From a business perspective - as business people - when we set goals there are clear and very real drivers and motivators to actually achieve the goal AND always sanctions if we don't achieve the goal - for example the biggest sanction (using the word in it's LOOSEST sense) is that our businesses will fail - our customers will vote with their feet and cash and take their pound, euro, dollar to the next girl up the road......This is the problem, the Beautiful Goals that the Planners make have absolutely no accountability attached to them when it comes to these global issues of poverty eradication......
For example: UN Summit 1990 set as a goal for 2000 universal primary school education....this is now goal 2 of the MDG's for 2015.
For example: UN Summit 1977, set 1990 as deadline for universal access to water and sanitation - again this target is still there unachieved over 30 years and $2.3trillion (yes trillion) dollars later...for 2015.
And according to Easterly, no-one was held accountable for this failure. Why do these Big Plans fail? The suggestion is - looking at the evidence of re-curring failure for pretty much ALL big plans - is that it is a simple philosophical truth - Big Plans will always fail to achieve the Beautiful Goal.
Planners ask - what does the end of poverty require from foreign aid?
Searchers (we will come on to them in a minute) ask - What can foreign aid do for poor people?
A subtle but crucial difference.....especially when followed by the question - what do poor people want foreign aid to do for them?.......
Planners look to implement plans - usually Big Plans, get stuck on certain objectives then pour money after money at it despite evidence that it clearly isn't working.
Searchers look for any opportunity to do what works....and then they do it. They don't get stuck on the train tracks of infeasible objectives.
It's kind of like this: The Big Plan sets the way the water MUST flow down the mountain after the rain to achieve the Big Plan Objectives, which they believe are the right things to achieve. The Searchers see which way the water flows naturally down the mountain, through observation, attention, and then work with that to get the most out of the water flowing down the mountain for the rain clouds, the water, the mountain itself and everything living on and around the mountain.
In The Art of What Works, Columbia Business School Prof, Will Duggan believes that business success does not come from setting a prefixed goal then working crazily to achieve it. He says successful business people are Searchers, looking for opportunities to make a profit by satisfying their customers. There are Searchers in 'Aid and Development' work....(I know that's what I am and after starting this book I realise how difficult it is going to be for me to succeed in this area... the sheer force of the Big Planners looms over my vision like sheet metal!!! ) Yes, there are Searchers... read this example, it's great and SO obvious you will probably horrified like I was to find out that this was considered innovative and new practice and outside the box etc whatever you want to call it.....
Getting Mozzie Nets to the Poor
World Economic Forum 2005 - celebrities and politicians decide its a great idea to get mozzie nets to poor people....this had been tried many times before but failed dismally, with most getting diverted into the black market, used as fishing nets or wedding veils.
Population Services International (PSI) gets its funding for doing stuff that works. This makes the org act more like a Searcher and less like a Planner. They figure out a way - almost by accident - to get these nets to the people who need em, with initial funding from the bigger aid agencies. PSI SELLS nets for 50c to mothers through ante natal clinics. The nurse who distributes them gets 9c for every net she sells (giving her incentive to always have them in stock). Nets are also sold to richer people for $5 a net - bringing profits to help the subsidies....
The PSI net programme increased the national average of kids under 5 sleeping under nets in Malawi for 8% in 2000 to 55% in 2004. mmmmmm.
oh dear! So what is this blog about... just sharing this business of Planners and Searchers. It's certainly been my experience so far - and not just in the short time of the 4CC project, but here in the Community Development work I TRY to get involved with in Wales - it has been my experience as a Searcher that the Planners get in the way time after time after time.....
So how can we sensibly deal with this? The question for me is ALWAYS so
'what do we do now?'
and moreover
'Will it work?'
I once read something about stupidity; as I recall it went something like this.....
Stupidity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
I suppose a final word to Planners -who may say well, we change our plans if they don't work etc.... that isn't the point..... there is STILL a PLAN!!!!!
I'm thinking now about how all this fits with Schumaker's ideas - Small is Beautiful.... maybe i will blog about that next....
Please circulate this blog I'd really welcome views and involvement
And as a SEARCHER i'm looking for what works!!!!!
So then we can get on and do it!!!!
have a great weekend
Drink plenty of water xxx
