Matthew's RSA blog

Beginnings...

Freshly back from the bank holiday weekend – and it feels that spring has definitely sprung, and the cobwebs are clearing.

The past few weeks have shown enormous promise and progress in terms of the Newtworks project, and much us this is down to the enthusiasm of Fellows.

With this in mind I hope you won’t find it too self serving if I start this weeks blog with this fantastic contribution from FRSA Tessy Britton.

Six months after the launch of the Networks project I feel more enthusiastic about it than ever. This is not because the practicalities seem easier, but the importance of what is being attempted is genuinely quite thrilling.

The RSA Fellowship is made up of extraordinary people, drawn to the RSA undoubtedly because of the organisation’s uniqueness and breadth of vision.

Where the RSA networks project adds to our Fellowship enormously is the invitation to participate. The shift in paradigm from being an interested but largely passive member to valued contributor is a really significant one.

It changes the questions from ‘what is the society doing for me?’, to ‘how can I contribute?’, it challenges our passions, time, imaginations and our commitments. It even challenges our abilities. It shakes us up, sometimes uncomfortably, to examine how, on a very personal level, we can not only talk about social change, but do social change.

The RSA is now saying to us that it is holding open a new sort of space for our ideas to be heard, to be animated by conversation with others and to be supported in many different ways. This is an incredibly inspiring thing to do, mostly because the long-term success of the developing network is dependent almost entirely on the interest and enthusiasm of Fellows to enter this space.

By these actions and attitudes the RSA is exposing the possibilities that are energised by individual generosity. It is rejecting the reductionist, remedial view of society and humanity and is firmly putting its trust and confidence into our innate capacity for collective good.  What could be brighter or more optimistic?

Take this paradigm out of the RSA into local government for a moment.  Imagine a local council where they put real value into their members – all of them.  What would happen if those members were stimulated, inspired, encouraged and supported to form connections and groups in those communities for positive social change?

It can be hard not to envy the nimbleness that other innovation groups can offer, especially in these early stages. However, the RSA comprises a disciplinary diversity and geographic penetration that is wholly unique – and it is through its determination to create these connective opportunities, these equalities and freedoms across disciplinary, social and regional boundaries that I feel some of the most exciting projects will emerge over time.

While others may surely look for evidence of innovation in the output of social projects already, I am simply delighting in watching and helping the process, which for me is the real innovation.   And it is amazing.

Injustices and waiting lists

This week’s events began with a screening of the BAFTA nominated “Taking Liberties”. The film follows the stories of normal people whose lives have been turned upside down by injustice, while using humour to emphasise its serious message. Set against a striking contemporary soundtrack, the film provoked a fascinating discussion with director and producer Chris Atkins and Jess Search, Chief Executive, BRITDOC.

RSA Thursday examined the question: The Secular State – the best option for British Muslims? Featuring Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, columnist for The Independent and co-founder of a new organisation, British Muslims for Secular Democracy, Inayat Bunglawala, writer on Islam and current affairs, Dr. Usama Hasan, Director of the City Circle and Ed Husain, author of The Islamist and deputy director of the counter-extremism think-tank, The Quilliam Foundation, this spirited debate was clearly too short for the audience! Though time defeated us in the Great Room, after the formalities audience members packed the Vaults to carry on the discussion over drinks. The RSA will continue to provide an independent platform to address these important issues in the coming months, both on and offline, via the Fellows Networks platform and future public events - so the debate is far from over...!

The increasing popularity of our events programme makes it all the more useful to have audio downloads and soon we will also have “Vision” to look forward to. More and more events are fully booked within days of their release and with long waiting lists, it’s great to have an alternative available for those who have missed out.

Last night's RSA Networks Exchange

Now, thanks to the miracles of modern technology I’m able to continue posting my blog while out of the office. But I wanted to publicly thank Laura Bunt in particular from the Networks team, who did such a stunning job of organizing last night’s event.

Andy Gibson FRSA also made an excellent job of facilitating and I was gratified to see so many staff members turn out to support the RSA Networks Exchange initiative.

There were many ideas buzzing around and the event reinvigorated a lot of Fellows following on from the event we had in November.

This is a perfect example of what Networks is about – it’s about bringing Fellows together, both virtually and in ‘real life’ to develop effective networks for delivering (and dealing with) positive social change.

There were a number of excellent projects proposed, and people were asked to make commitments as to how they would take these ideas forward. So here’s one from me. I think that we should commit to holding a similar event (around the country) at least once a month.

I’d love to hear from more of you who would like to be involved in an exchange event, or for those who attended, ways in which you think this event could be more effective.

