How do we fund systemic impact?
This is a question that keeps challenging me as Kia Kotahi Ako sets out to support systems change in education and I am meeting many amazing education initiatives and funders. I came across a blog I originally wrote as part of the WISE (World Innovation Summit for Education) emerging leaders programme, August 2019. It is a topic that we will be returning to again and again but I thought I would share these thoughts and would love to hear what others are thinking too…
Many of us know that neither ourselves nor our organisations can tackle the challenges of the education system alone. But we get wrapped up in our busy lives, drowning in our own work and so can’t surface to find time and energy to engage with other organisations who share the same goals. We often quote impressive statistics of the number of students, teachers or schools who have benefited from the work of our organisations as if it is some sort of competition, even though we know we should be collaborating.
So why is it so hard to step back and see the whole system? Not just the symptoms at the tip of the iceberg but the mechanisms and mindsets that need unpicking and shaking up further down the iceberg. How do we create the time and resources so that we can work together across the system and not feel like we are competing?
One key challenge seems to be how our organisations are funded. Whilst we want to collaborate and tackle the whole system, we are often competing for the same funding pots. Through drawn-out funding processes filled with bureaucracy, time-intensive networking and ever-changing goalposts, so much time and energy is spent on securing funding that it fuels this individualistic culture. Yes, there are buzz words around funding consortiums and partnerships, networks and innovation, but within philanthropy people still seem to give money to causes close to their hearts or want to achieve certain levels of influence with their soft-power.
I am only at the start of my journey in learning about how we can fund systems change and what is already working. However, it still seems like there are cases where the buzz words are all there and the conditions needed to create the change, but that the reporting structures, timelines and risk-management required still stifle the potential. An interesting report that I came across called “Funding Systems Change: Challenges and Opportunities” discusses many of the tensions that arise between funders and grantees and does propose some solutions (or at least places to start) for example:
Capacity building: to support system change leaders
Connecting and learning globally: to support funders to spread these ideas
Evidencing the value: sharing resources about what works
I am curious to explore this topic further and some of the case studies mentioned in this report (and definitely recommend giving it a read). Also if others have recommendations or ideas of what is working too then it would be great to share them. However, it does then make me think about what we can do as smaller organisations. We need the funding to survive to keep doing our day to day work as well as funding if we want to be able to work together to change the system. We are unlikely to turn down money if it just helps our organisation but could be detrimental to overall systems change. How then can we come together to demonstrate to funders the bigger potential of what they can fund? How can we have conversations with funders to think through how they are providing funding, how they can think longer-term, take on more risk and provide unrestricted funding?
As WISE emerging leaders, we are already on this journey and asking these questions. We are seeing the bigger system, starting to grapple with the complexities and working out the type of leadership that is needed for systems change. Now we need to work out how this gets funded.
Sarah Grant