“Managing Community Change”

Nanaimo, BC September 22 - 25, 2014

Ismo Heikkila National Director

Aboriginal Services

Cando 21st Annual National Conference & AGM

Speaker

Ismo Heikkila, National Director, Aboriginal Services Ismo brings over 30 years of financial services experience and an effective ability to communicate to a broad spectrum of issues related to change management, communication planning and financial education. He leads the delivery of Financial Education and Communication Strategies for Aboriginal clients of T.E. Wealth across Canada. T.E. is a partner member of the National Trust Officers Association (NATOA) and Ismo is a member of the Education Committee. T.E. is a corporate member of AFOA Canada. Ismo authored the following articles for the AFOA’s Journal of Aboriginal Management “The Financial Planning Growth Process”, “Supporting Community Change Through Communication and Financial Education”, “Human Resources Management The Rewards and Consequences of Retirement Planning”, and “Appreciating the Challenge of Community Change”. He recently authored “Financial Literacy & Health Wellness” for Aboriginal Marketplace. T.E. is a partner member of NationTalk and Ismo is a member of the Business & Finance Advisory Board. Ismo works closely with Aboriginal community leadership and human resource professionals to audit their existing financial education programs and design complimentary communication programs that assist them in meeting their objectives. He is a regular speaker on such matters having spoken at the Canadian Institute 50 Best Employers Conference, Human Resources Professional Association National Conference, The World Future Society Annual Conference, The Industry Council for Aboriginal Business, as well as the AFOA Canada National and Regional Conferences. Ismo also consults on matters relating to adult learning, financial literacy, and philanthropy.

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Our mission statement

Our team works with Aboriginal Communities and Trusts that are accumulating wealth received through treaty settlements, economic development revenue streams, resource revenues or the settlement of specific claims. It is our objective to build capacity at the Community level in order to enhance decision making abilities necessary in growing wealth for today...and preserving wealth for tomorrow.

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Today’s topics

• The Community • Managing Change • Learning & Literacy • Financial Education • Communication • Appreciative Inquiry

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Community status

• Goals • Capacity building • Empowerment

• Strategies • Primarily mainstream researchers and

practitioners

• Evolving trends • Communities taking control • Programs representing “own culture”

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Capacity

“A society doesn’t change by adopting new tools,

but by adopting new behaviors”

….World Future Society

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Dimensions of capacity

• Leadership

• Participation

• Social support – collaboration

• Sense of Community – readiness to improve

• Access to resources

• Skill development and empowerment

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What’s lacking

• Strategies for building capacity

• Measuring capacity change

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Considerations

• Aboriginal frame of reference is still developing

• Mainstream definitions of success differ from Community expectations

• Mainstream models assume mainstream resources and skills exist and can be identified

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What about…

• Community history

• Culture

• Language

• Identity

• Culture division – traditional & dominant

• Band sovereignty

• Priorities

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“Positioning…”

“Communities are the agents of civic reform…” …World Future Society

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“Ways of knowing”

• Aboriginal vs. Western mainstream

• Transformation of power relationships

• Honoring direct experience interconnectedness, relationships, values…

• Focus on Community self-determination, healing, transforming

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Community uniqueness

• Process on own terms, own skills, collective assets, link to other community initiatives

• New large initiatives can overwhelm resources and staff

• Long term initiatives have value, yet substantial immediate needs may have priority

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Time

• Time is needed to fully establish and integrate a capacity building process

• Mainstream models expect too much too soon

• Historical, cultural, special, political environment plus time is needed

• Pressure to succeed may cause failure – need time to build trust, improve communication, develop solid working relationships

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Sustainability

• Time for long term support and evaluation

• Is there an assumption that leadership will actually use the tools and processes?

