Seminar presentations showcase good practice

The OCVS hosts interactive seminars to promote the sharing of information and good practice to strengthen relationships with the community and voluntary sector. These include full-day Good Practice in Action (GPIA) seminars and 90-minute Good Engagement seminars.

The focus is on information sharing, results-based learning, and acquiring knowledge and expertise built on the good practice of others.

Presentations and/or summaries are provided below for ongoing reference.

Good engagement seminar 10 (23 July 2010 - Wellington)

Ethnicity is not fixed. People in New Zealand, as in other countries, may change the ways they identify themselves over time or they may identify themselves differently in different environments. Many aspects of an individual's circumstances affect how they identify their ethnicities and this may differ markedly from how a third party might identify them.

As New Zealand's population becomes increasingly diverse, government agencies and community organisations need to strengthen their connections with a range of ethnic communities.

The term 'ethnic' (matawaka), in the context of the Office of Ethnic Affairs' mandate, relates to any segment of the population within New Zealand society sharing fundamental cultural values, customs, beliefs, languages, traditions and characteristics, that are different from those of wider society.

This seminar looking at the Office of Ethnic Affairs' experience was presented by Deborah Lam (National Operations Manager) and Asma Bashir (Senior Ethnic Affairs Advisor, Auckland).  The edited powerpoint below includes some tips and barriers to engagement.

Good engagement seminars 6 & 9 (11 Feb 2010 - Wellington and 29 June 2010 - Napier)

Presented by Mary-Alice Arthur with support in Wellington from Vicki Wilde of the Art of Hosting Community of Practice. 

Through the methods of Appreciative Inquiry and World Café, the workshops explored how to evoke participatory leadership within organisations and communities. Using these methods to foster conversations that matter, the seminars demonstrated a hands-on approach so people are engaged, become clear on their commitment, and can take action - supporting each other to step in and step up.

Good engagement seminar 8
(7 May 2010)
- Wellington

This seminar featured the Ministry of Pacific Island Affairs explaining their community engagement framework, which guides the Ministry's engagement with Pacific communities, enabling relevant and timely advice to Government on matters of importance to Pacific peoples. 

This seminar included information on the framework, plus practical examples of how engagement with Pacific communities can work well. A panel of Pacific community movers and shakers outlined what engaging with government means to them.

The presenters were:

• Heker Robertson, Ministry of Pacific Island Affairs
• Filipo Lui, Wellington Tokelau Leadership Group
• Gerardine Clifford, CEO Taeaomanino Trust
• Tofilau Kerupi Tavita, Wellington Samoan Kilikiti

GPIA seminar 13:
Risk-based management of third party funding arrangements,
(23 April 2010) - Wellington

The establishment and monitoring of contracts and the enforcement of contractual obligations can be costly, resource intensive (for both parties) and requires particular skills and persistence. The Auditor-General and the general public expect government to use public money well, to manage risks and still support innovation.

Seminar attendees heard about the Auditor-General's expectations, how a large Ministry has addressed the issue of managing risk, about high trust contracting and new research findings on how public servants manage risk. Community and government participants explored the full spectrum of risk how this could be applied in their agencies.

Presentations covered four perspectives on risk:

• Nicola White (Assistant Auditor-General, Legal) discussed the Office of the Auditor-General's insights to risk-based management of third party funding arrangements
• Gayle Abel from the Ministry of Social Development presented on supporting and facilitating development of a Ministry-wide risk-smart culture
• Sally Babington and Brent Watson from the Ministry of Social Development's Family and Community Services talked about implementing the Ministry's approach to risk management and high trust contracting
• Carolyn Cordery (Senior Lecturer from Victoria University's Wellington School of Management) shared recent research on how public servants evaluate and manage risk when they contract with non-profit organisations.

Good engagement seminar 7 (31 March 2010) - Christchurch

This workshop on good practice in community-government engagement featured two presenters:

• Trish Hall: Brokering successful cross-sector partnerships
  Partnerships are easier to aspire to, than to achieve. A decisive factor in the success of partnering is the skill of partnership brokers or practitioners (who can be internal or external to the partner organisations). The role of this partnership broker is frequently overlooked and seldom developed. Trish's presentation will provide an opportunity for you to consider yourself as a broker. 
• Mary Richardson: Advocacy - an essential component of a healthy and vibrant democracy
  Debate is fundamental to the development of good public policy and a well-functioning democracy. Governments that are open to policy debate enhance their own legitimacy and strengthen the quality of decision-making. Dissenting views are an essential aspect of public debate. Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) serve several important functions in the policy debate, including providing information and opinions that would otherwise not be heard; representing marginalised groups that otherwise have no public voice; and providing a cost-effective channel for consultation. mary's presentation will provide an opportunity to consider the advocacy process and your role in it.

