Your Agenda, Your Discussions: Our journey navigating new terrain
Part of a series of posts written by the Directors’ Network, supported by One Team Gov and the Cabinet Office’s Collective Leadership Team.
We’re writing this blogpost to continue our series on growing the community of Directors committed to collective leadership, co-creation and building cultures that support collaboration. You can find out more about this work here:
Leading public services has always been tough — we have to tackle complex societal issues which no single organisation can face alone. As public sector leaders, Directors are the forefront of this, wrestling with the systemic and interrelated nature of many issues.
COVID-19 is hitting us in unimaginable ways. Amid the response, we are navigating new terrain in terms of how we get work done, finding new ways to work together. In a virtual world, this requires us to show vulnerability, authenticity, and empathy.
Reflecting on the importance of making time for ourselves whilst we live a more intense life, we decided to carve out a tiny bit of time to reflect, connect, and share in a safe space. This is especially important given pressure many of us are under and the breakneck speed of work on the COVID-19 response. We find we learn better when we learn together.
We wanted to open up the opportunity for Directors to have a different kind of conversation. To explore this, we had a breakfast call where we set the agenda and had the discussions. It was a very simple way of bringing a diverse range of views together to create change.
The agenda was not set in advance; instead, it was generated by us and what we felt passionate about. A participant-led discussion.
Using a Google Doc, we anonymously proposed a topic for discussion, used dot voting using emojis to prioritise the discussions based on what we wanted to talk about, and then discussed the highest voted topics together.
You can read our list of topics generated here:
Below is a summary of our discussions.
Topic 1: Is this the opportunity to dispense with government departments for good?
We thought that — in a crisis — teams need a sense of home and identity more than ever, structures may not be perfect but they give that sense of home in an enormous organisation like the Civil Service.
We reflected that however we are organised, response to the crisis is forcing a greater focus on outcomes, and we are noticing people are more willing to do what it takes and move faster. There are risks in that and we discussed examples of an emerging ‘blame culture’ or ‘hero leadership’ when what we need more than ever is collective responses.
We discussed examples of work where teams across departments are aligning around shared goals, other areas where multiple commissions overlap or conflict, and there is a sense of going round in circles. We also discussed how examples of matrix approaches can be helpful. We concluded by asking where are teams building or operating capabilities that can be repurposed and expanded to solve new problems across departmental boundaries. Can the Directors’ Network help to highlight those?
Topic 2: Top tips for looking after our teams particularly those who are on their own / isolated?
We shared examples of how we are checking in — we’re all spending a lot of time communicating — which feels right but perhaps too much in ‘broadcast’ mode?
How to avoid all staff calls being 100% ‘broadcast’ mode? Use of online facilitation techniques and better understanding how to use our various tools.
We talked about ideas to support team members who lived on their own, for example, by offering to buddy people up if they would find that helpful (we were keen not to imply that someone living on their own had no friends or family!).
Reflection
We reflected that we had found the conversation very useful and found the process of facilitating the discussion as useful as the content itself. This conversation led us onto a discussion about the need to learn how to facilitate online spaces, meetings, and workshops.
Some guidance on remote facilitation can be found here:
We are therefore exploring ways in how we could take this forward and help support the development of those skills across government — please get in touch with us if you’re interested at contact@oneteamgov.uk.
The kind of change we need starts from within. Whatever your role or discipline — we believe everyone has a topic in them. All Directors from across the Civil Service are welcome to join the ‘Your Agenda, Your Discussions’ breakfast call.
The next call will be held on Thursday 16 April from 8.30–9.30am.
You can sign up using the link below:
We look forward to seeing you there!
