top management team of TechnoServe, Inc. experienced the week at Mohonk as a time of appreciating their history and reaffirming their vital mission, making the transition to new leadership, and co-creating an organizational vision that will take this PVO into the next century and to a new level of global impact by transforming the lives of the poor across five regions and 20 countries through the power of the marketplace.
Through a shared commitment to post-Institute continual learning and evaluation activities, further understanding and knowledge about organizational innovations well be built as such changes unfold and are sustained over time.
In looking to future programs, plans are currently underway for the first OEP to take place overseas. In November, 1996, GEM will co-sponsor with the Wilgespruit Fellowhip Centre an OEP for South African NGOs. Wilgespruit is a South African NGO and a GEM alumnus that is re-defining its role in post-Apartheid South Africa to assist other South African NGOs to build a strong, participatory civil society.
GEM conducted its first PVO and NGO Partnership Program in collaboration with Save the Children, November 7-11, 1995 in Harare, Zimbabwe with the purpose of providing a forum for PVOs and NGOs to share experiences and techniques of partnering and institutional development through experience-based dialogue. Specific learning objectives of the workshop included:
* Common definitions of "partnership" and "institutional development";
* Tools for building partnership;
* Case illustrations from participants;
* An Appreciative Inquiry into the dynamics of partnership; and,
* A post-workshop follow-up plan.
Among the 46 participants from the U.S. and 13 African countries were Save the Children field staff, representatives from their NGO partners, and other GEM alumni organizations and their NGO partners. The approach and content of the week was enriched by a diversity of skills and experience represented by the partnership between Save the Children and GEM.
Prior to the workshop, participants conducted an inquiry into their experiences as partners to date. This data was then drawn upon at the workshop to illustrate specific concepts and techniques. The theme of partnerships and institutional development was explored over the course of the workshop through a flexible design that evolved as follows:
As a way of seeking out common understandings and connections, the participants spent the first day inquiring into a variety of topics associated with partnership and institutional development, including: the various images and definitions of "partnership" and "institutional development"; individual peak experiences of partnership, and reasons for building partnerships; regional/country experiences with partnerships; the various types of partners and partnerships; and models of collaboration.
On the second day the community learned about the logic behind Appreciative Inquiry and inquired into their existing partnerships to discover the best practices and organizational factors that promote partnership. They then envisioned the kinds of larger impacts in their regions and sectors that they most want to see, and the kinds of partnerships they would need to create to realize these impacts.
The third day was devoted to designing the "social architecture" for the kinds of organizations and partnerships that would enable participants to make such impacts. Participants created ideal models of their desired partnerships and of how their organizations would have to change to become better partners.
The principal area of inquiry on the fourth day of the workshop was how to translate such ideal forms of partnership into reality through practical techniques. In the morning participants generated criteria for partner selection from the perspectives of the international NGO and local partners, and discussed the various structures and strategies for sustaining them (e.g., financing mechanisms, management of partnership inequalities, merger integration). By using an "Open Space Technology," where topics of discussion were generated in the plenary, the afternoon dialogue was then designed around the participants' remaining questions.
The final day of the workshop was devoted to summarizing and exploring the implications of the work of the entire week as the community dealt with pressing questions, such as: Why organizational partnerships? Why not just go it alone? What aspects of cultural heritage support/empower partnership? What are the key challenges or constraints to partnering? How can real two-way mutual learning between partners be promoted? and, What are the powerful activities in the first six months for building a vital and healthy partnership?
GEM is currently exploring possibilities for additional PVO and NGO Partnership Programs over the next year in Kenya, Nepal and/or Latin America. These workshops will potentially bring together representative teams of PVOs, NGOs and governments that are currently engaged in the process of partnering, and using an appreciative approach, develop strategies to increase partnership effectiveness and chart a course that builds on the strengths and shared goals of partners.
The GEM Alliance Workshop, the result of an alliance between the Society for Participatory Research In Asia (PRIA), the Institute for Development Research (IDR), MWENGO in Zimbabwe and the GEM Initiative at Case Western Reserve University was held in New Delhi at PRIA's offices and training facility between November 25 and December 1, 1995. Among other things, the event derived its importance from its transcontinental character: the workshop brought together 25 participants drawn from 10 participating organizations (both support organizations and voluntary development organizations) located in 10 different countries across Asia and Africa.
