School of Business
MBA Program
Term Paper
On
Building a Coalition
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Submitted By:
Kochopper Deem
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Submitted To:
Prof. Dr. Md. Mahmodul Hasan
Faculty of Business Administration
Ahsanullah University of Science & Technology
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Date of Submission: 21-02-2017
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This is great privilege for us to express our enormous sense of
gratitude to the almighty Allah for his countless blessing upon for the
successful completion of this assignment.
We would like to convey our deepest sense of
gratitude and immense indebtedness to Prof. Dr. Md. Mahmodul
Hasan, Course instructor, Organizational Behavior,
Master of Business Administration, Ahsanullah University of Science &
Technology, for giving us opportunity to prepare these Assignment and support
to complete this in an appropriate manner.
A silent stream of gratitude to our most adorned parents whose blessing
are always with us in this world.
Finally we liked to add few more words saying that, this report is
prepared by learner and naturally there could be errors and omission which are
extremely belonging to us.
Date: 27-02-2017
To
Prof. Dr. Md. Mahmodul
Hasan
Faculty of Business
Administration
Ahsanullah University of
Science & Technology
Subject: Submission of Term Paper on Building a
Coalition.
Dear Sir,
We would like to draw our attention and submit this Assignment for your
kind perusal and necessary evaluation.
As a course requirement, we are assigned to develop and submit
assignment. We have been able to prepare and submit the same within the
stipulated time. Although the topic covers vast areas, we have tried our level
best to accumulate the relevant issues to develop a platform for our
understanding. We admit that the paper we prepared is not complete and accurate
in many aspects. Hence, we would appreciate any sort of supplementary and
clarification to this report whenever necessary.
We would feel highly rewarded if this assignment serves its purposes it
was aimed for.
Sincerely your Students,
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Sl
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Name
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Registration Number
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Signature
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1
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Rakibul Alam Laskar
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15.02.51.037
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2
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Arindam Biswas
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15.01.51.014
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3
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Md Yousuf Mridha
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15.02.51.050
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4
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Barna Barua
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14.02.51.042
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Executive Summary
According to the case, a coalition is a group of organizations that
come together for the purpose of gaining more influence and power than the
individual organizations can achieve on their own. From a community organizing
perspective, the reason to spend time and energy building a coalition is to
amass the power necessary to do something you can’t do alone.
In this case we can find coalitions come in a variety of different
forms. They can be permanent or temporary, single or multi-issue,
geographically defined, limited to certain constituencies (such as a coalition
of farm groups), or any combination of the above.
Too often, leaders in cooperative efforts feel like the hard work it
takes to participate is out of whack for the benefits gained. We call it the
Give/Get Ratio. For cooperative work to thrive, participating groups give time,
money, expertise, staff and volunteer hours, and much more to the effort.
Participating groups get the benefits of new relationships, learning, wider
expertise and clout.
Table of Content
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Title
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Page
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Page Title
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1
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Acknowledgement
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2
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Later of Submission
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3
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Executive Summary
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4
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Table of Content
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5
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Introduction
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6-7
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Chapter 1
1.1 The Communication Dimensions of Coalition
Building
1.2 Models
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8-10
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Chapter 2
2.1 A complex array of challenges in coalition
building
2.2 Models
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11-13
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Chapter 3
3.1 What
Motivates People to Join Coalitions
3.2 Models
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14-17
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Chapter 4
4.1 Examples
of Successful Coalitions
4.2 Conclusion
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18-20
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Chapter 5
5.1 Discussion
5.2 Advantages of Coalitions
5.3 Disadvantages of Coalitions
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21-22
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Chapter 6
6.1
Reference
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23
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Introduction
Organizational behavior (OB) is the study of the way people
interact within groups. Normally this study is applied in an attempt to create
more efficient business organizations. The central idea of the study
of organizational behavior is that a scientific approach can be
applied to the management of workers.
. 
