7 Comments on Purpose, governance and engagement – why third sector organisations must face the big questions

carl allen on Mon, 30th Mar 2009 2:42 pm


Here is another question, sadly.

What regulates the relationship in the Third Sector between big infrastructure organisations when competing for contracts?

From events watching, one would conclude there are strong indicators that orgnaisational self-interest consistently wins out with the wider sector well-being running a poor second.

And of course in most types of competition, to come second is to not exist.

So do we need a new type of regulating action, one perhaps where organisations are barred from competing, for a period or an event, based on their history of organisational conduct. Admittedly though, the innocent may suffer with the guilty but new entrants into the market will be encouraged to come forward … so perhapds that threat will balance behaviour.

Katherine Hudson on Mon, 30th Mar 2009 2:44 pm


Thanks for your post, Matthew – and for your insights at this morning’s seminar. I think the real strength of the discussion was the breadth of experience in the room. It’s always exciting to get people from the Fellowship and their broader networks together: simply because there’s such a diversity of interests and backgrounds we’re all likely to learn something new or look at a problem from a different angle.

Particularly pertinent – perhaps because of the setting – was the difficulty and necessity of ‘creating’ accountability in an environment increasingly reliant on the third sector – ie where it is not necessarily democratically elected. The conversation raised questions around governance and engagement for established organisations such as the RSA and RIBA. Environments – sociological, economic and technological – are changing and these are already having huge impacts on how organisations create and demonstrate relevancy and legitimacy and the extent to which they empower and engage their membership.

This is something the RSA explored in the NESTA-funded Networks project (the findings of which are at http://www.thersa.org/fellowship/rsa-networks/nesta-rsa-networks-evaluation) which has altered and informed the way the organisation works with its Fellowship. It will also be the focus of the RSA and NCVO – led Future of Membership project that I’ll be running from mid-April alongside a consortium of 12 leading membership organisations.* I anticipate that this project will speak to the questions and issues raised today, in particular questions of governance and accountability.

Moving away from the institutional, the seminar also raised broader questions about value and agency, namely:

o Are the definitions of public and private; state and third sector adequate when, for example, such a high proportion of GDP is in ‘public’ value and previously private institutions have an increasingly public ownership?
o Is innovation possible in existing organisational structures or is it something that necessarily occurs at the edges or when individuals interact? Can the energy for innovation exist within hierarchical governance structures or is it only possible outside of these spaces?
o How does the creation of ‘public’ values and spaces differ from local value or community engagement, and is it necessarily enabled or enabling?

For me, one of the most interesting things was the way we have different vocabularies to talk about different areas. I think it’s misleading to create two oppositions: hulking organisations, weighed down by legacies, governance and tradition against fast-moving, efficient, self-regulated 2.0-style innovation culture. Leadership, governance, innovation and accountability – whether tacit or explicit, peer-based or hierarchy-led – are issues that are key for both, and evolve over time. What will, I think, be interesting, is not whether one or other model wins out but how they influence one another and what will emerge in that interaction.

Questions of value and public agency are likely to be mulled over a lot this week, in particular by those participating in Paul Massey et al’s we20 meetings (http://www.we20.org/) across the country (there are some happening at NESTA as we speak…). They’re clearly problems that concern us all. The difficult thing is how we work together to discuss and begin to grapple with them. Let’s continue the conversation.

* The Consortium consists of Amnesty International UK, the Ramblers’ Association, the National Trust, the National Council for Voluntary Youth Services, the RNLI, the Scout Association, Supporters Direct, the National Children’s Bureau, the Workers’ Educational Association, the Royal Academy of Arts, the National Autistic Society and Action for ME.
More info at http://www.3s4.org.uk/about/events/does-membership-matter.

Mike Amos-Simpson on Mon, 30th Mar 2009 10:33 pm


I think the key thing is accountability and currently accountability tends to lie in the wrong places. It would be interesting to see how different services would be if they were held to account by the people they were supposed to serve, rather than by the few people who make up their governance or by their funders. By that I mean properly held to account, not some sort of exercise in consultation or glossy ‘look how good we are’ stuff.

In this respect I’d argue the style and method of governance are considerably less important than accountability – there are huge charities that have excellent governance, fantasticly expensive legal expertise and yet I’d never donate to them because as far as I’m concerned its my money that is paying for that legal expertise. I want instead to feel my money is making a difference so I’d far rather support a very small, possibly badly structured project that is making a genuine difference in the way that its beneficiaries feel suits them best. What I don’t have from either organisation currently is any indication of whether their beneficiaries actually want the services they provide and find them useful – besides of course the very expensive campaign literature the big organisation produces – which would be funded by your donation

matthewtaylor on Tue, 31st Mar 2009 7:15 pm


Thanks Mike. Big organisations have strengths and weaknesses, bureaucracy being one of the latter. Smaller organisations can be very innovative and close up to the issue but they also find it hard to develop beyond a certain stage. Fortunately, there are now more organisations and sites which aim to give advice about the merits of particular charities and projects, especially in the developing world. But I tend to agree with you that accountability (I prefer engagement ) is generally more important to an organisations’ effectiveness than formal governance.

matthewtaylor on Tue, 31st Mar 2009 7:23 pm


Hi Carl. I’m not sure I get this. Do you have any examples to illustrate the point?

carl allen on Wed, 1st Apr 2009 8:32 am


The manner of loss of the Third Sector Leadership Centre is the latest example of a pattern.
http://www.thirdsector.co.uk/Opinion/Article/892725/Editorial-Umbrella-group-rivalry/

As a number of acerbic wits have said, these big beasts and other big beasts are responsible for the ghosts of working together, with the spirit of working together being a mere convenience.

Reminds me of politicians and the free market and its cycle of failures which have little to do with risk taking but a lot to do with selfishness, greed, ego and no one must be bigger than me attitude.

But the really worrisome thing is that the up and coming potential leaders in those organisations take their attitude and cue from those curently in control. So what sort of junk food leaders will the sector have in future?

Indy Johar on Thu, 2nd Apr 2009 12:55 pm


Thank you for hosting the event Katherine and your input Matthew.

One of the key issues not made explicit in the conversation the other day was the increasing reality of organisations not using legal form or classic corporate governance models as mechanisms of legitimacy.

As practice and intervention have become increasingly situational and responsive to context – it is the accountability of action which is increasingly recongnised as crucial [thanks Mike for opening this debate up here].

Some everyday mechanisms for making practice/intervention accountable have been emerging from the field i.e. the use of the web as a public declaration device which invites cross peer review. These are behaviours that seem to point towards the emerging concept of ‘open governance’.

These alternative modes not only appear to liberate agency but also avoid the dislocation of practice and purpose; with a Board of Trustees often too removed from the point of intervention to adequately understand, and support the sensitivities of edge innovation practice.

It might come to pass that the governance of practice may ossify or by osmosis move into the governance of organisation, however a worthy space is opening up currently, in which leadership is no longer about getting permission, but is about the freedom to make something unbelievable happen and the accountability for when something goes wrong.

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