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By Ira Jackson and Leslie Hicks
Neither government nor the private sector have the resources or credibility to adequately address many intractable social and economic challenges. Nor should the nonprofit sector be expected to provide the magnitude of services and systemic change that people lack as a result of government or business failures. Some of the most inspiring, creative and effective approaches to public problem-solving involve cross-sectoral partnerships that leverage unusual alliances between leaders in business, labor, government, and the community, galvanizing resources and credibility needed to effectuate transformational change.
Over the course of five weeks and a local site visit, we convened a group of graduate students, centered at the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard Kennedy School, to learn about effective leadership across the private, public and nonprofit sectors. Our seminar gleaned insights from principal players in Boston who formed unlikely alliances and leveraged one another's strengths to achieve breakthrough results that acting alone would never have achieved. While these leaders and the examples are all drawn locally, their successes are highly replicable, some with national, and even global applications.
The following reflections represent a synthesis of ideas from tri-sectoral leadership experience, academic and practitioner publications, a site visit and dialogues with cross-sector leaders themselves. We expect these ideas to be refined over time, and we invite discussion to improve upon our own understanding.
Making the case for cross-sector leadership
The practice of cross-sector leadership, or of becoming “tri-sector athletes” as Joseph Nye, professor at the Kennedy School, coined in the late 1990s, is becoming increasingly popular as leaders recognize the benefits of learning from different disciplines and cultures. According to Nye, a tri-sector athlete has the ability to “engage and collaborate across the private, public and social sectors[1].”
Traditional leadership in business, government or nonprofit roles often prioritize expertise in a particular field. However, our sessions with these leaders raised novel or distinctive attributes that seem to characterize effective collaborative leaders. Based on our case studies, successful cross-sectoral leaders demonstrate a combination of the following attributes. Together, these skills and approaches achieve breakthrough results that lead to systemic change.
- Turning crisis into opportunity – Identifying and seizing on the timing of a crisis or a related movement can help to build momentum and support
- Sharing ownership and committing to mutual accountability – Leaders empower others, give credit where it is due, co-create solutions with representatives from communities that are impacted most, and manage diffuse ownership with allies. Cross-sectoral leaders are often humble. Frequently, collaborative leaders stand back rather than assert their prominence. They demonstrate Lao Tze’s definition of the ideal leader: one who, when the goal is achieved, the people say “we did it ourselves”
- Developing deep relationships across sectors – Developing and maintaining meaningful relationships can help to further a movement or cause. The most successful leaders find commonalities and work across lines of difference by meeting people where they are and establishing trust based on deep engagement
- Articulating an inspiring vision – Successful leaders and movements benefit from articulating a clear, long-term goal to unite stakeholders. Identify both incremental wins and major goals to track progress over time
- Demonstrating “collaborative intelligence” – It is often necessary to operate in a world of uncertainty. Leaders must drive towards solutions and shared learning goals amidst ambiguity and unclear objectives
- Practicing adaptive tactics and innovative approaches – Big wins require embracing innovation and adapting to changing circumstances
- Creating “collaborative alchemy” – The net effect of collaboration not only benefits each constituency and individual leaders, but achieves a synergistic result that goes well beyond the capacity or expectations of any one institution or leader
Case study: marriage equality in Massachusetts
Over ten years before the U.S. Supreme Court guaranteed marriage equality for same sex couples in 2015, Arline Isaacson led the legislative lobbying so Massachusetts became the first state to defeat a marriage equality ban in the state legislature. Isaacson, an advocate for marriage equality and the Co-Chair of the MA GLBTQ Political Caucus, was able to do so by organizing unlikely allies to support this lofty goal. Decades later, the political and advocacy playbook that was developed in MA was used for other successful campaigns across the country.
Articulating an inspiring vision
Arline and her fellow advocates understood the need to clearly outline their advocacy goal: lobbying the state legislature to keep marriage equality prohibitions from passing.
Starting in the 1900s, the Catholic Church held sway over many Massachusetts legislators’ views and votes. Understanding that the religious community presented significant opposition, Isaacson and other activists realized the uphill battle they faced in getting people to break from their religious beliefs. Instead, their coalition would have to challenge longstanding narratives in order to change people’s hearts and minds. Isaacson and her team reframed the issue to center the love and spirituality that marriage stands for, no matter what form it takes. Arline and her team refocused the debate from “God vs gays” to “God vs God.”In this way the debate became less about challenging religion and more about rights that are bestowed upon everyone.
Developing deep relationships across sectors
Isaacson began recruiting diverse and often unexpected groups of people to champion their cause. For example, senior citizens were a powerful ally, in that they are at the same time civically engaged and ‘nonthreatening’ to the broader population. The team also drew upon other clergy and labor union leaders for support. Their messaging appealed to these groups due to their focus on fairness and anti-discrimination, rather than making a moral case for same sex marriage, which many groups felt reticent to accept.
