Interagency Meeting in Lansing June 12: Resources for follow-up

by Ed Morrison.
Last Updated by Ed Morrison.

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MILansing June 2009 Contracting Firms Opportunities 02m 42s-350.png

Overview of Strategic Doing

Strategic Doing is a disciplined, practical process for developing and implementing strategies in open, loosely connected networks (like a regional economy).

The steps are simple to understand, but not easy for groups to follow. Conversations in loosely connected groups are difficult to guide (think cat herding). To create effective collaborations, we must think clearly, communicate concisely, and stay focused on translating ideas into action.

Innovative (and often complex) initiatives take sophisticated thinking and a commitment to learn from experience. We also need reservoirs of trust to execute quickly, so we can figure out "What works".

Strategic Doing, in the end, enables us to do complex projects by following some simple rules. The trick comes in following the rules. Like any new habit, practice matters a lot.

The Purdue Center for Regional Development and the Edward Lowe Foundation have supported the development of new, network-based models of economic and workforce development, including Strategic Doing. All of the materials needed for Strategic Doing are distributed through a Creative Commons 3.0 license. You are free to copy, use and modify any of these materials.

(Strategic Doing is a part of a different approach to economic and workforce development, called Open Source Economic Development. Purdue is offering a certificate course in Open Source Economic Development starting in the Fall 2009. You can learn more here. Purdue, and its partner, the Economic Development Institute at the Univeristy of Oklahoma will make these materials available to other colleges and universities.)

The following resources should be helpful for you to follow-up our Lansing workshop on June 12.

If you would like any additional information, please connect with Ed Morrison, Linda Fowler or Peggy Hosea.

Agenda
Ideas for collaboration
Audio of federal partner presentations
White paper on strategic doing
Workforce development from a network perspective
Re-engagement networks
Videos of the session

Agenda for June 12

On June 12, we met in Lansing, Michigan to explore how to accelerate collaborations among federal partners of the Employment and Training Administration, the Economic Development Administration, and the Manufacturing Extension Partnership. We introduce the participants of the workshop to framework of Strategic Doing, a discipline to develop and execute strategy in loosely connected networks of collaborations. The agenda for the session:

Ideas for collaborations coming from the session

The workshop session generated a number of potential collaborations to pursue from small to large:

The University of Michigan (an EDA university center) has compiled a CD of federal resources that are available to Michigan through the Recovery Act. At the same time, ETA's partners are planning a gathering in late August or early September of potential partners to apply for grants. These two efforts can be coordinated.
This group also explored the idea of placing extensive resource material on the Web and building aa "front end" that would enable businesses to locate resources quickly, as well as contacts. Kansas has a similar effort underway.
This group also explored the potential of linking the EDA's Revolving Loan Funds in Southeast Michigan with the Manufacturing Extension Partnership. These funds currently have unused balances.
Another group of proposed building a network of hospitals, educational institutions, and government agencies to accelerate the deployment of energy efficiency technologies in buildings.
A group exploring the development of regional planning strategies focused on the importance of building leadership skills among local civic leaders and elected officials. They began to focus on opportunity to create a regional leadership initiative to teach these skills.
The group exploring solutions for contracting companies in Michigan discuss the opportunity of developing a prototype strategy for redeploying the brainpower of scientists, engineers and managers who've lost their job and the current economic downturn. This idea is very close to the "Skunk Works" initiative underway in Kokomo.
A group exploring opportunities for solutions to expanding companies in Michigan focused on a the opportunity to build a prototype network of companies and universities based around a common technology platform.
The group exploring new Kurt pathways focused on idea to collaborate between ETA and EDA to assist displaced workers who may be interested in starting their own businesses. The idea emerged of creating any debater specifically directed toward these individuals.
A group focused on new opportunities in northern Michigan explored the idea of developing network maps of local and regional leadership, using social network software. They defined the steps needed to launch this initiative.

Audio of the Federal partner presentations

Here is an audio file of the presentations made by the federal partners.

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White Paper on Strategic Doing

Here is a white paper that explains some of the background of Strategic Doing, the way in which groups can form and execute strategy in loosely connected networks.

PCRD White Paper Strategic Doing v1

Strategic Doing Packs

Workshop exercises help keep conversations about complex initiatives focused. A Strategic Doing Pack represents a set of workshop exercises designed to guide a loosely connected network around the Strategic Doing Cycle. By completing these exercises, the group generates the main components of a Strategic Action Plan.

We introduced the concept of a Strategic Doing Pack in the June 12 workshop in Lansing. Here is the strategic doing pack that we used.

Lansing Strategic Doing Pack June 12

Here is a template for a Strategic Doing Pack that you can use to guide conversations among partners. Without a clear structure, conversations tend to wander. The Strategic Doing Pack helps impose some discipline on these conversations. As members of the group becomes more familiar with each other and with the practices of Strategic Doing, they move beyond the workshop exercises and develop their own frameworks for collaboration.

Strategic Doing Pack Template

Workforce Development from a Network Perspective

One of our challenges involves rethinking workforce development from the perspective of open networks. This presentation provides you an introduction to this perspective.

Heartland Leadership Slides

Re-engagement Networks

We did not focus specifically on the concept of re-engagement networks, but it probably makes sense to focus on the plight of auto communities from this perspective.

The following presentations introduce you to the concept of re-engagement networks.

Baltimore Re-Employment Workshop Slides Morrison

Purdue Re-Engagment Networks

Videos of the Session

Strategic Doing Lansing MI June 12 2009 Video 1 from Ed Morrison on Vimeo.

Here are videos of the presentations by groups after the first breakout. Notice the difference in specificity of the findings of each group. This difference reflects how well the group was able to keep its conversation on track. The goal of this breakout was to focus on the first question of Strategic Doing: "What could we do together?"

This conversation focuses on the opportunities that can emerge when potential partners focus on how they can connect their assets. Often, these conversations get off course because people focus on what they are currently doing or what they could be doing.

They are not focused on the new connections that might bring alignment to the assets embedded in different networks.