Community centred social innovation with PCSOs creating Locally Identified Solutions and Practices

1. Intensive Community Engagement:
Locally Identified Solutions and
Practices (LISP)
Tim Curtis
The University of Northampton
Feb 2014
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2. Big problems
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What is the cause of ASB?
How do we have a drug-free county?
Do immigrants cause higher crime rates?
How to get youths to behave?
How do we tackle apathy?
How to improve perceptions of Policing?
Which call-outs are more important?
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3. WHAT TO DO
1.
2.
3.
Justification for LISP (What are the issues identified? What is the evidence for this?)
What community assets/vulnerabilities are in the area? (what makes this area already
mostly successful?)
Who shares the problem? (stakeholders & networks)
Identify who are directly involved in this issue? (individuals, agencies, businesses, residents etc).
How are all people/agencies involved associated?
4.
Problem Rich Picture
How do stakeholders see the problem? Where do the issues arise? What parts of the
neighbourhood are great/? Map the results
5.
6.
Form a working group (Made up of stakeholders who are engaged and able to make
changes)
Solution Rich Picture
Engage working group in RP process - What do the solutions look like from the stakeholders
perspective? How can they be achieved? What would the neighbourhood look like if all the issues
were solved?
7.
8.
Agree Interventions & Evaluation (Who is doing what, when, how, by when, what does
success look like?)
Escalation: what will make the interventions fails? What are you going to do about it to
prevent that happening? Who will you need to approach to unblock barriers to
progress?
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5. How to LISP- getting to ‘maybe’

6. Community policing is a ‘complex problem’
• Recognised by policy makers, the PCC and Chief Constable
• A category of problems that are ‘resistant’ to the National
Decision Model approach
• Can’t agree on what the problem is, let alone what the
solutions should be
• Cannot be solved by projects, committees or joint working
by professionals
• Needs to be co-produced ‘with’ communities rather than
solved by experts ‘on behalf’ of communities
• The police cannot own the solution but can organise the
community
• Requires ‘Intensive Engagement’ with communities to
understand the problem better
Ackoff, Russell, "Systems, Messes, and Interactive Planning" Portions of
Chapters I and 2 of Redesigning the Future. New York/London: Wiley, 1974.

7. Problems with current approach
• Police only see a part of the problem
• Other agencies and the residents are seen as a
problem, rather than part of the solution
• The Police like to solve problems
• The Police can’t solve all of the problems that
influence their performance
• The Police spends a lot of resource on repeats
of ASB and SAC
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8. The Vision
• PCSO's are all trained problem solvers
• PCSO's are well practiced and proficient at problem analysis with
communities and delivering Rich Picture engagement in order to do so
• The Force ensures that PCSO's are able to access expert direct support in
delivering local engagement with communities.
• Interventions are evidence based and developed with the communities
involved
• LIPS are solutions focussed and become Locally Identified Solutions and
Practices (LISPs)
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9. ‘Hard’ problem analysisthe standard approach
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10. Early days- SARA
• Scanning - spotting problems using
knowledge, basic data and electronic maps;
• Analysis - using hunches and IT to dig deeper into
problems’ characteristics and causes;
• Response - working with the community, where
necessary and possible, to devise a solution; and
• Assessment - looking back to see if the solution
worked and what lessons can be learned
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14. Instead, we need to ‘motivate’ change
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15. Challenges
• How to DO problem-oriented policing better
• How to integrate it into the Police systems and
methodologies
• Shifting from a “strategy that could only be applied
short-term, in certain circumstances and to deal with
particular issues.” to
• Normal business
• Have clear lines of responsibility & accountability in
and outside Police through a (shared) agreement – LISP
• Shift from ‘problems’ to ‘solutions & practices’
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16. gather information & intelligence
LISP JOURNEY
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17. WHAT TO DO
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Justification for LISP (What are the issues identified? What is the evidence for this?)
What community assets/vulnerabilities are in the area? (what makes this area already
mostly successful?)
Who shares the problem? Stakeholders & networks
Identify who are directly involved in this issue? (individuals, agencies, businesses,
residents etc). How are all people/agencies involved associated?
Problem Rich Pictures
How do stakeholders see the problem? Where do the issues arise? What parts of the
neighbourhood are great? Map the results
Form a working group (Made up of stakeholders who are engaged and able to make
changes)
Solution Rich Picture
Engage working group in RP process - What do the solutions look like from the
stakeholders perspective? How can they be achieved? What would the
neighbourhood look like if all the issues were solved?
Agree Interventions & Evaluation (Who is doing what, when, how, by when, what does
success look like?)
Escalation: what will make the interventions fails? What are you going to do about it to
prevent that happening? Who will you need to approach to unblock barriers to
progress?
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18. 18