Adaptive tactics and innovative approaches
Also crucial to the success of the movement was the advocates’ sophisticated understanding of procedure and strategy. Having had a previous bill on discrimination against the LGBTQ community lose on a razor thin margin in the MA Senate due to a parliamentary maneuver, Isaacson took it upon herself to master the rules of parliamentary procedure. Typically a dull subject, Isaacson learned the rules of the game better than her opponents and used this to her advantage. She turned the arcane legislative process to her advantage, outmaneuvering her powerful opponents on their own turf.
Building on decades of organizing and political momentum, Arline and her fellow advocates finally delivered the victory they sought: the MA Supreme Judicial Court ruled in November 2003 that it was unconstitutional to only allow heterosexual couples to marry. After 10 years of lobbying against marriage equality bans in the state legislature, MA lawmakers defeated all efforts to pass a constitutional amendment that would have prohibited same sex couples from marrying. This momentous decision made history in the U.S. – the state was then the first to allow the right to marry to same sex couples. Arline’s legislative savvy, persistence, relationships formed over decades, and adaptive tactics combined to prevent a constitutional convention from overturning the court’s decision.
Arline’s story showcases the principles that we see most often in cross-sectoral leadership. Over the course of Arline’s career she was able to refine her skills to persuade unlikely groups to come together to form a coalition; to refine messaging to be clear, targeted and resonant with a wide audience; to be quite deliberate and strategic about who the messenger would be for which particular audience and any particular time and place; and to have the tenacity and patience to push for small wins that ultimately lead to large-scale change.
At a time when neither business nor government alone seem poised to solve intractable social problems, the lessons from our Boston case studies illustrate the potential and power of a new approach to leadership that is broadly collaborative. When effectively exercised, this approach can achieve breakthrough successes that offer a partial answer to society’s challenges. We hope that sharing these insights will inspire others to emulate, replicate, and adapt these lessons to their own cultures, settings, and on issues that demand nontraditional solutions.
Overview of sessions and seminars
- Suffolk Downs development – Suffolk Downs, an abandoned race track that sits on an environmentally vulnerable 160 acres largely in East Boston and in part in Revere, is being transformed into a new community, with 10,000 units of housing, 40 acres of green space, extensive retail and commercial development, and substantial benefits for the adjacent community in terms of affordable housing, job opportunities and subsidized daycare. This 20 year, $10 billion project, the largest of its kind in the history of Massachusetts, was the result of intense negotiation and eventual partnership between community and political leaders and a savvy developer. 477 community meetings later, developer Tom O'Brien showed his ability to build trust. He eventually came to see eye to eye with tenacious community advocates, illustrated by how they both compromised and adjusted their expectations to form a partnership that gained support for this improbable project
- Early childhood education: An unusual and unusually effective alliance has developed in Massachusetts to advance the issue of quality and affordable early childhood education. JD Chesloff, Executive Director of MA Business Roundtable, and Amy Kershaw, MA Commissioner of the Department of Early Education and Care, shared how they navigated the differing interests of the government and business community to support their initiatives
- Marriage equality — Massachusetts was the first state to legalize same-sex marriage. Arline Issacson, political mastermind and behind the scenes operator, built unlikely coalitions, maintained a clear strategy over time, and adapted a methodical approach to changing people’s hearts and minds. Eventually, this victory paved the way for similar wins at the state and federal level
- Domestic workers' Bill of Rights law – Massachusetts has arguably the strongest in the country, protecting domestic workers from sexual abuse and economic exploitation and giving them legal rights accorded to other employees. The effort was led by a charismatic volunteer lawyer who built a coalition among previously unorganized domestic workers from many countries, most of whom are BIPOC, and a suburban coalition largely of faith leaders and white mothers. State Senator Lydia Edwards, one of the strongest proponents, built this unlikely alliance, gave voice to the voiceless, and leveraged the support of newfound suburban allies and leaders from labor and the religious communities to achieve a stunning political victory
- Transforming Nubian Square into Boston's Black Wall Street. The historic heart of Boston's Black community, formerly known as Dudley Square, is experiencing a revival and potential renaissance, and has been renamed Nubian Square. Community leaders across business, government, and civil society have formed a cross-sectoral coalition to transform Nubian Square into what might yet become Boston's own Black Wall Street. This is perhaps the single largest opportunity to help close the racial wealth gap in the region. Community, business, and political leaders Richard Taylor, State Senator Liz Miranda, and Aisha Francis worked together to advance this powerful dream
Photo: Harvard Center for Public Leadership seminar participants, plus facilitator Ira Jackson and Research Assistant Leslie Hicks, with MA State Senator Lydia Edwards, under a portrait of President Kennedy, following her spellbinding presentation of how she and others successfully worked to enact the strongest Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights in the nation.
About the authors:
Ira Jackson is a Research Fellow at the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at the Harvard Kennedy School.
Leslie Hicks, Research Assistant, is a MPP student at Harvard Kennedy School and a MBA student at Harvard Business School.
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