• Communities want to preserve natural balances in nature and life

• Need to minimize mainstream linear, static, time – oriented format

• Mainstream involvement must include community specific orientation (awareness to action model)

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Change

• The relationship of events to time

• External & internal

• The growth process

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What we know…

• Strategy

• Tactics

• Templates

• Leaders & managers

• Influencers

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Review of the learning process

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Information Mental

Education Emotional

Awareness

Understanding

Acceptance

Competency

Action

Factors to consider

• Age • Gender • Current health statues • Marital/family status • Income • Personal assets

• Literacy • Current events • Organization culture • Residency • Ethnicity • Personal values • Education

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Traditional definition of literacy…

“You either can

read or you cannot

read”

therefore

“You are either

literate or not

literate”

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“Future Shock”

The illiterate of the 21st century will not only be those who cannot read and write – but those who cannot learn,

unlearn, and relearn”

…Alvin Toffler

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New definition of literacy

“Literacy is the ability to understand and use information from written text

in a variety of contexts to achieve goals and further develop knowledge and potential”.

- Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development

International Assessment of Adult Competencies - 2013

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What we want to accomplish…. • guide us to appreciate the “people issues”

• give us tools we can use to manage change

• stimulate discussion among members

Overview of managing change

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What major issues do individuals think about every day?

• Health

• Relationships

• Career

• Finances

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• Understand member is on the receiving end of change

• Manage change so the members will “own” the process

People challenges

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The members

“ We don’t have

a single person to waste”

- Maggie Kuhn, founder of the Gray Panthers

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People & Change

“You must be the change you wish to see in the world”

…Mahatma Gandhi

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Culture

• comfort in routines

• fear of change

• “initiative” fatigue

People Factors

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People & Change

“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but

no one thinks of changing himself”

…Leo Tolstoy

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… Overcome fear while

preserving ego … Fear → “Saving Face”

The challenge:

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Progress requires four pre-conditions:

• knowing what to do and why

• knowing how to do it

• wanting to do it

• having the resources

Gaining buy-in

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Leadership

“The noblest joy is the joy of understanding”

…Leonardo da Vinci

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Resistance

Overt Covert

• Memos, meetings, one-on-one, public behaviors

• Hidden and can go unnoticed until it destroys a change initiative

• More constructive than covert because it can be heard and be addressed

• Clandestine unrest from indirect complaining to sabotage

• Usually the result of low trust and inadequate preparation

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The community

“Social advance depends as much upon the process

through which it is secured as upon the result itself.”

- Jane Addams

Nobel Peace Prize laureate, social worker, and suffragist (1860-1935)

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• Diverging Goals - change is seen as a threat to

established goals and means of achieving goals

• Economic Motives - change seen as a threat to current

resource allocation

• Political Motives - change seen as a threat to establishment power relationships

Community sources of resistance

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Communication

“The greatest problem in communication is the illusion

that it has been accomplished”

- Daniel W. Davenport

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Communication

Step 1

Sender Message Receiver

Step 2

Sender Message

Receiver

Step 3

Sender Message Receiver

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Communication Challenge

“There is a breath of content for everyone, yet depth of content for only a few”

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The communication gap

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Issue focus

Time

Chief & Council

Managers

Members

Establish key messages

Answer the 5 W’s

• WHO: Who is affected? Who is championing? Who is Watching? Who cares?

• WHAT: What impact will it have on me? What will I have to do differently?

• WHERE: Where can I ask for help? Where can I get more information?

• WHEN: When will I hear more? When will these changes happen?

• WHY: Why is this necessary? Rewards & Consequences

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Who will be affected?

• Internally – the community members

• Externally – non-members

• How will they react?

• What are their expectations?

• How can they impact the success of the initiative?

• What approaches will be successful with each?

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• What are the current methods? ˗ Face-to-face ˗ Print ˗ Electronic

• What are the potential methods?

˗ Committees ˗ Special Events ˗ Surveys and Focus Groups

• What methods do the members prefer?

(do the research...get the support of the “go to” members)

Communication delivery

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“Something important is happening”

“This is a good change! I’m ready to take the next step!”