Chapter
1
1.1 The Communication Dimensions of Coalition Building
This paper cites some of the lessons learned from experiences in
building strong and lasting coalitions that increase the likelihood of
successful reform. In the areas of governance and development, coalitions have
served many purposes and have been formed in various ways. However, experiences
from around the world suggest that there are some essential steps to coalition
building that can be carried out in different sequences. The following
coalition building stages do not comprise a comprehensive nor prescriptive
list. That said, to increase the likelihood of success of change initiatives,
it is imperative that reform leaders take stock of the ways in which coalitions
have previously been successfully built and made sustainable. Drawing on a wide
range of sources from the fields of leadership, communication, negotiation, and
development, we find that coalitions are formed and strengthened through the
following stages:
• Issue Identification and Specification:
the overall objective of the problem is articulated
and broken down for detailed analysis; policy options are defined in terms of a
continuum of options (from minimum to maximum reform positions) that particular
stakeholders may either support or find unpalatable
• Relationship/Stakeholder Mapping: significant actors are identified; positions
toward key and related issues are plotted, especially in terms of the policy
options identified in the previous step
• Forming Core Membership: the core of a coalition is convinced about and
becomes self-aware of the benefits of change; core actors are organized, early
leaders and champions are identified, and the joint agenda takes shape
• Demonstrating Credibility: coalition demonstrates it is knowledgeable about
relevant issues, can act effectively, and is worthy of support from
stakeholders
• Purposeful Expansion: a critical stage when a small organization builds
a broader social and resource base while retaining coherence and effectiveness
• Sustainable Transformation: during which the coalition has grown and becomes
polycentric, with initiatives on many fronts, drawing strength from many
sources
The above-stated
processes through which coalitions are formed and made sustainable have
requisite research, networking, lobbying, and mass outreach activities. Communication
between and among current and potential coalition members plays an important
role in these activities, and should be key considerations in coalition
building efforts. It is to the communicative dimensions of coalition building
to which we now turn.
1.2 Models
Chapter 2
2.1 A
complex array of challenges in coalition building
Coalition building requires tackling a complex array of challenges,
one of which is getting the communication dimension right. Effective
communication efforts range from facilitating networks among likeminded political
elites; fostering deliberation, dialogue, and debate among multiple
stakeholders, especially public sector middle managers; measuring and informing
public opinion; and building support among various interest publics as well as
the general citizenry.
Effective communication
efforts in support of coalition building help secure, strengthen, and sustain political
will at various bureaucratic levels. Both decision-making elites and public sector
middle managers require support of likeminded individuals and organizations
that will provide political cover when unpopular decisions need to be made in
the public interest. The leveraging of shared resources allows coalitions to more
effectively inform and cultivate support among publics. Inclusive and
participatory approaches made possible by coalitions create a consensus for
reform which increases the likelihood of success and sustainability of change
efforts.
While there
may be no one way to build strong coalitions, experiences from around the world
suggest that effective communication is an essential component that needs to be
deployed judiciously in different combinations and sequences, depending on the
needs and stages of formation of particular coalitions.
Each of the
coalition building stages listed above implies communication activities, as
listed here under each stage:
• Issue Identification and
Specification: communication
efforts should focus on gauging public opinion and consulting with policy
experts to determine the national mood, public discourse, and policy options
surrounding the reform initiative (use public opinion research methods and key
informant interviews)
• Relationship/Stakeholder
Mapping: communication
efforts should focus on listening to actors and key informants, including using
and analyzing public opinion data to determine positions of general public as
well as subgroups (use public opinion research methods, key informant interviews,
and network
analysis)
• Forming Core Membership:
communication efforts should focus on
lobbying and persuasion of influential individuals and key targets, as well as
deepening understanding of their positions and trade-offs (use lobbying and persuasion
techniques)
• Demonstrating Credibility:
communication/messages should focus
on successes to date (even small ones), but framed as much as possible in terms
of the interests and incentives of core membership and key stakeholders;
coalition should also demonstrate mastery of the issues surrounding the reform (use issue framing and media
relations techniques)
• Purposeful Expansion:
the target of communication efforts
should shift toward addressing the interests of broader relevant issue and
policy networks (use framing for collective action and networking approaches)
• Sustainable
Transformation: communication
efforts should broaden and include appeals to the general public, especially in
terms of addressing social norms (use framing for collective action and media relations techniques)
While the
contributions of communication to coalition building in support of reform are
multi-faceted, successful efforts from around the world suggest that these
initiatives can be boiled down into two categories: communication efforts that either
build trust, especially during early formative stages or leverage diversity, to make the most of a coalition’s broad membership.
Finding a balance between trust and diversity which exert pressure in opposite
directions, much like centripetal and centrifugal forces, strengthens a
coalition’s orbital rotation around a particular issue and enhances its influence
in the public sphere.
