Nurturing inclusive environments: Supporting human functions in civil society organizations

Introduction

Both in civil society and community-based organizations that give primacy to education and learning, fostering inclusive and participatory environments is not just an aspiration—it’s an imperative. When we consider the issues involved in human functioning and team dynamics of any organization, we find that the landscape is complex and interesting. It is full of intricacies, which demand thoughtful consideration and unweaving.

A rich literature is available today on these topics, including in the specific context of civil society organizations (CSOs) from which practitioners can learn. In addition, many young people with professional training in organizational development (OD) are entering CSOs today. However, conditions were very different some thirty to forty years ago, when CSOs started functioning on a larger scale. While looking back at the initial years of CSOs’ formation and functioning, we find that in many ways most members were rather unprepared to deal with human dynamics and other related aspects of organizational functioning.

At that time there seemed to be disdain amongst CSOs for learning from writings on management or team processes. These were linked in our minds very closely with business and corporate practices and hence to be avoided. Engagement with a formal understanding of organizational and team functions was yet to find its way into the cultures of pioneering CSOs, such as Kishore Bharti, Vidushak Karkhana or Eklavya. Each group laboured to evolve its team structure and dynamics, and build its own system of decision making, from sratch. This was often at a cost to team members and their efficiency. What many members shared in fair measure in those early days was a strong commitment to the CSOs’ vision and the ideas of programs. They also had firm beliefs in ethical and participatory functioning.

In organizations, as in society at large, there have often been high and unrealistic expectations from the leaders. A leader is expected to be a know-all, who will solve all the problems. And because of these expectations, many leaders try to fit into such an image. On the other extreme, in organizations, which laid stress on introducing democratic functioning, there were efforts to downplay the role of any one leader, leading to a philosophy of “no leader”. When a democratic form of leadership is used, the leadership will inform and consult the group. This means taking inputs and feedback while taking decisions. This will lead to higher levels of engagement and commitment and bring in diverse perspectives and inputs to problem solving.

A more interesting scenario for participation emerges when the leadership recognizes its own limitations. Thus, leadership is distributed amongst members of the team, according to the perceived, context-specific requirements. Recognition of their own limitations by leaders will help them create new roles and avenues for the team. This could potentially compensate for these limitations. One method for doing this, would be to create spaces for constructive dissent, when leadership is perceived to be making a mistake. And additional forms of distribution of leadership could be to include delegation of leadership functions amongst team members. With such issues and questions in the background, it would be interesting to listen to actual experiences of some leaders and senior members of CSOs, who have played a role in charting a path from the early days of an organization to an established and stable status.

Diverse paths to participatory functioning

It is instructive to hear different narratives of the development paths followed by CSOs that have achieved a high level of stability and effectiveness. Through what processes did they reach their present levels of program management and decision making? What were the debates around issues of hierarchy and participatory processes? How were decisions taken regarding organizational systems?

To get some insights into such issues, I decided to learn about the historical processes regarding initial setting up and consolidation, leadership formation, participation and team dynamics in decision making, etc., from some senior members and leaders of different organizations. My objective was to understand the experiences and dynamics that team members and organizations went through in evolving stable systems and styles of leadership. How did the systems and structures in organizations evolve as they grew in size and understanding? Why were old systems given up in favour of new processes?

To initiate the discussions, I posed some basic questions to the leaders and senior members. I list a few of these here. When your organization started, did you have a collective understanding of human functions, such as team dynamics, decision making, etc.? How did this understanding develop? Was any planned external support taken to take this process forward and how effective was this? Was there any special focus on participative leadership in the group? What was the strategy adopted for this and how effective was this?

