Co-creating our future: The power of safe spaces
Emergent impact: Setting off a chain reaction
The Cambodia Futures Lab (Phase 1) was a six-month journey whereby leaders from government, civil society and the private sector along with UN agencies embarked on a collective leadership and learning journey on systems transformation in the recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic in Cambodia. It created opportunities for cross-sector collaboration and experimentation among leaders in government, the private sector and civil society during the post-Covid-19 pandemic recovery. This first phase was a partnership between the Office of the UN Resident Coordinator and the Ministry of Social Affairs, Veterans Rehabilitation and Youth, delivered in collaboration with the Presencing Institute, including the faculty of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and United in Diversity. The process was facilitated by Presencing Institute Faculty Manish Srivastava and Katie Stubley, with the social arts team of John Stubley (Social Poetics) and Shenali Perera (Visual Scribing).
In March 2022 we completed Phase 1 of the Cambodia Futures Lab. There was a strong sense that we had achieved something significant and yet it was difficult to quantify the extent of its impact. Boros Samheng captured this sentiment well in the following statement:
“I said it’s [impact is] not measurable because the impact is so huge that it potentially could set off a chain of reaction. It just continues, continues, continues, and goes on.”
While it felt difficult to quantify the results, it felt essential to be able to name the conditions and practices that gave rise to this impact. To do this a learning dialogue was conducted with Pauline Tamesis (United Nations Resident Coordinator in Cambodia), His Excellency, Boros Samheng (Secretary of State of the Ministry of Social Affairs, Veterans and Youth Rehabilitation), Alissar Chaker (UNDP Resident Representative ), Solinn Lim (Founder and CEO of Saddhā, Strategy and Policy Consulting Enterprise), Melanie Mossard (Co-founder Impact Hub Phnom Penh) ) and Katie Stubley (Presencing Institute Faculty) . These six people comprised a microcosm of the 35 lab participants and represented the convenors, facilitators and participants. We came together to reflect, distil the insights, and to try to name the key qualities that drove the success of the lab. This article attempts to identify some of the significant lessons uncovered during this learning dialogue in order to name the impact that is emerging.
The power of safe spaces
“When we step into a social space, something in the atmosphere resonates within us and that resonance shapes our being — the way we think, feel and act. It isn’t just that the social field shapes us. As we listen, act and interact we, in turn, impact the quality of the space we are inhabiting.”, said Eva Pomeroy, Research Lead, Presencing Institute
Speaking about her experiences working with the social field, Eva Pomeroy recognised the powerful importance of the social field for facilitating social transformation and change.
During the course of the Cambodia Futures Lab first phase, we consistently heard the term ‘safe space.’ People who took part noted the difference between how they usually came together and the quality of how they came together in the lab. The key difference was in how the lab created a ‘safe space’ — one that brought out the best in participants and those around them. The quality of the space was different. In the language of the Presencing Institute we refer to the quality of the space as the social field. When there is less of a feeling of safety in the social field, there is less opportunity for deeper levels of dialogue and connection. Creating safe spaces ultimately allows participants to access their highest potential outcomes for the future as they come into greater levels of coherence and resonance with each other. There is an art to creating generative social fields or what this group named as being a ‘safe space.’
Cambodia Futures Lab: A living example of the change we want to see
It is clear that to achieve the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, we need to invest in doing things differently. The Cambodia Futures Lab was an example of engaging with a process that puts inner and relational practices at the centre. We need to move these practices from something we do in our own time in our home lives, to being at the centre of our professional practice and convening methods.
The lab followed the U process, which moves through five critical stages to drive profound innovation.
Participants noted that the lab was particularly powerful because it focused on creating a safe space at the country level across sectors. It was acknowledged that we tend to focus on the quality of the social field in our teams, organisations or departments but that we rarely focus on this leverage point at a country level with the people who can influence its future.
“For me, the Cambodia Futures Lab was applying Theory U at the country level. The people who got invited to join the lab come from many different backgrounds, but what reunited us is our deep care for Cambodia and a desire to use our leadership to build a more sustainable future for Cambodia. This is very powerful” (Melanie).
“The Cambodia Futures Lab is different from any other engagement that the UN has done in Cambodia. The lab creates a safe space for experimentation. It allows us to prototype and quickly change course. By learning together, we are able to reimagine a sustainable and inclusive future for Cambodia.” (Pauline)
“We all have our blind spots, and the only way we can solve social issues is when we come together to identify our blind spots — and address them. Cambodia Futures Lab gives us a wake-up call and brings stakeholders to work together from across dimensions — government, business, civil society and development partners,” (Boros)
There is a power in creating and tending generative social fields: ‘safe spaces.’ If these can be tended to at all levels of society, we will have shared practices for generating the conditions to grow a better future for all. As Solinn stated:
“I see the lab as a space that could then be shared with broader society in some way, when it manages to root itself and find all the right mechanics that would allow us to scale up.” (Solinn)
So if we recognise that this ‘space’ needs to be shared, what are the important lessons that we need to identify in order to replicate and scale? We explore these lessons below.