Coalition members must
enjoy a level of trust that will enable the ceding of a significant amount of autonomy,
i.e., in sharing resources and decision making power). At the same time, each
member’s access to relevant policy networks and interest publics should be
leveraged toward increasing the scope and influence of the coalition. It is
toward building trust and managing diversity that effective communication is
critical. The chart in Annex A renders the relationships among coalition
building stages, their communication dimensions and a phased approach to
building trust and leveraging diversity.
2.2. Models
Chapter 3
3.1 What Motivates People to Join Coalitions
Convincing stakeholders to join a coalition requires crafting messages
that resonate with the motivations of potential and current members. A
recommended communication approach in this regard is called “framing for
collective action,” which essentially means finding a way to sell the coalition
by tapping into the motivations of stakeholders. Two dimensions of human
motivations (shared purpose and sought after rewards) are discussed below.
From the study of
political psychology, we have learned that particular types of shared purpose
play important roles in individuals’ decisions to participate in social
movements. An attempt is made here to apply these shared purposes to our
understanding of coalition building. Appeals for stakeholders to join can be
crafted based on the following:
• Identity—highlighting identification with preexisting in groups,
such as those based on ethnicity, gender, profession, etc.
• Ideology—responding to an individual’s search for meaning
(e.g., to serve the marginalized or enhance individual liberty) and serve as a
platform for expression of one’s voice (e.g., coalition as a forum for deliberation
and debate)
• Instrumentality—providing opportunities to influence the social
and political environment in the direction of a potential coalition member’s
pragmatic goals
Shared purpose is often
reflected in the stated objectives of the coalition, and is the most obvious
reason for joining. It thus makes sense to communicate based on one or a
combination of the shared purposes listed above. Effective communication,
however, requires more than simply proclaiming whether a coalition’s purpose is
based on identity, ideology or instrumentality. Sahr Kpundeh argues that in
addition to shared purpose, there are sought after rewards that drive the
desire to join and maintain membership in coalitions. These include:
• Material incentives: rewards of tangible value, such as money, goods,
or jobs—communicate in terms of material benefits to the in group, such as
shared decision making power over the allocation of
pooled resources and a
fair share of the gains from joint efforts
• Specific solidary incentives: “. . . intangible rewards arising out of the act
of associating can be given to, or withheld from, individuals—communicate a
sense of belonging and prestige derived from membership
• Collective solidary incentives: “. . . intangible rewards created by the act of
associating that must be enjoyed by the whole group, and restricted to group
members—communicate a sense of fellowship and community derived from membership
Crossing categories of
shared purposes with sought after rewards results in a more nuanced
understanding of human motivations. This enhanced understanding can guide
reform leaders in crafting messages that might appeal to various stakeholders,
once efforts have been made to understand the motivations of particular
stakeholders.
Coalitions have the
capacity to appeal to overlapping motivations of multiple constituencies. The
broader the shared agenda among members and the larger the number of segments
of society a coalition seeks to mobilize, the more potential motivations will
be available for message crafting. However, sensitivity to cross-purposes
among members needs to be managed by effective
communication and decision making rules. While coalitions, by definition, serve
a common vision, they must also cater to multiple motivations given their broad
memberships.
A caveat. It should be
noted that long term sustainability is not always an overarching goal of
coalition building since it could make sense for coalition members to disband
once their joint purpose has been fulfilled. However, there are long term
policy and advocacy issues that require attention over time, especially in terms
of applying pressure on decision makers and bureaucratic implementers to follow
through on commitments. This suggests that sustainability should always be
seriously considered to guard against the threat of counter-reform by vested
interests.
3.2. Models
Chapter 4
4.1 Examples of Successful Coalitions
Some examples of successful coalition building efforts in support of
reform are considered here, including anti-corruption efforts in the
Philippines, improving water services in Kenya, privatizing public enterprises in
India, and judicial sector reform in Georgia.