What would be great is if, together, we could create a culture of collaboration, in which people with similar ideas could develop one fantastic project, taking the best elements of what each person has to offer. A sort of open source project for social change, which takes as it’s premise that no one person has all the answers or bright ideas, and that we all have something to share and learn.

Again, well done to the team who made this event happen and in particular to the Fellows who showed such commitment and enthusiasm last night!

Come on(line) everybody!

In a world that is increasingly digitally enhanced, how do we ensure that people can be included in the conversations that are happening on the internet – or even at a more basic level can take advantage of cheaper car insurance (which seem to be available through internet only deals)?

This is true not only for society as a whole, but closer to home, as part of this society.

Roughly a third of Britons are considered ‘digitally excluded’. I’m chairing a conference on this tomorrow which will be looking at how we can reach this final third. No doubt I’ll be sharing my thoughts on this later in the week. But it made me think about what we’re trying to do here with the RSA Networks.

Tonight there will be an RSA Networks Exchange event here at JAS. The event is designed to mirror the experience Fellows have at our growing (and under construction) online platform. They can propose, discuss and support innovative projects. In essence it’s the physical manifestation of the virtual experience.

The idea is that not all the projects discussed tonight will be taken forward, indeed, not all the projects should be taken forward.

In our society we have an aversion to failure. This makes a lot of sense, failing makes us feel bad. But one of the capacities we need to be promoting is that of resilience. The ability to say ‘ok, this idea wasn’t so great, but I’m glad I put it out there, now I can move on and do something else.’

The other point of putting your ideas out there is that you can link to other people who are interested in similar things, and then together you can have even better ideas.

The beauty of the internet is that it creates a place for iterative project development. To borrow from recent speaker, Jonathan Zittrain, it’s a generative process. Together we can create something that is better than any of our individual ideas.

As I’ve said many times, our Networks project is about bringing together Fellows, so that they  can work together on projects which will support social change. But it occurs to me that not all our fellows are part of the ‘digitally included’. Of course with this blog I’m preaching to the converted, but it’s worth thinking about. How do we engage more Fellows in the online debate?

Have a look at this from Clay Shirky, who seeks to answer the question non-digital people always ask which is ‘Where do you find the time’.

We do

Last night we had a great lecture from Charlie Leadbeater discussing his new book We Think. The book has got interest and praise, not just for its content but also how it was written – collaboratively, via Charlie’s website. It may well be the first wiki-book

One connection I made was between Charlie’s thesis and Brooke Harrington who spoke here last week on her book Pop Finance. I asked Brooke whether Robert Putnam, author of Bowling Alone and the foremost exponent of the breakdown in social capital, was interested in the 20 million Americans taking part in investment clubs.

Brooke surmised that Putman didn’t investigate this on the grounds that investment clubs aim to make money. But, as she points out in her book, there’s no correlation between the financial success of the club and its long term future. There are clubs which make no money but are still meeting and investing, just as there are some clubs which are financially successful, but break-up due to personality clashes. In the final analysis, it’s all about people voluntarily doing stuff together.

I similarly asked Charlie what he thought about Putnam’s thesis. Does the rise of forms of on-line collaboration like Wikipedia and Linux disprove social capital theory.

The answer in part is Putnam was looking at distinct forms of social capital, arguing that the capital communities most need is the type that is declining fastest. So for instance, in deprived communities, what’s needed is ‘bridging capital’; people who are not in work having contact with those who are and thus creating opportunities through networks and connections.

The problem with the simplistic social capital thesis is that it seems to imply that after 150,000 years of human evolution in which we have been hard wired as a social species we have suddenly decided to retreat from the public sphere.

What I take from both Charlie and Brooke is that Putnam was mapping less a fundamental shift in human nature and more was the decline of old collectivist institutions. These institutions – think political parties, think trade unions, think established churches - are characteristically bureaucratic, rigidly hierarchical, and culturally self-denying (‘you have boring meetings to make the world a better place’).

What Putnam didn’t see was that alongside the decline of these institutions what would occur is the emergence of ‘new collectivist’ institutions – like investment clubs and on-line social networks - which are less bureaucratic, more dispersed, more subtly hierarchical, and more self-actualising (or what ordinary people tend to call ‘fun’).

Human beings do still want to do good stuff together, but because our lives and our expectations have changed we want to work together differently. This is what we’re trying to do here at the Society. RSA Networks is one way of doing that, but there will no doubt be others – such as this blog. One way of defining my mission for the RSA is to build on the great traditions of this old collectivist institution, but work with Fellows to turn it into an exemplar of a new collectivist spirit. 

