Most Significant Change Guide
Chapter 3 • Troubleshooting
We suggest two ways of responding to this concern. One is to explain that by asking people to write down their explanations for their choices of what is most significant, we are making their subjectivity accountable. Their judgments become open to scrutiny by other participants. Knowing that fact may also encourage participants to think carefully about how they explain their choices. On the other hand, this very possibility may be a source of anxiety, especially where people are not normally asked to make judgment calls! The second response is to say that in making a judgment there is no response that is objectively correct or incorrect. We are asking for people’s interpretations. Built into those interpretations are arguments about what values are important in a given situation. One person may argue for the significance of a specific change on the grounds of sustainability, another because of improvements in gender equity. Choices between these interpretations involve choices about priorities given to different values, and this is a matter of negotiation rather than calculation of truth.
Ghana – what is significance? “Significance IS ‘subjective’, and the successive ‘selections’ of the process are not meant to invalidate the previous ones, only to reflect the varying perspectives from which the ‘selectors’ interpret the stories.” (Johnston, 2002:9) Why do we have to select only one SC story? For a range of reasons, participants may express concerns or even dislike about having to choose one SC story from among the many SC stories in front of them. If they don’t understand the MSC technique, then you can explain that the process of having to make a choice, especially in a group setting, can stimulate debate and encourage people to think more deeply about what is involved in each story. Reluctance to choose can also have a more social and cultural basis. Participants may want to avoid conflict or being seen as critical of others. If this is the case, then consider different ways of structuring the selection process. Some of the options, including voting by secret ballot, are outlined in Step 5. It may be necessary to allow participants to select more than one story. In other difficult settings, participants have been asked to identify SC stories that can be eliminated (i.e. to select the least significant rather than the most significant). We have not experienced any situation where it was impossible to devise some form of selection process. This is too time-consuming! Time can be a significant problem in large organisations with large numbers of beneficiaries and staff. Selection processes should be structured so that no meeting called to select SC stories takes more than two hours. Try circulating stories to be read before meetings or having a facilitator at the selection meetings. Established procedures for reading, discussing, scoring or voting then documenting agreed choices can also help. Organisations can change the frequency of reporting SC stories. Only a few do it fortnightly, many do it monthly and some have changed to three-monthly reporting. The documentation of SC stories by individual participants may be considered timeconsuming for a number of reasons. The process may be new and unfamiliar or participants may not be familiar with narrative reporting. In this case, time needs to be taken to build the capacity of people to collect stories. For example, provide positive feedback about good practice, give examples of good practice from elsewhere, and offer refresher training (as has been done by CCDB).
Troubleshooting
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