‘Waking Up The Sleeping Giant’: Change Management, Policy Transfer and the Search for Collaboration
| Published date | 01 July 2005 |
| Author | Lorraine Johnston |
| DOI | 10.1177/095207670502000307 |
| Date | 01 July 2005 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
'Waking
Up
The
Sleeping
Giant':
Change
Management,
Policy
Transfer
and
the
Search
for
Collaboration
Lorraine
Johnston
University
of
Manchester
Abstract
This
article
is
situated
within
the
context
of
the
rapidpace
ofpublic-sector
reform
since
the
1970s
with
a
focus
upon
the
development
of
collaborative
synergies.
Such
change,
initially
stimulated
by
American
management
gurus,
set
forth
an
ideology
to
create
'lean
and
athletic'
organisations
for
the
modem
world
-
Kanter
(1989)
referred
to
these
transformations
as
'When
Giants
Learn
to
Dance'.
Such
management
principles
have
since
become
embedded
in
the
way
that
we
think
about
public-sector
management,
and
are
embodied
in
New
Labours
modernisation
and
new
localism
approaches
to
local
government
restructuring
and
the
subsequent
search
for
collaborative
advantage.
Within
this
context,
and
using
a
case
study
based
upon
Newcastle
City
Council
between
1997-2005,
this
article
analyses
the
adoption
of
a
package
of
measures
and
associated
policy
responses,
referred
to
collectively
as
'Waking
up
the
Sleeping
Giant'
which
emerged
as
a
reaction
to
the
historical
governance
trends
of
clientelism,
paternalism
and
fragmentation,
which
had
plagued
the
development
of
intra
and
inter
organisational
partnerships.
This
emphasis
sought
to
turn
the
council
into
an
'excellent'
performing
local
authority,
and
to
create
an
organisation
that
learns,
continually
adapts
and
develops
more
permeable
internal
and
external
boundaries.
It
is
argued
that
the
adoption
of
radical
overarching
management
strategies
can
have
an
unsettling
effect
on
organisational
arenas
with
implications
for
the
success
of
current
modernisation
policy
and
the
successful
development
of
collaboration
and
partnership
working.
Introduction
Change-adept
organisations
share
three
attributes:
the
imagination
to
innovate,
the
professionalism
to
perform;
and
the
openness
to
collaborate.
The
role
of
leadership
in
this
is
to
help
develop
new
concepts,
provide
organisational
competence
and
develop
connections
with
partners
(Kanter
1999,
p.2).
Public
Policy
and
Administration
Volume
20
No.
3
Autumn
2005
69
In
the
UK,
over
the
last
twenty
years,
the
debates
about
transformations
in
the
public
sector
through
change
management,
new
public
management
and
most
recently
the
modernisation
of
local
government,
have
strongly
influenced
the
creation
of,
as
well
as
attempts
to
remove,
embedded
organisational
cultures
within
local
government.
However,
many
of
these
ideas
were
not
developed
within
the
local
government
context
or
indeed
the
public
sector,
but
were
'borrowed'
from
the
private
sector
most
notably
in
North
America.
This
cross
fertilisation
of
ideas
has
given
great
resonance
to
the
concepts
of
'policy
transfer'
or
'institutional
transplantation'
where
ideas
in
one
organisational
setting
are
'flown
in'
to
different
organisational
contexts
to
varying
degrees
of
success.
Moreover,
within
the
current
climate
of
rapid
public
sector
modernisation,
the
enthusiasm
for
local
government
to
'look
elsewhere'
for
solutions
to
existing
problems,
often
premised
upon
the
notion
of
learning
from
best
practice
is
widespread.
This
article
will
highlight
how
in
recent
year's
private
sector
management
principles
are
increasingly
transferred
en
masse
and
actively
embedded
into
local
authority
cultures,
structures
and
processes.
This
will
be
explored
through
a
detailed
ethnographic
account
of
attempts
to
reinvent
government
in
Newcastle
upon
Tyne
since
1997
under
the
leadership
of
a
new,
young
and
dynamic
Chief
Executive
who
set
out
radical
plans
for
organisational
and
management
change
which
he
referred
to
as
'Waking
up
the
Sleeping
Giant'
(WUTSG).
This
approach
drew
heavily
in
both
practical
and
rhetorical
senses
on
the
influential
work
of
Kanter,
most
notably
When
Giants
Learn
to
Dance
(1989,
see
also
Kanter
1985,
1995).
Illuminated
in
such
an
approach
is
an
attempt
to
transform
the
City
Council
from
an
inward
looking
and
fragmented
organisation
which
struggled
with
cultural
embeddedness
and
an
inability
to
learn
from
previous
episodes
of
governance,
into
an
organisation
which
had
high
expectations
of
greater
choice,
responsiveness,
accessibility
and
flexibility
to
'customers',
and
importantly
an
institutional
environment
were
knowledge
is
fostered
and
organisational
learning
pursued.
The
intended
transformational
change
was
particularly
focused
at
the
intra-organisational
level
with
an
encouragement
to
work
across
traditional
siloed
departmental
boundaries,
by
adopting
new
ways
of
working,
and
developing
more
streamlined
and
adaptable
structures.
However,
such
change
also
sought
new
collaborative
advantages
(Kanter,
1994;
Huxham
and
Vangen,
2000;
2005)
through
relationships
and
partnerships
with
external
stakeholders.
This
article
concludes
by
highlighting
the
key
lessons
to
be
learned
from
the
application
of
change
management
theory
in
practice,
and
the
difficulties
that
public
sector
organisations
face
in
creating
fundamental
change
within
a
fluid
and
ever-changing
modernisation
process.
In
short,
it
is
argued
that
the
adoption
of
radical
overarching
management
strategies
have
an
unsettling
effect
on
organisational
arenas
creating
challenges
for
current
partnership
working.
Public
Policy
and
Administration
Volume
20
No.
3
Autumn
2005
70
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