Capacity building for an egalitarian society: the case of Vikas Samvad Samiti

With these questions on my mind, I had a discussion with Sachin Jain, who now works as the Director of Vikas Samvad Samiti (VSS). It was formed in 2001 as a project in Bhopal. Today VSS is a research, documentation and capacity building organization that works to build a team of socially sensitive cadre of workers and communicators in the nonprofit sector. In this interview, Sachin Jain talks about how the organization initially functioned in a centralized manner. However, over the years, experience taught him the need for participatory functioning. Following this, organizational change processes were introduced. It is instructive to see the introduction of formal systems and OD processes, as VSS has developed from a small organization into one that has been taking up bigger responsibilities in several states in the Hindi belt.

Personal beginnings: Sachin did not have any background of social service at home that would prepare him for civil society work or activism. His father had worked in a bank, and his grandfather was a pujari in a mandir. So, he says, he found himself totally isolated in the family, while developing this interest to be involved with social issues. In his community, there were strict social norms. For instance, they would not even drink water in another Jain family. Water would be warmed before drinking and could be used only for three hours after that. So, many eyebrows were raised when he first decided to do a summer project in tribal Bastar.

Later, while thinking about the nature of the organization he wanted to set up, he was clear that he did not want to make this a “personal entity”. People who were associated with him and later became part of the Board, were very supportive in giving praise. However, they could not offer any critical inputs, which he feels was required.

How are we different from other organizations: Sachin wanted to be clear how his organization was different from others. So, he would often pose the following question in his team. “Why are we here? What sort of a society do we want to build?” He tried to ensure that the vision and mission remain critical in decision making at both the institutional and individual levels. He realized that if the organization’s vision is not kept central to the decision-making process, then a leader’s individual thinking may take over and foist its direction on the organization.

Decision making in a small organization: Like some other founders, Sachin had not worked with any other organization. So, this was his first organization. He was learning from scratch. Everything was an experiment, and an opportunity to learn, without the shadow of another organization falling on him.

Sachin related that, to begin with, there were only five people in the organization. They interacted continuously to understand each other. This happened both inside and outside of the meetings. As a result, their decisions were not just the result of meetings. The personal interactions they held outside of the meetings also contributed as well. This worked well in a small organization. It also seemed quite democratic. Any conflicts or differences were sorted out through mutual interactions. Contexts were clarified at the platforms available for discussions.

Challenges of growing bigger: Once the team grew in size, the continuous sharing and close understanding of earlier days was not possible. Team members had to take decisions through formal meetings. This often did not give time for differences to be sorted out or contexts to be clarified. In a centralized system, the pressure on a single leader kept growing. Sachin found that he had to take most decisions single-handedly. From repairing a broken tap in the office to the appointment of a new team member, each problem was being referred to him. This made him uncomfortable and irritable.

He had believed in being accessible. So, the accountant would walk in unannounced any time with cheques or other budget work. He had little time left for his writing and research. His role in trainings and material development was also getting affected. It was this compulsion that made him realize the need for decentralization. It led him to develop participatory systems in the organization.

The responsibility for all financial matters, along with program implementation and reporting, was handed over to the program leads. All roles and responsibilities were clarified and fixed before a project was started. In the project plans, each activity had to be broken into a monthly plan, along with a concept note to explain why an activity had been included. An expenditure plan was also prepared. This was linked to, and had to be kept within the limits of, the project budget. A program committee was set up to oversee these operations. Thus, the load for managing programs was distributed amongst team members.

This was some years ago. Since then, Vikas Samvad has initiated a full-fledged OD program with support of a professional organization. This is helping them to plan ahead in a comprehensive manner. However, this should be the subject of a separate story.

Collaborative beginnings for collective action: what it takes to plan for and start a democratically run CSO

The second case study describes the initial processes during the establishment of an organization. It was set over forty years ago to work in school education by a group of young academics. They had already been working together to develop shared goals and mutual trust. This founding group of six persons had support from members of another organization. The latter had served as a base organization for the new initiative. To understand the dynamics of this process, I talked to a senior member associated with the organization since its inception. We shall call her Kavita. Some critical points about what gave a strong foundation to the new group emerged from this interview.

