The ‘unusual’ narratives from Unusual suspects: We started stakeholder mapping for the deep listening early in the year together with the finalisation of islands. In the pursuit to cover the nation, we selected 20 islands from north to south with a mix of geographical, social and economic features. The key was to include groups that may not be often represented in various studies and initiatives. As such we included groups like recovering addicts, home-based male workers and male workers in the informal sector and migrant workers. The inclusion of these people created varied and rich narratives which were helpful in the analysis and co-creation process.    The presence and being out there: Owing much to the inherent geographical nature of the country, some of the rural islands are quite detached from the central adminstration. Travelling to these islands and talking to them creates a huge difference. We had our collective interpretation and co-creation in two different islands. These steps created space for honest and rich exchange and added to the narratives that we collected from deep listening.    The gap between centralized policy and local level implementation: Engaging with local communities and individuals also surfaced the gap between centralized policies and local level implementation.    The need to avoid duplication: One of the key insights from our deep listening and the analysis that followed was the high level of duplication in terms of formulating and implementing projects and programs. In an environment with multiple donors and stakeholders at different levels co-exist in the development landscape, it is important that resources are pooled, and similar initiatives are somehow combined and aggregated to ensure efficiency and focused impacts.    Collaboration and resource mobilisation: On-barding key stakeholders from early on is crucial to ensure support and cooperation from stakeholders at different levels. In addition to onboarding concrete steps need to be taken to ensure that they are involved in the process throughout. Given the broader nature of the theme ‘future of work’ on-boarding and maximising collaboration was a challenge.  

Listening to the present, exploring the future | United Nations Development Programme (undp.org)

Working with government partners, especially at the central level policy/regulatory level, is a challenge to form and sustain partnerships. This proved particularly difficult for this frontier challenge as there were many relevant authorities working in the area of future of work. Despite successful collaboration with local level authorities and communities (island councils and island communities), we were unable to achieve the level of buy in that we wanted from key central authorities. Since partner buy in is important to amplify learnings and grow the solutions, competing priorities of different central level authorities makes it challenging to ensure their continuous commitment and collaboration.   Moreover, establishment of a Social Innovation Platform (SIP) involves a novel and emerging methodology, which was practiced for the first time in the CO. The novelty and the emerging nature of the methodology created delays in the key stages while on-boarding local innovators and solutionists proved to be challenging, especially during co-design and prototyping stages.

Field observations and immersion walks helped to grasp a nuanced understanding of the social and economic environments of the islands. In-depth interviews allowed us to listen to and unpack rich narratives from a wide range of individuals which are usually lacking in quantitative data sources. More focused in-depth interviews allowed us to unpack personal and individual grievances and opportunities in trying to secure a livelihood. 

Co-creation is a key step in establishing a Social Innovation Platform (SIP) on Future of Work. One of the key principles of the co-creation session was that local knowledge and grassroot solutions are key to shaping solutions that will work at the community level. Co-creation session was designed with a participatory design framework where participants were grouped in various priority areas and concept posters were used as aids. At the beginning, the personas created during analysis and validated at collective interpretation sessions were used as the starting point for discussions to create an apt environment for the participants to relate to these imaginary personas. Moreover, a brainstorming exercise was undertaken to generate ideas from the participants around a theme, following which a participants prioritised the proposed solutions. The concept posters allowed them to identify the target groups, needs/pains and pain relievers relating to the proposed solution concept. Finally, business model canvas was used as the tool to aid further development of the solution. This session was instrument in unpacking the system in the sense that the discussion was very much contextualised and allowed us to identify missing links between the existing initives and the extent to which these initiatives are helping to alleviate various challenges faced by island communities in securing decent livelihoods.

We worked with CSO working in the area of women empowerment, especially in the co-creation stage.

We worked with private sector organisation (Dhiraagu: State's telecommunication Company) in the collective interpretation stage.

We worked with Business Centre Corporation (BCC) a State-Owned Enterprise during the collective interpretation and co-creation stages.