Worksheet2 Governance issues
Governance issues | 2.5
Very few clusters have formal governance structures. Some of the elements of good governance – however informally arranged – are necessary for a successful collaboration.
Leadership
Few clusters have formal leadership positions – however, most have tacitly recognised leaders. Leadership can come about in a number of ways, including:
- as a consequence of the personal characteristics or experience of the individual concerned;
- because of the role of the organisation which the person represents (two of the Collaborate pilot clusters contained organisations with an infrastructure role which took on much of the responsibility for moving the cluster’s programme forward);
- because the person concerned took the initiative in forming the cluster.
Leadership in clusters is not an exclusive function, and carries no authority other than what the group chooses to assign. There can be more than one leader in the group, and in fact the more the better; problems around leadership arise much more frequently where there are none. It is also common for leadership to switch from one Core Group member to another according to the nature of the task in hand.
Facilitation
The clusters in the Collaborate pilot project had access to initial facilitation from HACT'S consultants. The feedback received during the evaluation showed that they found this an important factor in helping them to move ahead initially although, as time went on, each cluster increasingly took on the responsibility for driving their programme forward.
Where groups don’t have access to this sort of input, they need to agree between themselves who is going to carry out work between meetings. It is essential that cluster members share this responsibility, contribute the resources of their organisations where these can be of help, and – in particular – do what they said they would do. Momentum is a vital ingredient in developing an effective cluster, and meetings where everyone turns up and confesses to not having done what they agreed are an excellent way of killing it off.
Notes
While there are generally no formal minutes of Core Group meetings, proper action notes and agreed next steps are an essential discipline. They help to keep things moving forward, but also give the group a way of identifying and celebrating achievement. The clusters in the pilot project found this a key factor in motivating them to continue.