“I understand the importance of these changes and what they mean to me.”

“I wonder what these changes will mean to me?”

“This sounds important and interesting,. I’d like to find out more.”

Act

ion

Awareness to action model

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A framework model

• Create personal and professional relationships

• Development of individual and group skills

• Create effective working partnerships

• Promotes commitment to issues, the group, the process

• Core is Aboriginal Ideology

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How it works…

1. “Building relationships”

• Strong emphasis on “belonging”

• Importance of “commonality”

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How it works…

2. “Building skills”

• Learning “mastery”

• Unique individual contributions

• Enhanced interpersonal skills

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How it works…

3. “Working together”

• Promotes “interdependence”

• Full integration of individual, family, Community

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How it works…

4. Promoting “commitment”

• Honors “generosity”

• Knowledge transfer and intergenerational sharing

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Going beyond…

• Standard approach; • “Action planning” • “Engaging leadership”

• Acknowledges; • “Disparities, wounds, poor conditions

• Future seeking; • Collective identity • Trust • Reflect the Community’s reality

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Why it works…

• Mainstream models tend to blame Community “culture” for failure

• Their models were inadequate coming from “top down” (Community placed)

• Community model is from the “ground up” (Community based)

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Appreciative Inquiry

• Theory and practice of organizational change

• Result of dissatisfaction

with Action Research

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Focus

• Self Think about a time when you… • Community Think about a time when the Community…

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Why Appreciative ?

• Appreciation is a process of affirmation, it is an act of attention

• Create change by paying attention to what you want

• Appreciation helps groups generate images for themselves based on an affirmative understanding of their past

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The future…

• Predictable…

• Probable…

• Preventable…

• Preferable…

…World Future Society

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Problem solving Appreciative Inquiry

Felt need ‘identification of problem’

Appreciating and valuing the best of what is

Analysis of causes Envisioning what might be

Analysis of possible solutions

Dialoguing what should be

Action planning Innovating what will be

Basic assumption: community is a problem to be solved

Basic assumption: community is a mystery to be embraced

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Problem solving & Appreciative Inquiry

Assumptions of Appreciative Inquiry

• In every society, community, organization, group or family, something works

• What we focus on becomes our reality

• Reality is created in the moment and there are multiple realities

• The act of asking a question influences in some way

• People have more confidence and comfort to journey to the future when they carry forward parts of the past

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Assumptions of Appreciative Inquiry

• If we carry parts of the past forward, they should be what is best about the past

• It is important to value difference

• The language we use creates our reality

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Appreciative Inquiry process

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Discover and value

Dreaming - envisioning the future

‘What might be’

Design through Dialogue

‘What should be

Destiny - co-construct the future

‘What will be’

Amplification

Stories • Quality of stories told

˗ new telling, new insight

• Recording of stories told ˗ rich in detail, own voice

• Sharing of stories told ˗ thematic feedback, documents,

video

Propositions – capturing the elements

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Appreciative Inquiry involves a shift

“ No problem can be solved from

the same level of consciousness

that created it. We must learn to

see the world anew.”

…Albert Einstein

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How does this connect with what I am doing?

You should be:

• thinking

• hoping

• planning

• dreaming

– transition points of connection – separation & integration

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Appreciative Inquiry summary

• The task of management is meaning - making and creating possibilities

• Communities are networks of conversation

• Affect action through communication

• Communication contains moral order

• Manage change by managing the communication

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“One can live magnificently in this world

if one knows how to love and work;

to love one’s work and to work for one’s love.”

- Leo Tolstoy

Contact information

Ismo Heikkila National Director

Aboriginal Services 26 Wellington Street East, Suite 710

Toronto, ON M5E 1S2 Direct: (416) 640-8572 Cell: (647) 520-3879

iheikkila@tewealth.com www.tewealth.com

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Thank You!

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