GPIA seminar 12 (19 & 22 Feb 2010 - Wellington & Hamilton)

Staff from government agencies brought representatives from their community partners/stakeholders to these seminars, which featured the following:

• Case study 1:
  Interactionz, a Hamilton based disability services provider and its Work and Income  national contracts advisor will tell their story of a long term funding relationship. One feature of this story is the provider's commitment to challenging its own purpose and outcomes and the funder's acknowledgement of the provider as the "expert".
• Case study 2:
  He Oranga Pounamu, the Christchurch-based Ngai Tahu-mandated health services co-ordinator in the South Island and the Ministry of Health tell their contract story.

The case study presentations were followed by facilitated workshops designed to enable participants to apply learnings to their own situations.

Attendees learnt about:

• contracting arrangements that work for both parties
• the critical importance of trust between funder and provider to assure clients of the best services in the long term
• the challenge of achieving policy goalsas well as the goals of community-based providers
• contracts that recognise the providers' expertise
• the value to both parties of investing in a relationship to make the contract work.

Notes form the group discussions will be added at a future date.

Good engagement seminar 5 (23 Sept 2009)

Organisations face a growing need to work in an integrated fashion across different sectors. To achieve successful results from stakeholder engagement, we need sound knowledge of stakeholders’ needs and understanding of how to work collectively.

The presentation by Kate Irvine and Peter Barton from the Ministry for the Environment’s Stakeholder Engagement team provided insight to the Ministry’s systematic approach to building key relationships.
There was particular interest in the toolkit the Ministry developed to help staff implement planning techniques to build a sound knowledge of stakeholders’ needs and an understanding of how to work collectively. 

To request permission to use material (including images) from the presentation below, please contact:
Julia Porter, Director Organisation Performance, Ministry for the Environment, PO Box 10362, Wellington, New Zealand.
Email:julia.porter@mfe.govt.nz

Good engagement seminar 4 (12 June 2009)

Trish Hall of Thought Partners spoke about effective partnerships - see her presentation for more details.

GPIA Seminar 11 (29 May 2009)

This seminar featured a case study from Jim Olson, Director, Strategy and Capability Analysis, Ministry of Defence, which provided a very different and challenging way of looking at planning for complex relationships - dimensions such as non-adaptive vs. adaptive; simple vs. complex; and predictable vs. chaotic.

Interventions in complex and adaptive social systems represent some of the most common problems of social policy. Complex adaptive systems often manifest unexpected behaviours and it’s good to be able to study them before committing to a real-life intervention. Policy advisors always need to be clear about their intervention logic – that is, the reasons why they believe that certain interventions will result in certain (desired) outcomes and not other (undesired) outcomes. Developing intervention logic always involves applying some form of “thought model” of how the world behaves. This presentation challenged the way we traditionally think by discussing the kinds of models that are appropriate to different circumstances. It was followed by a discussion about the use of agent-based simulation as one tool for providing insights to complex and adaptive social systems.

Good engagement seminar 3  (22 April 2009)

Vivien Twyford has extensive experience in designing public participation processes in Australia and New Zealand, and providing training for local, regional and central government agencies. The seminar challenged participants to rethink their allocation of time and resources between planning, implementing and evaluating.   Vivien explored and explained the implications of her statement:

“The command and control theory of management was designed to reduce uncertainty and vagueness and deal with complexity in war.  This approach to community engagement can place a community in the role of the enemy.  Planning using this approach often focuses on tools to manage and influence the community to agree with expert decisions.”

GPIA Seminar 10 (6 March 2009)

The State Services Commission presentation covered what is being done to strengthen trust and reinforce the spirit of service in the public sector.  NZAID presented on how they responded rapidly and decisively to implement organisation-wide change after their procurement and contracting processes were rated as “poor and needing significant improvement” in an audit. 

Good engagement seminar 2 (11 Feb 2009)

This seminar, by Dr Trish Nickel, considered the ideal of public participation, its criticisms, and contemporary methods to overcoming these challenges.  Dr Nickel's presentation included a specific focus on the Open Space Technology approach.  

Dr Nickel is a lecturer in the School of Social and Cultural Studies at Victoria University. Her research explores the theory and practice of civil society and governance. She has worked for six years on public participation and governance in Russia, Serbia, Ukraine and the United States.

Good engagement seminar 1 (9 Dec 2008)

This fast-paced, participatory seminar, presented by Anne Pattillo, outlined a framework for good practice in community engagement, including the International Association for Public Participation engagement spectrum and core values.

GPIA Seminar 9 (28 Nov 2008)

Encouraging innovation through relationship building was the focus of presentations on the Better Connected Services for Kiwis project and the Ministry of Social Development’s SKIP programme.

