Painting a policy

A painting requires a canvas, paint and a painter. Only when the three come together do you have a great painting.



A policy is like a painting. The community and individuals affected by the policy are like the canvas. The policy ideas, research evidence and examples from other contexts are like the paint. And the policy maker takes on the role of painter.



If you want a great painting, the painter needs to know his canvas and his paint intimately and possess the skills to work with both to create something that works.



If you want a great policy, the policy maker needs to know the community/individuals and the policy ideas/research evidence/examples intimately, and possess the skills to combine both into a policy that delivers. Just because the paint has worked on one kind of canvas, it does not mean that the paint will work on another.



Evidence-based policy making places great emphasis on the importance of the paint. Within evidence-based policy making, there has been little emphasis on the importance of the canvas. There has been even less emphasis on the importance of the painter other than as someone to administer the paint.



Coffee Conversations* assume the choice of canvas is fixed – that there is a context in which the policy will be implemented. Coffee Conversations aim to provide the painter with a feel for the canvas – the textures and ways the canvas will react with the paint. As well as the canvas, the painter needs to understand the nature of the paint available to him. What kind of evidence exists? Why is a new policy needed? What has happened in other contexts?


Only then is it safe to start to imagine the painting. And that’s where the individual painter’s skills come to the fore. However scientific, analytic and statistical the painter’s approach, however robust the research evidence, the finished painting will reflect the painter’s unique individual flair.


Barod does not pretend to provide a good understanding of the paint, and we don’t claim to be painters. But we do believe we are good at helping painters to understand canvases.


And one of our main tools for doing this is Coffee Conversations.


*Be patient - the research findings describing Coffee Conversations is almost ready for public release...