Does this story sound familiar? This is a simplified view of decision making, but we often see this story played out in the public sector. Too often decisions are made with little knowledge or experience of the problem that a solution seeks to solve. We create a business case, get funding, implement it, then often end up with a solution – which could be a product, policy, or service – that does not meet the needs of the end-user.
In other words, she increased her knowledge and reduced her risk. The result was that she didn’t build the wrong solution. The accelerator process starts with a discovery phase to uncover the root cause of the problem, then moves into co-design, validation, and iteration phases and ends with a high-profile event – Demo Day – where teams pitch their ideas to 400-plus people, including ministers, government officials, stakeholders, media, and interested members of the public.
When solutions don’t work, they often have two problems:
What does this look like in practice?
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There is little knowledge of the experiences of those affected by the problem.
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There is little experimentation and testing done to ensure the solution achieves the desired outcomes before it’s implemented.
Over the last three years, we’ve worked with 15 central government agencies, 8 local government bodies, and 14 NGOs or start-ups on 30 projects. Here are a few examples.
Is there a different way? What might an alternative problem-solving route look like? A route that leads to different decisions and therefore produces very different outcomes – more Jacinda and less Winston. We suggest before anything else we: •
connect with other agencies that might also be contributing to the desired outcomes
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identify the root cause of problems by connecting with the realities of users’ experiences
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co-design solutions grounded in evidence about the problem
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embed feedback loops to allow for improvements
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co-construct outcomes with those most affected.
What if we do all of this before we ask the decision makers to decide on the best solution? At which point there is a continuing process of iteration, and solutions can evolve with users’ needs. The programme The NZ GovTech Accelerator is a 13-week government innovation programme that happens annually in Wellington. It takes projects and staff from government agencies who are tackling complex problems and applies innovation methodologies to create solutions that work. The programme aims to solve root-cause problems, facilitate collaboration, and upskill participants – and so drive better outcomes. “You can see the innovation potential that has been brought to life by the process that the teams have gone through.” - Paul James, Chief Executive, Department of Internal Affairs. The accelerator works to increase knowledge rapidly, removing the risk of building the wrong solution, just like Jacinda spent time experiencing her future job options before committing to enrol.
The seven-stage sprint process the teams work through 26 PUBLIC SECTOR December 2020
Making space for the albatross In 2018, the Department of Conservation and the Ministry of Primary Industries needed a solution to the problem of Antipodean albatrosses being killed or injured during commercial fishing operations. The bird’s population has halved in the last five years, making it critically endangered. Through the accelerator process, the team developed the Electronic Automated Reporting System (EARS). This uses sensor technology to make sure fishing companies are complying with the tools that protect albatrosses – these are using night setting, streamer lines, and line weighting. They provided an incentive to fishing companies to install the technology through offering a competitive advantage. Since the programme, Fisheries New Zealand has successfully tendered a company to develop the technology. According to Fisheries New Zealand, the programme, as well as saving countless albatrosses, has saved an estimated $650,000 because a working prototype was built and it sped up solution development by two years. As seabird researcher Dr Igor Debski explained “... this development would not have been possible without applying new ways of solving problems”. Hearing the voices of whānau In 2019, a collaborative team from Te Hau Āwhiowhio ō Otangarei Trust, Te Tihi o Ruahine Whānau Ora Alliance Charitable Trust, and the Social Investment Agency (now the Social Wellbeing Agency
