Learning in and for interagency working :Learning in and for interagency working Harry Daniels The Centre for Sociocultural and Activity Theory Research University of Bath, UK h.r.j.daniels@bath.ac.uk


Outline of the Presentation :Outline of the Presentation The policy background Learning challenges identified in LIW Professional learning Organisational learning Some of the research questions


social exclusion :social exclusion social exclusion which may be typified as loss of access to the most important life chances that a modern society offers, where those chances connect individuals to the mainstream of life in that society.


interagency work :interagency work Responsive interagency work in these contexts requires a new way of conceptualising collaboration which recognises the construction of constantly changing combinations of people and resources across services, and their distribution over space and time.


Working together :Working together young people require, but typically are not in receipt of, flexible and responsive interagency service delivery professionals need to learn how to work collaboratively. Collaboration between agencies working for social inclusion also now emphasises collaboration with service users. Promoting deliberative agency


Slide 6:Craft Tacit Knowledge Mass Production Articulated knowledge Development


Slide 7:Craft Tacit Knowledge Mass Production Articulated knowledge Process Enhancement Practical Knowledge Renewal Development Linking


Slide 8:Craft Tacit Knowledge Mass Production Articulated knowledge Process Enhancement Practical Knowledge Mass Customisation Architectural knowledge Renewal Development Linking Modularisation


Slide 9:Craft Tacit Knowledge Mass Production Articulated knowledge Process Enhancement Practical Knowledge Mass Customisation Architectural knowledge Co-configuration Renewal Development Linking Modularisation Networking


Slide 10:Co-configuration includes interdependency between multiple producers in a strategic alliance or other pattern of partnership which collaboratively creates and maintains a complex package which integrates products and services and has a long life cycle.


Learning :Learning For co-configuration In co-configuration Need to go beyond conventional team work or networking to the practice of knotworking


Knotworking :Knotworking is a rapidly changing, distributed and partially improvised orchestration of collaborative performance which takes place between otherwise loosely connected actors and their work systems to support clients. various forms of tying and untying of otherwise separate threads of activity takes place. Co-configuration in responsive and collaborating services requires flexible knotworking in which no single actor has the sole, fixed responsibility and control


Knotworking :Knotworking requires participants to have a disposition to recognise and engage with the expertise distributed across rapidly shifting professional groupings.


Social world structures thinking Any function in the child’s cultural development appears twice or on two planes… It appears first between people as an intermental category, and then within the child as an intramental category :Social world structures thinking Any function in the child’s cultural development appears twice or on two planes… It appears first between people as an intermental category, and then within the child as an intramental category


Scientific and spontaneous concepts :Scientific and spontaneous concepts Spontaneous Concepts Scientific concepts Impose on child logically defined concepts Scientific concepts move ‘downwards’ towards greater concreteness Evolve in highly structured and specialized activity of classroom instruction Concepts emerge from the child’s own reflections of everyday experience Spontaneous concepts move upwards towards greater abstractness Develops in child’s everyday learningenvironment Mature concepts Object Concept


theories of learning :theories of learning subject (traditionally an individual, more recently possibly also an organization) acquires some identifiable knowledge or skills in such a way that a corresponding, relatively lasting change in the behaviour of the subject may be observed. knowledge or skill to be acquired is itself stable and reasonably well defined. There is a competent ‘teacher’ who knows what is to be learned.


Slide 17:People and organizations are all the time learning something that is not stable, not even defined or understood ahead of time. important transformations -- literally learned as they are being created. There is no competent teacher.


Development :Development In Activity Theory development is not only an object of study, it is also a general research methodology. The basic research method in Activity Theory is not traditional laboratory experiments but the formative experiment which combines active participation with monitoring of the developmental changes of the study participants. Ethnographic methods that track the history and development of a practice have also become important in recent work.


Slide 19:finland june Daniels Visser and Cole 1999 19 questioning analysing modelling interrogating implementing Expansive Learning Stages after Engestrom


Change Laboratories :Change Laboratories Each lasts about two hours. Tensions and dilemmas will be highlighted Alternative ways of working proposed.


Developmental Work Research :Developmental Work Research Drawing on ethnographic evidence to question existing practices (i.e. learning in and for interagency working) Analysing the historical origins of existing practices and bringing these analyses to bear in analysing current dynamics within and across services. Modelling an alternative way of working. (i.e. a new model of learning) Examining the model to understand its dynamics, strengths and pitfalls. Implementing the model and monitoring the processes and impact of implementation in the dispositions and actions of professionals. Drawing on these data to reflect on the processes and outcomes.


Slide 23:Work in the Change Laboratory typically starts with the mirror of present problems. It then moves to trace the roots of current trouble by mirroring experiences from the past and by modeling the past activity system. The work then proceeds to model the current activity and its inner contradictions, which enables the participants to focus their transformation efforts on essential sources of trouble. The next step is the envisioning of the future model of the activity, including its concretization by means of identifying 'next-step' partial solutions and tools. Subsequently, the stepwise implementation of the new vision is planned and monitored in the Change Laboratory.


Organisational Learning: the final three case studies :Organisational Learning: the final three case studies A new multi-professional team that was learning to work together A loosely coupled team working with looked after children A boundary between an extended school and the reconfiguring children services in a local authority


Two of the Research Questions :Two of the Research Questions What are professionals learning when they do interagency work? What forms of interpersonal and organisational practice are associated with this learning?


Key features of the project :Key features of the project Research team of 9 – 14 ;from Birmingham, Bath, Oxford and Loughborough Universities– mixed backgrounds Linked with work in Helsinki Focus is upon work with pupils are at risk and who are involved with a range of professionals 4 year project began January 2004 How professionals learn to do joined up work – something new, unscripted


Formative and summative findings :Formative and summative findings Between each DWR workshops the videotapes and transcripts and interviews were analysed and tentative proposals were offered as mirror data. These were provisional, interim formative findings. This presentation focuses upon the summative findings.


Summary: what are professionals learning? :Summary: what are professionals learning? To know how to know who (can work with them) To be pedagogic and developmental with other professionals To make their professional values explicit To focus on the whole child in the wider context To be clear about their own focus and expertise and recognising the expertise distributed in the system To be able to develop the strategies they need to take their work forward with other professionals


Example: Reminder of the context :Example: Reminder of the context Restructured local authority (multi-professional teams in localities); Initially working with education based multi-professional team; The second phase of the case study: social care professionals joined multi-professional team; Two cycles of learning (within education based team and within an expanded team)


Learning acquired through LIW project phase1 :Learning acquired through LIW project phase1 Making professional values and expertise explicit Be able to make and rework the tools (resources) they use to support children's trajectories Being aware that they bend the rules Learning to take responsibility for communication with strategists


Learning specific to the second cycle of learning :Learning specific to the second cycle of learning Social care and education: where is the child in professional activities? Learning about each other’s professional tools (through involving each other in case work) By means of learning about each other’s tools – realisation that they share professional values


Slide 32:Implications


Implications for organisations (1) :Implications for organisations (1) Organise in a way that allows strategy to listen and learn with operation: beyond the rhetorical ‘consultation’ Structures that derive their rationale from process as well as outcomes: after the Glissen and Hemmelgarn study and our ‘rule bending’ findings Analyse rule systems for future rather than letting legacies of the past dominate the future


Implications for organisation (2) :Implications for organisation (2) Structure the division of labour (vertical and horizontal) to align with new demands Organise for regular purposeful reflection oriented to ‘surfacing’ underlying tensions in practices and the development of new tools for new tasks Organise to articulate objects (what needs to be worked on) rather than outcomes alone