EXAMPLE 1: TRANSPARENCY AND ACCOUNTABILITY COALITION IN THE PHILIPPINES
In the Philippines, the
Transparent Accountable Governance (TAG) initiative is a good example of successful
pro-reform coalition building. In the late 1990’s, The Asia Foundation was able
to build a coalition for curbing corruption and fostering an improved
environment for economic growth. Initially partnering with academic
institutions to carry out research activities to examine the problem of
corruption in the Philippines, the coalition was joined over time by other
groups such as the League of Cities of the Philippines, credible NGOs and
private sector partners. These additional coalition members increased the influence
and ensured sustainable support for the program. In addition, creation of the
TAG Web site (http://www.tag.org.ph) proved instrumental in empowering citizens
and motivating them to participate by making their contribution visible in a
publicly accessible space.
Unlike traditional,
one-way communication, which keeps repeating the same simple message through the
same channel, coalition building is about building trust. This, requires
engaging people with credible messages, backed up by research and evidence and
delivered by credible messengers. Vested interests are at a disadvantage in
this new landscape. TAG has had significant achievements, such as textbook monitoring
with the Department of Education, development of a feedback mechanism for
procurement monitoring with the Office of the Ombudsman, and development of
deployment software for civil society observers of the Bids and Awards
Committee.
EXAMPLE
2:
WATER SECTOR REFORM COALITION IN KENYA
In Kenya, building
broad coalitions around decentralized institutions led to successful
implementation of water sector reforms. High-level policy makers and other
stakeholders brought on board broad political and social support ensuring a
transparent and accountable process. Because of a clear focus on the major issues
in the country’s water sector, the political momentum created with the incoming
government (in 2003), and the renewed interest in water by the government’s
development partners, a coalition quickly coalesced around reforms. Guided by the
interministerial Water Sector Reform Steering Committee (WSRSC), the Water
Sector Reform Secretariat (WSRS) implemented the reforms.
In the late 1990s,
chronic water shortages had cultivated among the citizenry a sense of urgency
for sector reforms. The Ministry of Water and Irrigation’s role was, therefore,
to build a coalition not only among people and groups who were disgruntled with
the administration of water services to date but also among others who needed
to be associated with such reforms, especially the new government that had
campaigned on a platform of good governance and improved public service
delivery. Under the new government, political awareness about water sector
reform led to responsiveness to stakeholder demand for action and transparency
in the reform process. The success of reform was due to broad-based consensus,
stakeholder mobilization, the formation of a policy-making steering committee
composed of key stakeholders, and the establishment of an independent
implementation unit free of government manipulation or intervention.
EXAMPLE
3:
JUDICIAL REFORM COALITION IN GEORGIA
In Georgia, survey
results and focus groups suggested that citizens thought very poorly of the
judiciary and showed a strong mistrust toward the institution. Although the
leadership of the judiciary was capable and reform oriented, changes in the
system were not going to happen overnight, and when they would take place, they
would be known only to those using the courts. Explaining those changes to the
public was a challenge because of the judiciary’s low credibility. Messages in
support of judicial reform would be much more successful if they were to be
communicated by a neutral third party.
For this purpose,
several NGOs active in the field of justice created a new organization—the
Association for Legal Public Education (ALPE)—tasked to implement the
communication program. Thus, four NGOs and a state body, the Council of
Justice, established ALPE. The new organization was given the responsibility of
walking a very thin line: while remaining an NGO with a strong, independent
voice, it had to engage the judiciary to become more open and transparent while
at the same time helping the judiciary to reach out to the public.
EXAMPLE
4:
PUBLIC ENTERPRISE REFORM COALITION IN INDIA
Another successful
coalition building effort was the controversial public enterprise reform in
West Bengal, India. Many powerful and long established stakeholder groups
opposed change, each with its own reason to preserve the current balance of power.
In support of reform, government used a coalition to neutralize opponents.
Those tasks required sophisticated deployment of communication techniques. In a
low-key and transparent manner, government launched a broad, consultative
dialogue among public enterprise managers, unions, and government: identifying
problems together, drawing conclusions about the similar problems faced by the
majority of firms in the public enterprise sector, and by exploring available
options.
This approach gave
labor leadership a sense of shared ownership of the problems together with
management and government.
The communication
strategy followed logically from the political nature of the problem that
communication was required to address. Once the decision was made for government
first to work with core stakeholders and later to involve mass media, there was
no large audience involved at the beginning, and the core stakeholders could
meet more or less in one room. The most intimate, flexible, and credible
medium, then, was face-to-face meetings; the second-most was written
correspondence. These letters and minutes not only kept all core stakeholders
aware of how the policy debate progressed, but also put stakeholder positions
on the record and discouraged participants from backsliding or shying away from
earlier concessions.
