Collaborative Innovation in the Public Sector: A new role for public managers and public organizations Jacob Torfing Roskilde University and CLIPS 10 May, 2012

Public innovation  Many perceive the public sector as ossified bureaucracy characterized by stalemate and inertia  However, the public sector is far more dynamic and innovative than its reputation  Just think of the significant transformations we have witnessed the last 30-40years

Growing demand for public innovation 1. Globalization is constructed as a competitive game that nations, regions and localities can win or lose, depending on their capacity for innovation 2. The public sector is caught in a cross-fire between rising expectations and limited resources 3. There is a growing number of wicked problems that cannot be solved by standard solutions  Public innovation can: –generate growth –enhance service quality –save money –break policy deadlocks

A new innovation agenda  Public innovation is often episodic and accidental: –New technological possibilities –Crises and scandals –Local experimentation –New employees or managers  As such, it fails to enhance the organizational capacity for innovation  Need to turn public innovation into a permanent, systematic and pervasive activity

Defining innovation  Innovation is a open ended search process through which problems are defined and new and creative ideas are developed, selected, realized and spread  Successful innovation is when innovation leads to a desirable result in the eyes of multiple stakeholders

Celebrating innovation heroes  There has been a tendency to focus upon and celebrate different innovation heroes: –Elected politicians –Public Managers –Private contractors –Public employees –Users

Collaborative innovation  However, new research shows that all phases of the innovation cycle are strengthened through collaboration  Collaboration is defined as the constructive management of differences  Collaborative innovation ensures that it is the ability to foster innovation rather than organizational boundaries that determine who contribute to public innovation

Collaborative innovation strategies 1. Cultivation strategy:  Create spaces permitting employees to collaborate across organizational boundaries to develop and test new ideas 2. Replication strategy:  Collaborate with other public authorities to identify, adjust and try out their most successful innovations 3. Partnership strategy:  Test new ideas in collaboration with public or private partners that are subjected to other rules 4. Network strategy:  Facilitate mutual learning and joint ownership through sustained interaction between public and private stakeholders

Hands-on innovation management InteractionCollaboration Innovation management Actors ConvenerFacilitator Catalyst Barriers: Lack of tradition, bad experience, or demotivating uncertainty Barriers: mental silos, lack of trust, or conflict of interest Barriers: tunnel view, risk aversion, or low degree of institutionalization

Three roles of innovation managers  Convener: –Create momentum, secure political support and integrity, set the team, distribute roles, clarify the process, define milestones and deadlines, and align expectations  Facilitator: –Provide administrative support, enhance trust, develop common frames of reference, solve or mediate conflicts and remove barriers for collaboration  Catalyst: –Provide new perspectives, construct threats, create incentives, bring new knowledge into play, change the venue and mode of interaction, spur transformative learning and manage risk

The need for a cultural revolution  Hands-on innovation management must be supplemented by a more long-term hands- off innovation management: 1. Active use of the HR function –Ensure diversity and develop boundary spanners –Recruit and nurture creative talents –Enhance collaboration, trust and influence 2. Create innovation culture –Combat the zero error culture, the tyranny of bureaucratic rules and the constraining auditing regime –Create flat and flexible organisations –Drill holes in the public silos and create open, borderless organizations

A new vision for public administration  New Public Management has led to many good things, but tends to generate an increasing amount of frustration  New Public Governance offers a new and promising vision for public sector development NPMNPG Problem Public monopoly Growing complexity SolutionCompetitionCollaboration Ambition Effective administrative units Interorganizational problem solving and mobilization of citizens Focus Input and output Process and outcomes