RSA Networks Exchange

A few RSA colleagues went to the Social Innovation Camp a couple of weekends ago. This brought together technologists and innovators to develop new ways to meet social need.

Next month, the Innovation Exchange for the third sector is holding two 'festivals of ideas' that aim to bring together social innovators with commissioners of services in the hope that fresh approaches to old problems will emerge.

In a similar vein, as part of the RSA Networks project, we're now building up to our next big Fellows' event on the evening of 28 April - the RSA Networks Exchange.

This will be a bit like the ideas equivalent of a 'bring and buy' sale. You bring a project; you offer help in developing other people's projects.

We've already had a great response, with people saying they want to talk about subjects ranging from reducing the loneliness of freelancing, to initiatives designed to help people dealing with alcohol and drug abuse get back on track.

There is more about the event on the Networks platform, and you can get involved by registering your interest.

In reflecting on the buzz around these kinds of events currently, two things strike me.

First, the power of new technology to make visible a form of 'gift economy' that has until recently remained fairly hidden. If participating is easy, and feedback is quick and positive, people are willing to give their time and expertise to others and the greater good (a theme that will no doubt be taken up by Charles Leadbeater in his talk here next week). 

And second, perhaps an important reminder for us here, that the fuel of any gift economy is passion. Without passion, people have little reason to give up precious time. So part of what we need to do here is unlock people's passion for social progress, and help them to find others who share that passion.

With those reflections in mind, we've been busy inviting people via the OpenRSA Facebook group and the Networks platform. We'll see how it works, and feed any lessons into our plans for regular events of this kind in London and around the country.

Hope to see you there!

Fail better

In Chichester last night for an open space event with South East Region committee members, Fellows and guests. It was great to see so many people taking time out on a Monday evening to discuss how the RSA could make a greater impact and be a stronger network. The evening came up with some good ideas and a real desire to grow RSA networks and activities.

I emphasised two points in my opening comments. The first was that while we need to get continual feedback from Fellows as we take forward our ambitions for Fellowship, we need to give as much time to the change we want to achieve in the world outside as to the changes we need internally. There has been lots of debate in the OpenRSA facebook group and our RSA Networks platform about the change process, and we are learning some valuable lessons, many of which will soon be seen in a series of adaptations leading up to a re-launch of RSA Networks platform. But I sense that Fellows are now impatient to focus more on the real world projects that might emerge from our new forms of engagement.

This takes me to my second point. If we are to turn more outwards we need to make sure that the ideas we have are robust and add value to what is out there already. A networking approach, whether delivered online through the Networks platform, or locally in events and emerging relationships like those being fostered in the South East and North West, offers a fast track to testing and developing ideas.

Being an RSA Fellow offers an invaluable opportunity to test out an idea with a group of well-connected, intelligent and diversely talented colleagues. These ideas can come from many different sources. Just today I have been asked to join RSA Network discussions about education reform (instigated by the authors of a fascinating letter in the Journal) and the growing debate about failure (again building on a Journal article). When our new all-singing-all-dancing website goes live soon, it will provide lots of new sources for ideas and debate. For example, our videos of RSA lectures will offer links through to discussion forums about the lecture and from that, possibly, to network initiatives seeking to turn ideas in actions. 

The ideas that past muster will then have access to insight, support and participation from Fellows as well as various forms of support from RSA HQ (and our soon-to-be-appointed field work team). But, speaking as someone who has a new idea every week and a good one roughly every three months, it is just as valuable to find out quickly that one’s idea doesn’t quite make the grade. There is nothing worse than putting lots of time and commitment into a brainwave only to find out it has a fatal flaw, that someone is doing it already, or that no one shares your enthusiasm.

When ideas are floated in the RSA Fellowship (whether on or off-line, whether in national local forums) they should get feedback not just from Fellows but from other people and organisations we invite because they have expertise and experience in the area under discussion. A strength of the RSA brand is that busy important people usually respond with enthusiasm to requests from us to offer advice. This way we avoid re-inventing the wheel or, worse, re-inventing the Sinclair C5.   

If one in thirty of the ideas floated in emerging Fellowship networks - whether on-line or in off-line sessions like Chichester last night - gets through to the stage of becoming a developed proposal it will be a good hit rate.  As Mitchell Sava points out in the Journal, failure can be as creative as success. 

Getting these new ways of working right is about resources, systems, participation but also vitally about culture. We need working methods and norms that encapsulate the right combination of challenge and support. RSA Fellows should be seen as the kind of people who have commitment and ideas but also the kind who thrive on constructive criticism. 