The new organization was not the result of an individual’s initiative, but the outcome of joint efforts by a group of motivated individuals. They had left their jobs to commit to full time participation in this new initiative. The group spent more than a year in preliminary planning and in examining alternative strategies to start work. No external inputs regarding organizational systems and structures were taken. However, the experience of the supporting organization provided a strong base of values and operating systems for participative functioning.

Starting with a process of group leadership of diverse individuals seems to have provided many benefits. It provided the organization with a broad base of academic and social skills. It also helped attract new members with diverse backgrounds and interests. Kavita had participated in group meetings of the founding group, since she had been visiting the parent organization for her master’s project work. However, at that point, she was not part of the new group being formed. But she had sat through many discussions in the new group, since these discussions were open and were being held in an inclusive manner.

Her insights give interesting pointers about the dynamics in the organization during its formative years. A critical contribution to the institution building process was made by a member of the group, who invited written views from the other members on their vision for the new organization. Based on this, a consolidated paper was shared with the group for discussions and to develop a unified vision. This was a timely input that helped develop mutual understanding. It also brought cohesiveness in the objectives and priorities of the group’s members.

Another member played a crucial role in meeting and motivating new members to join the group. After participating in the initial stages of discussions on objectives and planning, two other members put in a month-long effort to prepare a strategy paper that gave a clear-cut action plan to set up the structure. This was later shared with the professional community and the government, whose partnership was considered the bedrock for changes in the school education system.

So, by the time this organization started functioning, the participatory process that had preceded the establishment, helped set up a close-knit group. It also had clear-cut and documented plans to start the initiative and take the program forward. This long process had prepared the team for critical and frank discussions. This, thus, had created a lively and robust environment.

Decision-making structures: Initially, while the working group was small and had just six to seven persons with relatively uniform backgrounds, it functioned and took decisions in a very open and informal manner. When a second wave of new persons joined the organization, which included some junior members too, then the question arose about who should participate in decision making. At this point, a council of members was formed from amongst the larger working group for decision making. It had been agreed upon from the beginning that the Governing Body would not play a decisive role in the organization. The council of members would run the organization and take decisions based on consensus. The Governing Body would play a supportive and advisory role in the programmatic and financial decisions of the council. In addition, there would be no full-time Director.

From this initial formative period, the organization promoted a democratic and federal form of functioning. The organization functioned as several centres of innovative action. Each of these shared and focussed on common programs. However, they could also initiate separate activities and programs.

Decision making principles: If a critical decision had a split vote, say 8 versus 7 in a group of 15, then the group would go back to the discussion table. The stress was on consensus and ensuring participation in discussion of many, and not just a few, during decision making. Observers from the team were invited to council meetings as non-voting members to learn and enhance understanding. The initial program of the organization was to cover all the schools in a district. So, the team was spread out in that district over three centres. This promoted decentralized functioning. Many independent initiatives were promoted at the different centres. In fact, the initial name of the organization carried the byline “Centres for educational research and innovative action”.

A fourth centre, which played the role of coordination, was opened at Bhopal. However, special efforts were made to ensure that this centre did not become too powerful and subjugated the others. In the first year of formation, a senior member started a regular but informal newsletter to share what was happening with all the centres. This helped develop stronger communication channels amongst all the members.

This brings our story to the end of the very beginning of this organization. Its journey after this point involved huge structural changes necessitated by a long period of growth, multiple inputs for organizational development and a drawn-out period of change management. But all this we shall leave for another day.

In conclusion

To summarize, the two case studies here have dealt with some very early challenges that all fledgling organizations must face. These include involving members in decision making and growing in the direction of participatory leadership. The first organization had to face simpler challenges. However, the second organization had advantages, since it started with a larger group of ‘more equal’ members. Therefore, it could develop an early form of group leadership. This allowed it to start a process of leadership turnover in good time.