The workshop marked the inauguration of a three phase process, the first phase being this GEM Alliance workshop in New Delhi, the second phase, a series of Participatory Action Research (PAR) Projects to be undertaken by the support organizations in their national/regional contexts, and the third phase, a follow-up workshop planned for the fall of 1996 when the organizations will reconvene in Harare to pool their collective learnings from PAR Projects. The overall objectives of the GEM Alliance Program include:
* To expand the potential impact and the capacities of the support organizations;
* To stimulate joint learning, both intra-regionally and inter-regionally;
* To foster potential long term associations between the organizations;
* To produce research and learning outputs that can be published and documented for the benefit of others in the development community;
* To pioneer a global support organization initiative;
and,
* To explore the potential of cross-sectoral and interorganizational alliances.
The first phase, the GEM Alliance Workshop, was a seven day program during which participants experienced a combination of theoretical inputs and hands-on exposure to methodologies such as Appreciative Inquiry, Future Search Conferences and Strategic Thinking Workshops, opportunities for cross fertilization of ideas through interactive group discussions, and intensive planning for the implementation of PAR projects in the back-home situation. A brief overview of each of the sessions follows.
* Introductions: The purpose of this session was to begin the week's work together in a way that celebrated the diversity of the group and began to build a learning community. It included introductions, words of welcome, an overview of the week together and an opportunity for each organization to introduce itself to the rest of the community. The specific objectives of the GEM Alliance Workshop (the first phase) were: 1) to build a common understanding of key concepts; 2) to develop an appreciation of and build skills in key methodologies; and, 3) to create and plan for the PAR projects.
* Civil Society Framework. This session presented a civil society framework and gave participants an opportunity to explore the relationships among the state, the market and the civil society in the context of their own countries. The focus was on the dynamics of NGOs and support organizations operating in civil society.
* Identity and Strategic Thinking: This session encouraged participants to grapple with the challenge of defining organizational identity in a field characterized by multiple perspectives of their proper role and a variety of organizational nomenclature, including voluntary development organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), private voluntary organizations (PVOs) community service organizations (CSOs), and support organizations (SOs). Clarifying identity is crucial for enacting well-conceived development strategies driven by a strong sense of organizational mission, mobilized by a powerful vision and grounded in relationships with key constituencies.
* Interorganizational Relations: Around the world, organizations from all sectors are discovering the inescapable lesson that new forms of organization are required to enable different constituencies to collaborate in addressing problems none of them can solve alone. This session introduced various models of partnership, the practices that seem to work best and the different types of partnership including networks, coalitions and alliances both intersectoral and intrasectoral. The focus was on forging, developing and sustaining partnerships and on balancing the competing demands of interdependence and autonomy.
* Appreciative Inquiry: During this session, participants experienced the Appreciative Inquiry approach and developed ideas of how to use the methodology for fostering innovative organizational and interorganizational intervention in their own communities.
* Future Search Conferences: This session explored the theory and uses of search conferences and offered participants a simulated experience of one. A future search conference attempts to discover global trends and diverse stakeholder perspectives to inform the creation of a preferred future, one that is rooted in the participant's values, visions and knowledge of what is technically and socially feasible.
* Bridging Capacities: This session presented capacities needed by support organizations to serve important bridging functions among institutions of civil society. It focused on skills in coalition building, negotiating and conflict management for the facilitation of collaborative social change work.
* Participatory Action Research Methods: During this session, the PAR tradition was explained with reference to its historical roots, the underlying theory of change and the contrasting orientations implied by the three terms, "participatory", "action" and "research". The presentation also covered the nature of PAR, the criteria for developing PAR's and opportunities for planning national and regional PAR projects.
* Participatory Action Research Planning: Participants were invited in this session to conceptualize and later share their plans for the PAR projects to be carried out in their own countries. The sessions covered various phases: country planning, the convening of action research project groups, sharing of action research plans and review and future planning. PAR project possibilities include:
* Using strategic thinking to help NGOs in Uganda clarify their identity;
* Working with Indian NGOs using Future Search to vision future directions;
* Using Appreciative Inquiry to plan NGO government and business relations in Sri Lanka;
* Examining best practices among NGOs and government efforts in collaboration using Appreciative Inquiry in Bangladesh.
The World Mountain Forum
A second GEM sector alliance involvement has taken place through consultation to the The Mountain Forum. In the last week of September 1995, GEM staff designed and facilitated a four-day meeting for the organizing of a global sector alliance of mountain organizations (see story and interview, pages 18-27 ). Recognizing the urgent need to continue the dialogue on mountain issues initiated in Lima, Peru, 25 people from five continents-representatives of (NGOs) interagency groups, government organizations, and resource persons-met at The Mountain Institute's Spruce Knob Campus in Franklin, West Virginia to flesh out the form and functioning of the The Mountain Forum. In order to strengthen the organizing dimensions of the Forum, GEM staff entered into a collaborative and consultative partnership for mobilizing the multiple organizations involved to discover common values, trade best practices, share resources, and develop plans for joint action.
