The aftermath of the conflict in Attercliffe, where we closed the Forum to set up a Development Trust and so receive significant European funding, cannot be described as irenic. Positions were deeply entrenched between the remnants of the Forum and the fragments of various groups who came together to run the Trust. Our strategy was to showcase good management – now we had to do it!
The Trust took on two new workers. Kate was overall strategic manager and Neil was operations manager.
Operations
Neil was a few years out of university, studying psychology. He was a brilliant administrator. I remember his first day working with us. At the time, I was running myself ragged preparing management accounts for our European funded JobLink project. About 10 o’clock on his first morning, I asked him whether he could prepare them, thinking a day or 2 would be a great relief, if I didn’t have to prepare them.
Neil looked grim. Well, he said, I’ve only just started, so it’ll take me a while. It had been taking me 2 or 3 nights, so I knew what to expect. Would it be OK if I leave them on your desk by the end of lunch? At that moment I understood why St Paul includes administration as a gift of the Holy Spirit!
Neil was a star and after Kate left, he took her role as strategic manager and then went on to work for a regional association of development trusts.
Strategy
Kate was highly perceptive and approached conflict by wading in. Some people said she looked like a bag lady. She carried her belongings in plastic carrier bags and perfected the “dragged through a hedge backwards” look. But she was sharp! She could read people after getting to know them for a few minutes and had a clear idea of what they stood for.
I learned a massive amount from Kate. She taught me soft systems analysis, something I use to this day and encouraged me to be assessed for NVQ Level 5 strategic management. Over the years as a development worker, I’d accumulated experience of strategic thinking. She helped me become conscious of what I knew.
Strategic thinking is not easy. Most people find it hard – I find it easier when I have a coach who holds my feet to the fire. For example, people often approach me for help with a solution. They have leapt to a solution without defining the problem.
Chris, they ask, can you help me design a website? My first question is, what’s the problem you want to solve with the website? Define the problem before you pursue a solution. Solutions don’t work if you do not understand the problem.
Plotting
So, strategic thinking is what I bring to businesses that contribute to the local economy. But, the other week I noticed something else.
On and off over the years, people have told me I’m a good storyteller. Mostly, I ignored them because I couldn’t see it myself. These days I offer guidance to business owners, using storytelling, as a tool.
We need stories because the local economy is both personal and public. It’s not merely a measure of currency in circulation, if such a measure is even possible. It’s an accumulation of relationships and so stories are the most effective way of marketing and raising hopes for a better future. Well-being is never solely personal, it’s the relationships we have with dozens of people, encountered as we go about our business.
I’ve listened to dozens of business stories and one universal characteristic of a story poorly told is poor plotting. Reflecting on this a few weeks ago, I saw congruence between plotting and strategy! Plotting structures the past, whilst strategy structures the future. There’s no single plot to a story and no single strategy to solve a problem. Both require ability to see hope in an impossible situation and choose between alternatives.
LOCKDOWN POSTSCRIPT
Strategy is difficult. The steps we take change the landscape and so we’re forced to revise on the hoof. Nothing ever turns out how the experts predict! This applies even where you are the expert. The key is to be clear about the problem you’re trying to solve.
Brexit is a classic example of a solution that’s lost sight of its problem. Ask anyone what the problem is that Brexit is supposed to solve and you’ll get any number of answers. Let me illustrate with one possible problem Brexit is supposed to solve.
Loss of national sovereignty.
I agree there’s a serious problem here. Members of Parliament have far fewer powers than they had up to the 1970s. We joined the Common Market in the 70s and so it’s easy to jump to the conclusion that it’s to blame. The problem is we’ve lost sovereignty not to the EU but to corporations. The EU may have enabled that to happen but it’s the corporations that want to see a change now. Their problem is regulation.
Regulation disadvantages corporations. These are multinational organisations and so to deregulate actually passes control into their hands. We’ve already seen this. Privatisation passed powers from elected government into the hands of corporations and other governments.
Regulation favours local businesses. Granted people moan about it but what it does is create niches where small businesses find opportunities. We see major changes to our towns because of the growth of chains of stores that are the same everywhere, out of town shopping centres and Internet trade. Each of these favour multinational businesses who take money out of circulation. It’s not hard to see how Brexit intensifies this.
Tried and tested solutions are really helpful so long as they’re applied to a problem correctly identified and understood. We should be far more cautious with untested solutions like Brexit.
Plotting Stories
Stories deal with the past. Consider a story from your past. What’s it about? There’s no fixed answer and there can’t be. Does it have a happy or unhappy ending? It depends on when you end the story because life goes on regardless. You choose what your story means and plot it accordingly. Let’s say your marriage broke down and ended in divorce. Is divorce a happy or unhappy ending? Regardless of how you felt at the start, are you happy now? Or have your feelings changed over the years? Will you feel the same in 1 year or 10 years’ time?
There is more fluidity to the past than we realise. To make sense of it, we must structure it in some way. It’s up to us whether we choose to be generous to others involved. You tell a different story if you’re able to forgive.
When we prepare a strategy, it’s similar to telling a story. Just as we impose out point of view on events when we tell a story, so we express our vision of a possible future through a strategy. Both are fluid and must be adjusted according to circumstance.
Is there deceit in this? Honestly? Possibly. Plotting and strategy are subjective. We validate either through sharing with others and adjusting according to feedback. If when a marriage breaks down both parties tell their story, we expect them to be different. How do we choose between them? Most likely it depends on which party you support.
Our dilemma as storytellers or strategists is this: “It’s much easier to be deceived by a lie than it is to admit you were so deceived.”
Why I do this
Stories rarely remain unchanged, the context in which they’re told matters just as much as the context referred to by the story. I wrote this sequence of 21 stories about 18 months ago. You may have read some or all of them in their earlier form. Reading them now, we perhaps see something different, especially as we consider the need for innovation, post-lockdown..
As I republish these stories, I revise and polish them. Some need little change, for others the changes are extensive. At the end of each story, I add reflections based on where my thinking has moved onto, especially the relationship between strategy and plotting.
This is story 20/21. Last Story: Innovation: A Grand Old Man (and his Nemesis) Next Story: Graves