The IllumiLab equips organizations to increase their impact by aligning their Why, What, and How. No project better exemplifies this approach than our work with the newly formed Eastern Region Alliance. The Alliance is a collaboration of four county tax funds who came together to align their funding requirements, processes, and tools in order to equip each of them to:
- more efficiently and effectively meet their mission,
- reduce the administrative burden on the agencies they fund,
- and unleash the power of data in driving process improvement, decision-making, and measuring and demonstrating impact.
As tax funds authorized by the same state legislation, the four Alliance partners – Productive Living Board of St. Louis County, St. Louis Office of Developmental Disability Resources, Developmental Disabilities Resource Board of St. Charles County, and Developmental Disability Advocates of Jefferson County – fund services to the same target population by supporting many of the same organizations while using similar processes and tools. However, their terminology and funding processes and requirements were unique enough to cause confusion and inefficiencies for the agencies they fund.
Over 18 months, The IllumiLab used our skills and expertise in performance management, project management, evaluative thinking and quality improvement to facilitate a critical reflection on their current practices and to envision, negotiate, and articulate a new, shared, and aligned Why, What, and How.
What
At the start of this work, the four Alliance partners funded over 200 projects between them, many of which represented the same services provided by the same organizations. However, each were structured and labeled differently enough to create confusion for agencies and for the Alliance partners. Through a painstaking process, the teams compared the different boundaries and structures of each project to reach agreement where they could, thus creating consistency and efficiencies for funded agencies.
Why
The Alliance partners entered this process aligned on their most fundamental purpose: to fund services that support the independence, inclusion, and quality of life of people with developmental disabilities. However, true alignment required them to define success in meaningful and measurable terms. By reflecting on past practices and data, eliciting input from funded agencies, and articulating our intentions, the Alliance created a shared Outcomes Framework that will allow them to measure and describe impact within each county and across the region.
The only way the Alliance partners can achieve impact on the lives of people with developmental disabilities is through their partnerships with funded agencies; this is their primary mechanism for creating change. Recognizing this, The IllumiLab challenged the team to begin its work by articulating its vision for its relationship with its partners by answering questions like:
- Why do we fund what we do?
- Why do we require what we do of agencies?
- Why do we monitor funded projects?
- Why do we gather the data we do?
This process culminated in the creation of Guiding Principles that articulate the Alliance’s values and priorities – another Why.
How
Guided by their newly articulated Why, the partners had to design a new How – new funding processes, procedures, requirements, and tools – that aligned with their What and Why. The IllumiLab challenged the team to ensure fidelity to their Principles, create consistency throughout their process, and to “walk their talk.” The team shared their commitments with their funded agencies and invited them to hold the Alliance accountable. We are in the process of developing self-assessment and evaluation tools to monitor the Alliance’s fidelity to its Principles and to create regular and systematic ways of reflecting, learning, and making improvements.
Power of Alignment
We called this project “Alignment & Integration” because we were focused on aligning the four partners with each other and integrating processes and tools to support that alignment. It would have been possible to stop there, but we didn’t. They recognized this as an opportunity to rebuild their work in the image of their values. They recognized that process impacts results, and well-founded and justified processes earn the respect and trust of their partners. In sum, with processes (How) that reflect their values and support their intentions (Why), the work of the partners (What) becomes more efficient, focused, and impactful.
Here’s what three of the partners’ Executives say about this experience:
“Through this process, we made the changes necessary to be who we said we wanted to be – a trusting partner who is responsive, accountable, and efficient. This process has been challenging and lengthy, to be sure, but Sarah was able to generate energy, translate our ramblings into clear and concise commitments, and challenge us to think outside our comfort zone. We could not have done this without The IllumiLab; Sarah’s management of this project and skill set helped turn our vision into a reality.”
~Shaelene Plank, Executive Director, St. Louis Office for DD Resources
“The Alliance Partners have worked together on several projects in the past, but nothing near the size and scope of the Eastern Region Alliance. Simply put, without the expert guidance of The IllumiLab, this vision might never have become a reality. Sarah helped us determine the project’s scope and priorities, establish an aggressive but achievable timeline and held us accountable to our commitments. Most of all, she challenged each of us to stay focused on our Guiding Principles when difficult decisions needed to be made.”
~Peg Capo, Executive Director, Developmental Disabilities Resource Board
“The Alliance recognizes how very fortunate we are to have Sarah as a partner, guiding us through this complicated, important, sometimes messy, exciting work that will benefit the community for many years to come. Her unique ability to synthesize reams of information quickly and accurately, to clearly communicate complex ideas to broad audiences, and to diplomatically manage a variety of personalities and team cultures has positioned the Alliance to be not only successful, but a model for other organizations looking to collaborate. Working with Sarah is the best investment an organization can make in itself.”
~Becky Herschbach, Executive Director, Productive Living Board