• Strategies with Kids, Information for Parents (SKIP),
  Gael Surgenor & Lorraine Tarrant
  This Narrative as Evidence presentation illustrated goverment working with delivery systems to learn from, and add value to, work already happening in the community. Participants heard how SKIP created space for collaboration and innovation by:
  • investing in the capabilities of community organisation partners
  • developing the delivery programmes in partnership supporting community organisations to try a variety of ways to get to the same goal
  • encouraging reflection and learning.
    » Learn about SKIP – Strategies with Kids, Information for Parents       
• Better connected services for Kiwis,
  Derek Gill & Elizabeth Eppel - Institute of Policy Studies, Victoria University
  Participants heard about how ordinary New Zealanders in the public sector worked collaboratively and achieved some extraordinary results in seemingly commonsense, everyday ways. Joined-up government is not about throwing out everyting we currently know and do. Its about adding new ways of working to the repertoire so that better outcomes for Kiwis can be achieved more often and in a wider range of circumstances.
  » Read more about the Better Connected Services for Kiwis project

Discussion during the day focused on the continuum of working with others – from co-existence, to communication, co-operation, co-ordination and collaboration.  Emphasis was placed on the fact that collaboration is not always the best option – and that there are perfectly legitimate times when basic communication or co-ordination are what is needed.  This is usually the case where there is agreement about what needs to be done and there are clear boundaries of responsibility.   Seminar participants recognised the demands of collaboration, the need to create space for venting, thinking, scoping what to do and the challenges of sustaining any collaboration long term through successes and failures, and personnel changes.

» Read the Statement of Government Intentions for an Improved Community-Government Relationship

GPIA Seminar 8 (19 Sept 2008)

Featured case studies:

• The Ministry of Health Drinking-Water Assistance programme “bringing water to remote communities, an exercise in innovation”
• SPARC’s research on finding and keeping volunteers: “they all do it for different reasons”.

GPIA Seminar 7 (16 March 2007)

This seminar featured Mark Lyons, (Adjunct Professor of Social Economy in the School of Management at the University of Technology in Sydney, Australia) and explored:

• an international perspective on relationships between the state and third sector
• the need for a whole-of-government approach to implementing the Statement of Government Intentions for an Improved Community Government Relationship
• the need to develop robust theoretical frameworks for the community relationship
• how to build a strong platform for government agency engagement in a June 2007 cross-sectoral forum with government
  (see www.ocvs.govt.nz/publications/community-government-forum.html )

GPIA seminar 6 (24 Nov 2006)

Volunteers play a vital role in contributing to social development, the economy and the environment. The Government Policy on Volunteering acknowledges the importance of volunteers, and highlights government’s expectations of state sector agencies in relation to their policy development, service delivery and interactions with volunteering.

At this seminar, participants heard about and discussed why volunteers are important to government agencies and how they contribute to achieving government and community goals.

GPIA seminar 5 (25 Aug 2006)

This seminar examined the principles involved in the good management of public resources. Case studies explored issues of accountability, transparency, risk management, equity and fairness, while acknowledging Government’s expectations of relationships with the sector such as collaboration and partnership. Presentations and case studies were made by the Office for the Auditor-General, Ministry of Social Development, Energy Efficiency Conservation Authority and the State Services Commission.

GPIA seminar 4 (12 May 2006)

In this GPIA seminar, three government agencies presented their take on how and why they build trust with the community and voluntary sector. 

Keynote presentations were:

GPIA seminar 3 (11 Nov 2005)

Keynote presentations:

The Nga Puna Wai o Hokianga pilot project: a “hands-off” approach to collaboration – Dr Michael Taylor, Senior Advisor (Environment Team), Environmental Health, Communicable Disease and Environment Health Policy, Public Health Directorate, Ministry of Health; Jeff Foote, Senior Systems Scientist, ESR, Christchurch; Mike Anderson and Maryanne Marino, Whirinaki Water Board.

GPIA seminar 2 (24 June 2005)

“At their best, the State is very good at standardising and the community and voluntary sector is very good at customising.” That was how OCVS Senior Analyst Hugh Lawrence described the complementary roles of government and the sector. He also described conceptual frameworks that could be used to better understand and manage community-government relations.

Don Clarke, Director of Global Programmes for NZAID, said the relationship between the sector and government is simple: “It’s about human relationships, it’s about treating others as you would like to be treated yourself.”

Don outlined how NZAID developed a rationale for building trusting relationships with its non-government organisation (NGO) partners. He was supported by Peter Zwart of Caritas Aotearoa and Mike Hartfield of the Council for International Development, who presented their perspectives as organisations that receive NZAID funding.

All three presenters talked about the Strategic Policy Framework as the basis for their working relationship. The Framework can be accessed via www.goodpracticefunding.govt.nz/funding-relationships/examples/nzaid.html

Keynote presentations:

GPIA seminar 1 (22 April 2005)

Keynote presentations:

These online toolkits are aimed at public servants, but have many useful tips of use to all.

• Good practice participate.
  This toolkit assists public servants to engage successfully with community, voluntary, iwi and Maori organisations when decisions are being made.
• Good practice funding.
  This toolkit provides the funding principles and processes of government agencies in New Zealand and overseas.