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Workshop 4 April 2009

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Notes from Ian Page talk: "Ideas about change and delivering vision"

The following are some notes taken from his talk, not a full report.

Ian presented us with a model of any system which needs to change over time.

H1 represents people who want the status quo – ‘business as usual’ – people who don’t want change. This is often because they are fearful of the future in any different form to the one that they know. Over time the curve gradually reduces because the conditions that allow for the status quo inevitably change. Those who want more nuclear power are an H1 group who want to keep business as usual. But, we are going to run out of uranium. Ian talked of not only peak oil, but peak everything except carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen. Our future solutions must inevitably depend on these elements mainly.

H3 represents the people with vision who can see that things can/should be different. They see that the future needs to be different. Often people full of hope, but confusion as well.

H3 people are often laughed at or feared by H1 people. H1 see H3 people as “off the planet”. And H3 people often see H1 people as ‘old fogies’ – they just don’t get the problem or the vision.

H2 people are often the pragmatists (often Venture Capitalists or unprincipled opportunists) who see that things are changing and are prepared to take a gamble on moving with the change. They take some of the vision from H3 (without necessarily buying into the whole vision) and put stepping stones in place to enable the move to the H3 position. The curve is a parabola because the solutions at H2 are not the final solutions – they are just the first steps that enable the true vision to begin to be realised.

H3 have the vision while H2 set up the opportunities. Some of these H2 projects will be positive (ie lead to the H3 vision) but others may be neutral or even negative (such as building nuclear power stations as a solution to energy crisis when the uranium is running out – they will inevitably end and won’t be part of an H3 energy solution.) H2 is where the change happens. H2 people are often the saving grace otherwise no change happens.

Ian also gave us his mantra for change

For any large scale change to occur it needs:

Change Example: Falkirk

Ian gave some examples of how large scale change was implemented in his work in Falkirk.

In this example, when the oil refinery (which supplied virtually all the jobs in the area) was to close, almost all the people were H1 – their only thought was how to hang on to what they currently had. No-one had any vision of a future without the refinery. This was a ‘conceptual emergency’. The current council/unions/businesses etc had come up with the Falkirk Action Plan. An action plan implies a future designed by experts ( although there can be no experts on the future) and implemented by rote. It fails to engage the whole of the available energy and resource. While the Falkirk Action Plan was a useful first step in getting key people round a table, it was rapidly realized that something different was needed.

To get to H3 they needed a vision which was fun, ambitious. The local people he worked with came up with ‘My future’s in Falkirk’. Which made a statement full of hope and positiveness.

In order to get to H3, they got some H2 projects going – they tapped into people who knew how to get grant money etc and set out to make Falkirk a place to live, work, have fun and not leave. It gradually became a place where individuals wanted to invest because they could see that things were improving. The H3 vision configured things – it was promoted in schools, groups, the local paper etc. The college was involved in retraining – because it became clear what the future opportunities were going to be. The council etc agreed to manage the ‘red tape’ for anyone wanting to invest in the town/start up a business. People felt the town was becoming ‘nicer’. Some small amount of work on old buildings created places for small companies to start up.

The Falkirk people have been amazingly successful, but at a meeting in 2007 it was realized that having built a ‘can do’ culture which generated economic success, they wanted more to achieve their vision, and the idea of a Helix project to bind the three local towns together with a leisure, culture and ecotown focus was born and received a large Lottery grant to support it.

Out of the Falkirk dilemma of facing a huge loss of jobs and learning how to change, came an H2 project - the Falkirk Wheel – the world’s first and only rotating boat lift(http://www.thefalkirkwheel.co.uk/).

Now the area is looking at tackling other problems, uniting three towns, separated by marshland, but making cycle paths, the waterways department converting the marshland into an attractive amenity for leisure - much of this being the result of facing change and using it as an opportunity.

Guide to Influencing Change

He gave us his personal guide as an approach to consider:

  1. Review your own attitudes – are you H1, H2, H3? Most people are a mixture but it helps to understand how to approach people if you can move towards their thinking.
  2. Create a ‘yearning’ for change – he gave as an example the creation of a bumper sticker ‘My future’s in Falkirk’ (which implied that there was a positive future). This needs PR, education.
  3. Create a symbol of success – make it BIG (he gave an example of the kelpies at Falkirk)
  4. Do a few H2 things – make them simple and achievable.
  5. Make conceptual space for others to design the change – tap into local groups, more education - something for everyone.
  6. Celebrate the H2 positives ie those H2 projects which will lead to H3 outcomes. Be prepared to ‘co-opt’ other people’s work and congratulate them on their foresight.
  7. Bend the infrastructure
  8. Don’t try to manage – enthuse and co-opt
  9. If you find yourself talking just about you, something is wrong – it is about all of us so networks are critical.

Footnote: Ian Page is a retired Futurist who worked for many years for Hewlett Packard. He is part of the International Futures Forum (IFF) - www.internationalfuturesforum.com and he gave us a couple of IFF booklets titled “10 Things To Do in a Conceptual Emergency” and “Beyond Survival – A Short Course in Pioneering in response to the present crisis” – further copies available through the website.

Notes from discussion of how we work

To be added

Notes from discussion of the 12 steps to Transition

The following notes were taken following a discussion about each of the 12 steps to transition. We reviewed where we were with implementing them and looked at priority actions for the next 12 months.

Step Comment
1. Steering Group Have the potential to use business meeting / Saturday work days or working group
2. Awareness Raising * Underway but more people needed to help with current programme. Much more needs to be done. Have some useful working groups in place inc publicity group. Need to think about using Thornbury FM more strategically
3. Networking* Doing this – need to do more. Need to get out our identity / image and encourage more people to think about the future
4. Unleashing Big Public splash can be daunting prospect. Needs to be done well or not worth doing
5. Working Groups We have work groups for some things but these working groups are strategic level groups who are looking at the future for Thornbury area in a topic area. We need to look to see if there are any existing groups which might take on this role as well as providing the impetus for these groups to form.
6. Use of Open Space etc A useful tool. We have used a similar technique successfully in our networking supper and also at our first Saturday event. Need to bear in mind when planning events.
7. Project* Projects provide a visible outcome of our ideas / allow for team building – such as the plastic bags campaign and the GIA-TIA day. Could begin to think of one now.
8. Reskilling Many members of our group have skills – because of our age profile. Also within the area is a vibrant U3A which also could be a huge skill resource. We need to spread the skills & empower people to learn. Green Fair is a good opportunity
9. Local Government Lots of good networking done with South Glos and Thornbury TC. More needs to be done with surrounding parish councils – current opportunity with Alveston Parish Plan just out.
10. Elders Museum has a current project to record local people’s experiences. Looking for volunteers – opportunity to structure the discussion to cover life pre-cheap oil. Lots of useful info in museum also. Potential to reach elderly people & interview them on Thornbury FM
11. Let it go We need to be a catalyst – to ‘prod’ and inspire
12. Energy Descent Plan Probably want to rename this when we get to thinking about it – not yet.

Transition Thornbury Area

* The starred items in the table were the ones that we decided we should focus on during the next year or so. We have not fully resolved the discussion about the steering group. In groups we discussed the starred items using the first stage of the Board Game approach suggested by the Transition Handbook. We considered each and thought about what would the project need to achieve for each of us individually to feel that it would be worth giving it 100% support. The outcomes of these discussions become the objectives for our projects/work.

Awareness Raising:

of the issues of peak oil, climate change & need for transition

Networking

Project

Project Ideas