Interactive Panel 2: Engaging Governments

Wednesday 14 May2:30pm

Session reporter: Victor Kuo

Summary of the content of the session:

Social Investment Business (Jonathan Jenkins) Government has helped create social finance bonds, $1B dollars wholesale social investment

fund, and social investment tax relief, G8 Social Investment Task Force, Investment Contract Fund to help get ready. Without the government, none of this would have happened. 1 Pound turns into 35 pounds. Government engagement is important. It’s frustrating, but it’s the most impactful. It is the only way we can achieve scale and systemic change.

Benedict Cheong (Temasek Foundation) Temasek was set up in 2007 to contribute to human and social development. If you have

strong institutions, with leaders, and connections, that’s a formula that leads to development. Our strategies include capacity building, train the trainers, multipliers, education, public administration, and management. We work with government a lot, for scale and systemic improvement. We engage the ministry of education in Vietnam, Indonesia. If you get the top leaders engaged, a few things happen: 1) signaling, you get the right to the hierarchy below, especially in Asia, 2) government leaders can mobilize their resources to engage in counterpart funding, 3) they are the ones to lead and implement the projects. Only through working with government can they achieve the objectives that they want to achieve. Challenges: breaking promises, expectations of further support. Good news, there are high spots, to multiply the learnings through the system, teachers of teachers in education.

Amitav Virmani (ARK India) ARK is a UK based charity for 12 years set up by hedge fund managers. Focus in 1) child

protection, 2) education, and 3) health. We entered India to focus on education because of the challenges. In the last 6 years, we are a catalyst, to run programs at scale. Pilot programs, and then scale. We have worked with governments to define standards. We worked with a state of India and were given a proposal by the commissioner to manage 120,000 schools in the state. He gave us 2-page proposal to evaluate schools. We worked on an evaluation proposal to evaluate 120,000 schools. We went back 3 months later, presented it to the commission, and he liked it. 3 months later, the commissioner was gone,

replaced by someone from labor. Didn’t like it, then 2.5 years, 4 commissioners changed, and finally got one to sign. But the value was so high.

Mairi Mackay (Social Enterprise British Council) Global council works in Beijing. 1) We work with governments in East Asia on urgent matters

such as inclusive economic development. Myanmar is an example. We also focus on 2) collaborating for impact, to the point of systems change. That’s hugely important. Opportunities for partnerships and increasing scale. 3) “Can’t” and opportunity are about leadership.

Questions from the Audience:

Understanding government, how we can engage them from the early beginning of program development? Government representatives are excited to be involved with partnerships. [Mairi] My answer is that it’s more about convergence and telling a story of value. So government is one piece, and you have to understand who you need on the team and build relationships. There’s a huge need to be creative about collective impact stories. When we talk about government, we default to dry, reports instead of videos to demonstrate value.

[Amitav] Important to engage all levels, but that’s a flaw, because they’re not the ones signing the contract. At some point in time, it will not work. Someone will ask, why are we doing this? Everyone in the system needs to have an “ah ha moment of why they’re doing it.

[Mairi] It is not about convincing, but having people enter into what you’re doing, and how to influence the change.

[John Godfrey, philanthropic fund raising consultant] I’m observing the effort required to engage the government, but how do you assess your own return on investment? In a worthwhile way? What kind of conversation do I need to have with myself? [Benedict] if you want to ripple through the whole system, you must be involved. In Asia, two words: 1) trust, some agencies saw us friendly, so worked with them. 2) Face, the second operative word in Asia. Whatever we do must not make them look bad. You cannot say, “You need this.” You must work with them to identify their needs. Don’t let them loose face.

[Casey Chu, chair of fundraising for NUS, SMU] Comment. Pleased to see this topic of engagement governments. There are government and there are governments. It’s a spectacular example of what is good to do, but it insufficiently acknowledged. When you give, you get a 250% deduction. At the university, you get 1.5 : 1 matching. For arts, you can GD. This is exemplary behavior, but unrecognized. We should rank government with how helpful they area. AVPN and EVPN are the only two who can do this. Just as in any other country, or sector, you worked with them all.

When we engage governments, they neglect what we are doing. They are supportive and fund with us, and then they take over whatever we’re doing! The government will take over

our work and will not recognize us. They learn from us but then don’t recognize us. [Benedict] I’m ok. It’s not about me or the foundation. If you want to continue working on it, ok! You should let them be take credit as the founders. We did a training program, and then they applied this to other programs. It saved $500,000. In Singapore let them take ownership, because that’s where they should go.

Getting out, exit, with government is the harder task. Defining exit is more important. It’s about getting the government to realize 20 years later, you the government will be doing it. So we, as the foundation, don’t want it anyway.

[Benedict] If you’re interested in development, the definition of need and solution must come from the community. We are in a way a servant to the community. The power is with them.

[Dahlberg] What are practical experiences or tips that have helped you open doors, to turn the levers of impact when working with government? Experience with a middle eastern; these governments work because there is someone who does more work than average while others do less. It was the COO of the Economic Development Board who made things move. And the only way to get him was to wait by the elevator or at the spa to talk with him! When dealing with corruption, have a frank conversation with the political leadership. We understand you need to create impact. You can use us to do the work. Another set of tips is to: offer up my car, so I ride with government official and have my meeting with him in the car, and offer to write up speaking points for commissioners’ speeches and get time with him. Finally, have a meal or drink with them.

[?] Entry and exit. I’ve worked with 45-55 nonprofits. They have a grand idea to develop a project, make sure it works, hand it over to government, and then scale. Often political masters have decided they just push it off and then move on. Why don’t nonprofits say, we will do the program, and the government will outsource the project to us, indefinitely. Why not say, you legislate, you regulate, and you collect funds, but you let us to manage the selection.

[Andrew] Building a relationship in a large organization means you build leadership with a large organizations.

Truism: governments hire smart people. They take the brightest. I believe government people are not bad, but the systems make them under-perform.

[Benedict] there is a moving paradigm, shifting. Philanthropy and NGOs go in where the government has failed. Alternative is to go where there is a need! Treat them as partners.

[Mairi] Trust is a huge piece. Measurement and metrics, evaluation will take off in next 2-3 years. Trust will be central. With the government, you need to be clear how we do that with government.

[Jonathan] too easy to say it’s too hard to engage. It’s our obligations. I think you can move with urgency to drive systematic change without government.

Feedback/Take-Aways for the AVPN: Government engagement is important, but it’s frustrating, but it’s the most impactful. It is

the only way we can achieve scale and systemic change. If you have strong institutions, with leaders, and connections, that’s a formula that leads to

development. If you want to ripple through the whole system, you must be involved. In Asia, two words: 1)

trust, some agencies saw us friendly, so worked with them. 2) “Face”, the second operative word in Asia. Whatever we do must not make them look bad.

Getting out, exit, with government is the harder task. Defining exit is more important. It’s about getting the government to realize 20 years later, you the government will be doing it. So we, as the foundation, don’t want it anyway.