Applying Best Practices

Pre-election positioning, campaigning and hype are long over. The surprises

and festivities of the election results are also behind us. Even the political

jugglery that follows all these has concluded. As is often stated, "it's

time now to do some real work". The media has already started hammering the

recent parliamentary and assembly election winners with difficult questions on

their proposed policies and plans-of-action — that'll help shift gears from

politics to civic governance.

Techniques of civic governance may come very naturally to some elected

representatives-especially those who have been doing it successfully for many

years. However, for most (including cine-stars, young Turks and even those who

enjoy political lineage) it may be a daunting task to grapple with the

complexities of being an MP or MLA-with so many issues to address, lobbies to

appease, expectations to meet and results to deliver.

Rather than shooting in the dark or reinventing the wheel, wouldn't it be

great if the elected representative's could quickly "get down to

work" using some tried and tested approaches? Indeed! There are lessons

from the industry that our elected representatives can use to take their civic

governance off-the ground. It is commonly acknowledged that there are

fundamental differences between the social terrain of elected representative and

commercial terrain of the industry. However, commonalities between the two also

can't be ignored. For example: expectation management, delivering results,

gaining consensus, building trust, leadership, etc. are all areas that both a

business leader and an elected representative need to master. In particular,

India's star industry of IT/Software has set an example to the world on how to

find innovating solutions to these issues and deliver some very impressive

results.

One of the biggest contributors in this direction has been the well-intended

and faithful implementation of process frameworks like Software Capability

Maturity Model (SW-CMM)® and People Capability Maturity Model (P-CMM)®. Up

until now, these models have helped us take a structured approach for improving

our software and people processes. Lets look how the proven power of these

models can be applied to improve even the quality of our civic governance.

For a fresh look at our system of civic governance, here are some simple Key

Process Areas (KPA) that one can focus on. These are built on the basic premise

of the CMMs —that all work can be structured into constituent processes, and

the incremental maturity level of the organization is reflected by the extent of

intent-based implementation of these.

Needs Analysis: This is a three-part KPA. First, various segments that the

constituents can be reasonably divided into are identified. The segment-wise

analysis may be performed along the lines of geography (e.g. rural, urban,

residential, commercial), occupation (e.g. professionals, businessmen), age

(e.g. students, elderly), etc. Second, the constituents' immediate/short-term

needs are proactively solicited for each segment, documented, prioritized,

reviewed and used to guide funding requests and development activities of

various public agencies in the constituency. Thirdly, since these needs are not

static, they are reviewed frequently for additions or removal of items or change

in the relative priority of various item. One will also need to define ways of

addressing conflicting needs with-in and across segments. As is evident, this is

the starting point for a lot of decision and actions, hence a thorough

implementation of this process is an imperative.

Communication: Is it amazing how often elected representatives and

constituents complain of working in a vacuum. Unlike the IT industry which has

access to both "push" (e.g. email) and "pull" (e.g.

intranet) channels of communication, civic governance has traditionally relied

mostly on unidirectional "manual push" (e.g. notice boards, mailers)

means for communication. This KPA, hence, ensures that there are adequate

mechanisms for multi-way information to flow between elected representative and

constituents, and between the various constituents. Specifically, it entails

understanding the communication needs and vehicles (e.g. public notices, media

releases, web sites, email list, language of choice) for each constituent

segment and using these vehicles on a regular basis to share updates on events,

happenings, values, progress, etc. The constituents, on the other hand, have

mechanism (e.g. web, post, phone) through which they may raise their issues,

suggestions, complaints to the elected representative, and seek their closure.

Solution Planning and Monitoring: The prioritized needs of each constituent

segment are used to develop an aggregate list of development projects (e.g.

building roads, opening a new school, renovating a medical center) that address

most (if not all) of the immediate needs. For each project, its cost-benefit

analysis is done. This analysis along with the ongoing status (e.g. schedule

slippage, cost overrun, milestone achievement) of each project is regularly

shared with the constituents using appropriate vehicles as stated in the

Communication KPA.

Stakeholder Assurance: This is a novel approach for ensuring that the

end-users, i.e., the constituents, whose needs are being addressed through the

development projects, become an active stakeholder in the same. This is done by

carefully selecting a representative set of constituents per project— whose

responsibilities include verifying the proposed development projects against

confirmed needs, ensuring health of the project while it is on and providing

final approval or acceptance to the same when they finish. An example would be

involvement of the Residents' Welfare Association (RWA) that has requested a

new park in the colony. Once approved, the progress of the work is monitored by

the RWA to provide the assurance that it is being developed as per the needs of

the various residents (e.g. children, elderly) of the colony. The final payment

to the agency/contractor may not be done until the RWA "accepts" the

park as a fit end-user solution.

Orientation: As is evident from the above-mentioned KPAs, an environment of

healthy cooperation between the elected representatives, constituents, public

agencies and NGOs is a must. However, spurned by decades of distance and mutual

distrust, this is not as easy to come by. Hence, we need to focus on sensitizing

the stakeholders on the value and mechanics of sharing information and working

together. This will bring clarity of respective roles and responsibilities as

well. For example, activities like formal training in school/colleges on the

evolved civic governance system, street-plays and informal gathering can go a

long way in each stakeholder understanding the turf.

Team Formation: It is customary for each elected representative to form a

team of paid or volunteer "workers" around himself (other than public

servants). This team usually assists the elected representative in staying in

close touch with their constituency (specially when there are long spells of

absence created by the need of the elected representative to be in the

state/nation capital). The competency and values of this team reflects the image

of the elected representative and efficacy of various decisions. Hence,

selection of the coterie has to done objectively based on defined

responsibilities and desired skills.

Lest the above give the wrong impression that to define and implement a

well-oiled civic governance system, it is only the elected representatives that

have to work hard, it needs to be stated that all constituents have an equal

role to play in understanding and partaking in these processes. In an ideal

state, the elected representative works chiefly as a facilitator amongst the

constituents.

If implemented well, these processes should appropriately provide relief to

the constituents on questions and comments like: "we only see our elected

representatives at election time", "we get what we don't want, and

don't get what we want", "beyond casting our votes every so many

years, how do we get involved in day-day civic governance". Similarly, for

an elected representative, these approaches should help keep his ears close to

the ground realities, ensure proper usage of scarce resources and obtain the

ongoing co-operations of his constituents.

But the real test is whether, as a nation, we have the courage to admit that

(in spite of being the largest working democracy) we may not necessarily have

mastered the system of civic governance, the humility to learn from others and

the will to change. If we don't, answers to the "Now what" question

will hover between "whatever" and "nothing".

The author is Consulting Partner, QAI India mail@dqindia.com