Double vision

Another good week of speakers here at RSA.  Clay Shirky spoke about organising without organisations to a packed Great Room yesterday. It was a brilliant talk – available now as a downloadable audio file, and in a few weeks as an edited video!

Clay’s view about on-line and off line networks were better thought through and more balanced than the utopianism heard from some quarters. But there was plenty here to encourage us in our vision for the RSA.

Equally encouraging, from another perspective, was reading Sir Ronald Cohen's The Second Bounce of the Ball, which he spoke to here last night. In the book Cohen tells the reader how his idea of venture capital was a decade ahead of its time in Europe. Indeed he launched his first fund in the unpropitious economic times of the 1970s. But eventually perseverance –  which ranks pretty high up Cohen list of key requirements for an entrepreneur – won through.

We are learning a lot as we develop the ideas behind RSA Networks. Scaling up the numbers who can access the platform, dedicating more resources to moderation and developing a more user friendly and engaging platform are all parts of this learning process. We are also getting more interest from regional and local RSA chapters that want to use the platform as the basis for developing area based activities. We will need many virtues as we seek to enable the Fellowship to become a network for civic innovation –  including perseverance.

We are saying ‘goodbye’ today to Liz Winder, head of our lectures team. Anyone working in an organisation, especially as old as RSA, knows they are part of a story that begins before them and carries on afterwards. Yesterday, we started filming lectures for our new website. An innovation like this is possible because we can build on the strong foundations built by Liz and her team in her nearly two decades at the RSA.

My first visit to JAS was for an event with Al Gore which was one of the many great events overseen by Liz. We will all miss her but, hopefully, as well as coming in to see us at John Adam Street she can visit our website and see some of the fruits of her years of brilliant service for the RSA.

Oligarchs, the fall of communism and the RSA

For reformers history has a hard lesson. Those who offer the prospect of change can unleash desires and expectations which not only sweep away the old order but make the citizenry impatient with the attempts of those same reformers to manage transition.

This thought was provoked by seeing a full-page advertisement for Louis Vuitton luggage in the FT featuring former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. A man who history will no doubt judge as a great leader and reformer who was rejected by his own people in favour, first of the excesses of Yeltsin, and now the authoritarian nationalism of Putin and Medvedev.

It is, I know, risible to draw comparisons between the fall of Communism and the reform of the RSA. One involves overthrowing decades of central power and exposing an ageing oligarchy to openness and accountability, the other happened in Russia.

But seriously… The RSA has benefited from great leadership in the past. In recent years the decision to develop the vaults showed great vision, making John Adam Street an exceptional venue and helping to put the House on a sound financial footing.  Among other achievements, my predecessor Penny Egan oversaw the development of our research programme and worked with the Trustees to get agreement to our Academy (on which front things are going well). Now, the over-riding reforming goal is to enable the Fellowship to work as a powerful network of civic innovation.

Progress has been impressive. The open space day on November 22nd was a powerful launch pad for phase one of the project. We now have getting on for 400 Fellows and invited guests participating on the RSA Networks platform. Last week we had a very positive meeting of regional officers, who are clearly committed to greater Fellow engagement and real world impact.

But I also sense some impatience that the process of change is not even faster. 2008 will be a watershed year for the RSA Fellowship with momentum building as the year goes on. As I never cease to remind people, the 2007-8 budget contained virtually no money for Fellow engagement and organisation, in the year ahead we intend to spend upwards of £250k on Network organisers at JAS and fieldworkers to support Fellows' initiatives outside London.  In a few months we will see the regional websites integrated in the new national website. And as the year proceeds, first new Fellows, then all Fellows in selected localities will be invited on to the RSA Networks platform.

The Fellows' recruitment journey will be re-designed to stress the scope for networking and civic engagement. And I hope that on the Networks platform we will move from a fascinating discussion on how to make RSA Networks work to the development of projects about change in the outside world.

How far and how fast we go ultimately depends on Fellows themselves. Our role is to support the change. But creating the right infrastructure can't happen overnight. It requires a step by step increase in investment and for us to learn and adapt as the change develops. I have a Trustees' away day next week and will be working with them to agree ambitions goals for the next three years.

Transformation is possible as long as we all - Trustees, Fellows, regional officers - are part of the change, enjoying its highs but also working together through the challenges it is bound to present.

RSA networks

It’s great to see the activity on the RSA networks web platform. This has flowed out of the debates and initiatives started here at the Fellows’ day on November 22nd.

We are still only at the beginning of the process of transforming the Fellowship and putting Fellows at the heart of the RSA. Where this journey takes us is one of the big questions for 2008.