20. Benefits for communities
• Solutions focussed not problem- oriented
• Gathering different perspectives from all types
of citizen
• Helping citizens to see that different people
see problems differently
• Focusses on capabilities and assets, not deficit
and blame
• Allows (hard to hear) residents to speak on
their own terms
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21. Benefits for the PCSO
• Demonstrates and legitimates what you
already do
• Creates an evidence base for you to influence
behaviour & Police strategy/resourcing
• A clear basis of action in partnership with
other statutory agencies
• Doesn’t require ‘resources’ or funding
• Can be done ‘on the fly’
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22. Time for the walkabout
first engagement with a neighbourhood
‘good enough’ data
informal engagement
TASK 1: RAPID APPRAISAL
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23. Contexts and methods
• Street walking
• Victim support
• Community meetings
• Get the residents
– talking to you
– explaining what they see ‘I’m not sure I understand
fully, can you draw that?’
– doing rich pictures
– remember grass roots, not ‘tips’
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24. Essential distinction
• ‘Grass-tips’ - usual suspects/’professional’
community activists
– Consultees are only partly connected to their
community and not well informed about
community politics, (or not demonstrated) or
• ‘Grass-roots’- unusual suspects
– Consultees are not well informed about the
interests of the organisation consulting
– Or might be ambivalent about the Police
Make a list of people you know in each category
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25. Working out a ‘perspectives’ map
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33. EXERCISE: On the flipchart paper in
front of you, draw a picture of
‘what you saw’
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34. getting to the grassroots
finding capable people
TASK 2: DEVELOP NETWORKS
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35. Social Capital- networks
• How many
acquaintances does
an individual have?
• Who knows who?
• How do they solve
problems?
• Who do they go to
get problems
solved?
Rough Guide to Social Capital: How do you get a problem solved with no money? 35