Throughout the session there was an attempt to balance theory with practice, interweaving conceptual material with opportunities for active experimentation. The Certificate Program began with discussions on social constructionism-a view of all realities and relationships as products of the collective imagination-as a paradigm for the challenges of the 21st Century. Members of the Taos Institute joined GEM staff end participants to focus on how social constructionist theory and practice can guide the work of global change and organization development through attention to narratives, the role of metaphors, creating generative theory, relational leadership, and transformative methods of dialogue.
With these understandings of the constructionist approach, Appreciative Inquiry was then explored as an approach to organizational analysis and learning that taps into the collective imagination and fosters innovations in social and organizational arrangements and processes. After a thorough introduction to Appreciative Inquiry, participants engaged in "mini" Appreciative Inquiry studies with each other to discover and craft grounded images of the ideal organization, partnership, and interorganizational alliance for global change.
Next the focus turned to the theory and practice of global cooperation. Examples and case studies of innovative approaches to collaboration were used to illustrate the values, organizational design principles, leadership challenges, and relational competencies that advance interorganizational cooperation. The group also experimented with the "Future Search Conference" as a method to bring together multiple constituencies to develop consensus on vision and strategy in large diverse groups.
Charles Lankester from the UNDP joined the group to provide a thought-provoking description of the ways in which information technologies are supporting and will continue to support global communication, cooperation, and sustainable development. During this session, GEM staff described GEM's Global Change Innovations Network which links PVOs and NGOs with organizational innovations occurring around the world through an electronic database.
At the end of the program, participants added the finishing touches to their action-research projects and discussed them with a chosen "shadow mentor" from the GEM staff and the rest of the group. Plans were made to connect each participant with GEM faculty and fellow participants via the Internet. Each of the field projects that emerged is concerned with studying and advancing a significant global change initiative occurring somewhere in the world, as the following examples illustrate:
* Building Regional and Organizational Capacity in East Africa: An appreciative inquiry into organizational capacity when it is at its best (includes identifying peak experiences, life giving forces, best practices, unique cultural aspects that support it, and hopes and aspirations for the future). This inquiry is to be done with 20 organizations in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia, and Sudan.
* Getting Richer by Joining Hands. Partnership to put the Civil Society First: An appreciative inquiry into the topic of partnership with a variety of civil society support organizations in Bangladesh.
* Imagine Pendleton County: An Appreciative inquiry into how to create community agreement, hope, and shared vision among communities in Pendleton county (WV) that historically have been separated geographically, socially, and environmentally. The inquiry is to include many organizations and community members, from youth to elderly.
Overall the program far exceeded the expectations of both GEM faculty and program participants. The rich histories, conceptual depth, and compassionate commitment of the program participants created a fertile and dynamic learning environment. A self-governing learning community emerged which drew on the wisdom and experience of everyone involved and was characterized by a spirit of mutual care, encouragement, and a lot of good humor.
This "Class of '96" will present the results and implications of their studies to fellow participants and GEM colleagues during the third week of October 1996 at a site of their choosing. GEM faculty will continue to assist with the development and dissemination of this new knowledge on global change and social innovation.
GCIN reporters and PVO/NGO innovators work closely together to locate, understand, and describe interesting and exciting happenings in the development community in ways that both draw out unique experiences and that provide insights into the organizational dimensions of global social innovation. over the last year numerous stories have been contributed that profile a variety of organizational innovations (e.g., in strategy, leadership, structure, culture, programs, partnerships and alliances) among GEM alumni and other PVOs and NGOs some of which are profiled in this issue of Global Social Innovations. Currently, GCIN coordinators are seeking to significantly expand this network and its variety of stories by building deeper learning relationships with the particular person within each PVO/NGO who is most associated with innovative ideas and efforts (nominations are welcomed).
To further enhance the collection and dissemination of innovations, a World Wide Web page has been created that allows for access to and submissions of best practices and innovations among alumni and other exemplary PVOs and NGOs It also includes descriptions of the GEM program offerings, information on GEM alumni and staff, a series of working papers and a bibliography on global excellence in management. This information can be accessed through the Internet at: http://www.geminitiative.org
The longer-term vision of the GCIN is the creation of a sustainable network of learners and a compendium on global social innovation, which together foster creative new organizational responses to pressing global issues.
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