Human beings are our greatest asset
At this significant point in history, we have many of the technical and structural solutions to create a world we want to live in. The biggest block to creating the change that we want to see is our own mindsets and our ability to be in relationship with each other in a way that builds trust and drives the collective action we know needs to happen.
“For me, to be very honest, it was the COVID blow which really showed me how fragile we are. It showed me that the human being is the greatest asset; all the social innovation, all the response, all the commitment came from people, but it was also the weakest link. The weakest link in terms of inequalities, in terms of psychosocial and mental resilience; in terms of embracing our emotions and our relations. I could see it more clearly. It was not in books anymore. It was around me, my team, my friends, my people… And me.” (Alissar).
If human beings are our greatest assets, then why do we see so many situations — whether on a global stage, as part of national issues or in our day-to-day lives — where human beings are often the weakest link? Greed, desire for power and control, disconnection and mistrust often stop the highest possibility coming into being.
In our learning dialogue around this question, we named a few important points that block our ability to realise our greatest asset.
1. Traditional meeting styles: Using the same practices, processes and structures that have created and maintained the problems we are facing.
2. Separation of individual best practice from professional best practice: We know that mindfulness and building relationships are important in our own lives but we leave these practices behind when we enter the workplace.
3. Lack of trust: We know that communication flows through trusted relationships, and that collective action happens when we feel supported in taking a risk. However, most of our processes designed for achieving collective goals do not prioritise building mutual trust.
4. Focus on analytical thinking: Human beings have many forms of intelligences, and yet in many situations we only focus on our theoretical intelligence to solve the problems we are facing. Increasingly, science is recognising the importance of our heart and body intelligence. If we are to make the most of our greatest asset — being human — then we need to embrace all parts of our humanness.
So how can we overcome these barriers? How does change actually happen? Why is a safe space such a powerful solution to these barriers? For the answers to these questions we need to look more deeply into how change actually happens.
Shifting how we drive change
In our learning dialogue we examined our thoughts on how change happens. We looked at how we had previously thought change occurred, and how this has shifted through our experiences.
Some key themes that emerged.
From external goals to inner goals
When we reflected upon what we have learned that actually creates change compared to what we had been brought up to believe about how change happens, we realised that our observations aligned strongly to the Inner Development Goals (IDG).
This year the IDG framework of skills and qualities was launched. This has been the culmination of years of work from scientists, changemakers and practitioners to identify what is needed in order to work with complex societal issues and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). As is stated in the report;
“The starting point for this initiative was a belief that there is a blind spot in our efforts to create a sustainable global society. We have accumulated much knowledge about environmental problems, climate change, poverty, public health, various social ills, etc. In the UN’s Agenda 2030 goals and targets have been formulated for 17 critically important areas relating to sustainability. We know a lot about conditions and causes, and there is also a lot of knowledge and ideas about what could and ought to be done. We have a vision of what needs to happen, but progress along this vision has been disappointing. The initiators of the IDG project were motivated by a belief that what has been largely missing is a keen insight into what abilities, qualities or skills we need to foster among those individuals, groups and organisations that play crucial roles in working to fulfil the visions. The argument is that we talk far more about what ought to be done to resolve the problems out in the world, than we talk about how to build skillfulness among the actors who are in a position to make the visions happen.” — IDG Framework and Background Report.
In Table 3 of the IDG Framework and Background Report there is an Overview of the IDG framework which includes the qualities and skills that are needed to drive external change.
These are summarised as the following:
Through the research and work of the IDGs it has become clear that we need to develop these skills and qualities if we want to achieve the SDGs. The question then remains of how do we do this and where? We believe that the Cambodia Futures Lab provided a safe space which was not only a learning ground for these skills and qualities, but one that also provided a strong process that gave practical methods for achieving the SDGs in a way that embodied the IDGs. This was done through creating a generative social field or, again, as participants of the lab referred to it as, a ‘safe space’.
Essential actions for creating safe spaces.
In our learning dialogue we identified several key practices that shifted the quality of our social field and created a safe space. In the table below we have drawn out key quotes from the learning dialogue, and have identified an essential action for creating a safe space and establishing a generative social field.
The impact continues to grow
“For me, the prototype really is all of us. How each of us individually are changing the way we lead, the way we bring people together.”, said Pauline, (United Nations Resident Coordinator in Cambodia)
Through this six-month process we also worked on collective prototypes that we are continuing to develop and grow our own leadership capacities. From community-empowered labs at a village level, to a green Cambodia, to policy labs that work to include voices from the ground-up to address cross-sectoral issues of social protection, climate change and digital transformation. Through these experiments we are prototyping the future we want to see and it is clear that change is unfolding and that we are beginning to work across sectors to break down silos, internal barriers, as well as expanding and creating new safe spaces. There is a lot to be hopeful for.
More about Cambodia Futures Lab: The lab is a learning initiative to co-create pathways for a prosperous, inclusive and innovative Cambodia to bring stakeholders from government, private sector and civil society and the UN to rethink how cross-sectoral issues of social protection, climate change and digital transformation can be taken into consideration in policy solutions.