37. EXERCISE: draw over your original
rich picture, the people that you
would expect to find in this locality
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38. addressing the deficit model
TASK 3: ASSETS AND CAPABILITIES
DOES YOUR RP LOOK A BIT THIS?.........
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40. Traditional development vs ABCD
• Needs, deficiencies, probl
ems
• Negative mental map
• Client mentality
• Resources go to social
service agencies
• Undermines local
leadership
• Dependency
• Separates community
• Outside in
• Capacities, assets, dreams
, strengths
• Optimistic mental map
• Citizen participation
• Minimizes
bureaucracy, resources to
community
• Builds local leadership and
confidence
• Empowerment
• Builds connections
• Inside out
Discovering Community Power: A Guide to Mobilizing Local Assets and Your Organization’s Capacity
by John P. Kretzmann and John L. McKnight, with Sarah Dobrowolski and Deborah Puntenney (2005).
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41. Categories of Assets
• Individuals
– Skills, talents, capacities
– Dreams, visions
• Associations
– Families, friends, groups, teams
• Institutions
– Businesses, schools, libraries, police, fire, nonprofits
• Physical environment
– Greenspaces, transportation
• Local economy
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42. A B C D Processes
• Map of community’s assets
– Rich picture format
• Individuals mobilize, contribute gifts, talents
• Internal connections
– Develop a vision, “common good”
– Define and solve problems
– Multiple pathways for leadership
• External connections
– Reinforce internal strengths
– Appropriate to community’s vision
• It is a guide for relationship building, not just data.
• Knowing others in your community that have similar
interests allows groups to gather for a common cause
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44. avoiding jumping to solutions
understanding the problem better
solving the right problems
TASK 4: ANALYSE COMPLEX ISSUES
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46. Solving the right problems
• “Successful problem solving requires finding
the right solution to the right problem.
• We fail more often because we solve the
wrong problem than because we get the
wrong solution to the right problem”
• Russell Ackoff 1974
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47. What we need is to understand how different stakeholders ‘see’ the problem in the first
place and appreciate how they go about problem solving
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48. “Some
problems are so complex that you
have to be highly intelligent and well
informed just to be undecided about
them.”
Lawrence J Peter
Chapter 1 of Dialogue Mapping: Building Shared Understanding
of Wicked Problems, by Jeff Conklin, Ph.D., Wiley,
October 2006.
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49. Wicked Problems
• The solution depends on how the problem is framed and viceversa (i.e., the problem definition depends on the solution)
• Stakeholders have radically different world views and different
frames for understanding the problem.
• The constraints that the problem is subject to and the
resources needed to solve it change over time.
• The problem is never solved definitively.
• You don’t have the right to get it wrong
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50. Avoid taming the problem
• Simplistic causes “it’s all because…..”
• Tackle a small part of the real problem
• End of a project means the problem has been
‘fixed’
• Solution is definitely right or wrong.
• Problem is just like one that we have seen
before.
• Solutions can be tried and abandoned.
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51. This is NOT the only community engagement method
It is my favourite
It works for me most of the time
I teach it to my students
use ‘rich pictures’ (RP) to understanding different worldviews
use RP as an engagement tool
use RP as a problem analysis tool
ENRICHING OUR PERSPECTIVES
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52. Metaphorical language is superior to literal language because it captures experience
and emotions better and because it can communicate meaning in complex, ambiguous
situations where literal language is inadequate (Palmer & Dunford, 1996 p. 694).
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53. What to put in a rich picture
• Structure, e.g.
– departmental or organisation boundaries,
– geographical considerations,
– people and institutions.
• Process - activities, information or material flows.
• Climate - the relationship between structure and
process, and any associated problems.
• ‘Soft facts’ - concerns, conflicts, views.
• Environment - external interested bodies, factors
affecting the organisation.
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54. Hints and tips
• Start with a person in the middle
• Think about ‘boundaries’
– The limits of your ‘system of interest’
– External factors: that affect your system, but is not
affected by changes inside your system
• Think geographically
– map emotions and reactions in specific locations
– map known data on the same RP
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57. behaviours and practices as well as projects
TASK 5: IDENTIFY SOLUTIONS &
PRACTICES
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58. What does success look like?
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•
•
•
For you?
For the victims?
For the perpetrators?
For the other stakeholders?
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59. Getting agreement
SOLUTIONS – One off events, projects or facilities
What?
Why? (What
is the intend
effect?)
With whom?
How?
By when?
Measures of
success
By when?
Measures of
success
PRACTICES – ongoing behaviours or activities to sustain success
What?
Why? (What
is the intend
effect?)
With whom?
How?
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61. Evaluation & Escalation
• Evaluation
• What factors will indicate ongoing success?
– i.e. How many crime incidents are being prevented
• How are they to be measured?
• Escalation
• When, how or why should this LISP be escalated
up the Police for action at a higher level?
• When, how or why should this LISP be escalated
outside the working group for action?
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62. CASE STUDIES
Asian Gold Burglaries

69. Street Drinking & Drug Abuse

71. Justification for LISP

74. Problem Rich Picture

78. TEAM WORK