Mornington Crescent: The Taunton variation

In my previous post Walking in each others moccasins: a creative collaboration workshop to solve wicked problems in the Local Council sector I set out the background to an innovative collaboration workshop involving a group of senior Local Council professionals in London in early April 2022. In this post I’d like to expand on the use of ‘personas’ as part of the creative design process that we’re using for the workshop and how it fits with who we are as a group of senior professionals

As part of the registration process for the event, potential attendees were asked to complete a short survey that included 12 attitudinal statements based on the ‘big 5’ personality traits (openness to experience; conscientiousness; extraversion; agreeableness; and neuroticism). They were asked to score each statement using a 4-point Likert scale survey: 1= Very like me; 2 = like me; 3 = unlike me; 4 = very unlike me

Methodological limitations are such that the survey results are of limited value in terms of use as a model for explaining the wider world i.e. the Local Council sector at large, but they still revealed some interesting – and useful – polarisation even within this relatively small and self-selecting sample group.

Statement	Very Like me	Like Me	Unlike Me	Very Unlike Me
I look forward to socialising with people in my professional network	13	6	1	0
I enjoy experimenting with new technologies	6	6	6	4
I tend to be quite reserved	1	8	6	7
I am more interested in the journey than the destination	0	12	5	4
Other people would describe me as curious	8	7	5	1
I am reliable	16	6	0	0
I’m actively engaged with my SLCC local branch	16	5	1	0
I prefer having set routines at work	2	8	9	1
I rarely find faults with others	2	12	7	0
The social element of work is important to me	7	5	5	4
I can be somewhat careless	0	3	7	11
I prefer virtual meetings to physical meetings	1	6	8	5

It is probably fair to say that the respondent group supported the statements I am reliable and I’m are actively engaged with my local SLCC branch.

Nine of the statements split the group, with the most ‘divisive’ statements being that the social element of work is important to me; I enjoy experimenting with new technologies; I prefer having set routes at work; and, other people would describe me as curious. The result for I am more interested in the journey than the destination is an interesting one as although more than half of the respondents reported that this was ‘like them’ the result was skewed by 4 respondents reporting that this was ‘very unlike them’.

The data supports the hypothesis that there is wide range of personality types even in this small group of 22 Clerks from larger Councils who have self-selected to take part in this survey.  This suggests that the proposed use of ‘personas’ in the April workshops does have some merit, as a ‘one size fits all’ approach will not be appropriate if we’re to make progress solving issues that face senior practitioners in our sector.

Further analysis of the survey results using statistical analysis software revealed some interesting linear correlations in personality trait factors. There’s a significant caveat in the limitations of this analysis due to the relatively small sample size and use of a 4-point scale, however for the purposes of exploring potential ‘personas’ of Clerks for this workshop some interesting discussion points do seem to emerge.

In broad terms:

• Colleagues who report as being curious are also more likely to enjoy experimenting with new technology and more likely to value the journey more than the destination, and may be less likely to prefer set routines;
• Colleagues who report as being quite reserved are also more likely to prefer set routines and to rarely find faults in other people, and may be less likely to be considered by others to be curious.  They are somewhat less likely to enjoy socializing at work or with their wider professional network as much as other colleagues, and may be less interested in the journey than the destination.
• Colleagues who enjoy the social elements of work are also more likely to enjoy socializing with their professional network and are somewhat more likely to find faults with others.

This leads me to propose two potential ‘personas’ that may be useful when considering perspectives around some of the issues being addressed in the workshop in April:

Persona 1: Curious, enjoys new technology, values new experiences, happy to work flexibly, enjoys discussions and challenging/being challenged.

Persona 2: Quite reserved, more wary of new technology, task-orientated, prefers set routines, less comfortable openly challenging people.

A crude division of the responses suggests that the workshop attendees tend towards persona 1, but there is a fair representation of attendees who tend more towards persona 2 at the workshop, with a very rough ratio of 2/3 to 1/3 .

Reducing such a rich collection of variables in terms of personality types, longevity of service, skills, values and beliefs into two crude personas is clearly a clumsy start. But it is a start nonetheless. We’re taking some early and gentle steps in thinking about the issues facing senior practitioners from larger Local Councils, and in order to build empathy and understanding into that work we’re going to walk in the moccasins of those two (and maybe more!) personas as we move forward.

Whatever does or doesn’t come out of the workshop in April I feel that the empirical evidence that this small sample of colleagues from our sector clearly has a broad range of personality types, values and beliefs is still a powerful and positive thing to be able to talk about. We should celebrate this diversity; appreciate our differences; harness the energy that can arise from differences of opinions and attitudes; and beware of ‘group think’ or attempts to frame solutions in ‘one size fits all’ terms.

I’d welcome any feedback, thoughts or opinions on the findings from this survey or the proposed personas. Do you identify with one, both or none of them?!

Vive la Difference! It takes diff’rent strokes to move the world…