How to Build Commitment and Enthusiasm
I was recently asked to write an essay about a recent complex project and what we did to ensure commitment and enthusiasm. What follows is some of that story and what I took from the project.
In 2015, I volunteered to reimagine and revitalize an established project, with the super descriptive direction to ‘create momentum’ for a project that had been stalled for several years.
The project was foundational, because it was intended to be a complete shift in the approach to creating regulations. The idea was to change the scale of regulation so that it would be more efficient to create and administer the ‘rules’ and also for the application process that went along with those rules.
Gathering Perspectives
At the onset of my work, I tried to gather the perspectives of nearly every functional group affected by the change in approach. My idea was to understand what was needed in the space between established provincial or regional direction and the on-the-ground delivery. This information gathering also gave us insights into where the problems and gaps existed and, more importantly, the potential solutions that had people in the system thought might work.
A reimagined concept emerged only after I attended an inspiring and immensely constructive executive education course called Leadership Decision Making at Harvard Kennedy School. While the course focused on making better leadership decisions, it was a sidebar discussion on citizen juries that resonated with me and helped complete the new regulatory concept.
A Two-Pillar Approach
The concept I brought forward, based on probably hundreds of conversations and presentations, was built on two pillars: one technical and one engagement pillar. The technical pillar was intended to integrate our knowledge across technical specialties, while the engagement pillar sought a deeper involvement of indigenous communities and stakeholders in the development of regulations. Drawing on the citizen jury idea, the intent of the engagement pillar was to ask people in an area how development should occur, not whether it should occur.
Trying it out
We launched a pilot project and started with the integrated assessment. Linking together technical experts can be challenging and rewarding at the same time. A good deal of time was spent simply creating common language across specialties. Since everyone was a technical expert, they wanted to create a perfect final product as a way to demonstrate their expertise. We resisted this urge, and instead we very purposefully focused on a minimum viable product, a concept borrowed from software development and suggested by a member on the assessment team. The minimum viable product approach allowed us to continually adjust what and how we were delivering.
Once we had put together information to share and to use in our deliberations, we set up a panel with a group of affected stakeholders and began to discuss some specific issues with the intent to find some solutions. This group had a broad and diverse membership and what could be called divergent perspectives on the issues we were discussing. As we dug past those perspectives, we came to a place where the group was focused on solving the issues and satisfying the values behind their various perspectives. When we completed our discussions, some 10 months after we began, we had come to consensus on every suggestion we put forward for decision.
Lessons along the way
I learned a lot along throughout this project, but here’s a few that are top of mind.
Everyone should see themselves in the vision. Gathering perspectives was very important in the creation of the concept, because it allowed people to feel that their ideas and concerns had merit.
Interesting ideas can come from anywhere. While the citizen jury was not what we finally used in our concept, some of its key elements were pivotal to creating the concept in the first place.
The vision should be simple and intuitive. The simple concept encompasses the complexity and allowed us to communicate ‘why’ we were doing the work. As a result, people would typically ask and then be drawn in to figuring out ‘how’ the work could be done.
Adapt and change. Throughout our panel process, we continuously adapted our discussion and our process to meet the needs of the group. This is not to say we abandoned the overall purpose, but we routinely adjusted the process we used to achieve that purpose.
Be aware of people’s specific language. This can give us a deeper sense of whether and to what degree someone supports an idea or concept. I learned this the hard way by discovering that what I thought was support for the project had been veiled opposition.
Scott Millar often works as a "peacemaker" by gathering people with different experiences and values and helping them navigate beyond their differences to tackle complex problems together. Through Collaboration Dynamics, he offers a program in High Performance Collaboration, where he guides groups to explore the nature of collaboration, inclusivity, and innovation, and acquire new abilities to create the conditions that enable groups to contribute and thrive in challenging environments.