Personal meetings and
transparent statements on paper were effective means of building transparency, credibility,
and trust.
4.2 Conclusion
Coalitions do not last forever. Sometimes a coalition can be
repaired, and sometimes, the effort to do so is not
justified. Be ready to dissolve a coalition if
it does not achieve satisfactory goals or if it is no longer effective. Sometimes it is best to walk away with a handshake and a
smile. At other
times a celebration at the conclusion
of a successful campaign is a great way to
acknowledge the relationships forged during the life of the coalition.
Remember,
virtually every carefully crafted coalition will have an impact. “An effort may
fail, then partially succeed, then falter, and so on. Since mutual trust is
built up over a period of time, coalition organizers should avoid getting so
caught up in any one effort as to view it as ‘make or break.’
Every effort
(at cooperation among groups) prepares the way for greater and more sustained
efforts in the future.” Coalitions consist of people.
Therefore,
shared efforts leave us with surprises, memories, and mutual respect.
Chapter 5
5.1 Discussion
The Communication for
Governance and Accountability Program (CommGAP), a global
program at the World Bank, seeks to confront the challenges inherent in the
political economy of development. By applying innovative communication
approaches that improve the quality of the public sphere – by amplifying
citizen voice; promoting free, independent, and plural media systems; and
helping government institutions communicate better with their citizens – the
program aims to demonstrate the power of communication principles, processes
and structures in promoting good and accountable governance, and hence better
development results.
CommGAP is funded through a multi-donor
trust fund. The founding donor of this trust fund is the UK’s Department for
International Development (DFID).
5.2 Advantages of
Coalition
The benefits of coalition
building go beyond increased power in relation to the opposition. Coalition
building may also strengthen the members internally, enabling them to be more
effective in other arenas. Some other key advantages to coalition building
include:
- A
coalition of organizations can win on more fronts than a single
organization working alone and increase the potential for success.
- A
coalition can bring more expertise and resources to bear on complex
issues, where the technical or personnel resources of any one organization
would not be sufficient.
- A
coalition can develop new leaders. As experienced group leaders step
forward to lead the coalition, openings are created for new leaders in the
individual groups. The new, emerging leadership strengthens the groups and
the coalition.
- A
coalition will increase the impact of each organization's effort.
Involvement in a coalition means there are more people who have a better
understanding of your issues and more people advocating for your side.
- A
coalition will increase available resources. Not only will physical and
financial resources be increased, but each group will gain access to the
contacts, connections, and relationships established by other groups.
- A
coalition may raise its members' public profiles by broadening the range of
groups involved in a conflict. The activities of a coalition are likely to
receive more media attention than those of any individual organization.
- A
coalition can build a lasting base for change. Once groups unite, each
group's vision of change broadens and it becomes more difficult for
opposition groups to disregard the coalition's efforts as dismissible or
as special interests.
- A
successful coalition is made up of people who have never worked together
before. Coming from diverse backgrounds and different viewpoints, they
have to figure out how to respect each other's differences and get
something big accomplished. They have to figure out how each group and its
representatives can make their different but valuable contributions to the
overall strategy for change (See consensus building). This helps
avoid duplication of efforts and improve communication among key players.
5.3 Disadvantages
of Coalition
- Member
groups can get distracted from other work. If that happens, non-coalition
efforts may become less effective and the organization may be weakened
overall.
- A
coalition may only be as strong as its weakest link. Each member
organization will have different levels of resources and experience as
well as different internal problems. Organizations that provide a lot of
resources and leadership may get frustrated with other members'
shortcomings.
- To
keep a coalition together, it is often necessary to cater to one side more
than another, especially when negotiating tactics. If a member prefers
high-profile confrontational tactics, they might dislike subdued tactics,
thinking they are not exciting enough to mobilize support. At the same
time, the low profile, conciliatory members might be alarmed by the
confrontation advocates, fearing they will escalate the conflict and make
eventual victory more difficult to obtain.
- The
democratic principle of one group-one vote may not always be acceptable to
members with a lot of power and resources. The coalition must carefully
define the relationships between powerful and less-powerful groups.
- Individual
organizations may not get credit for their contributions to a coalition.
Members that contribute a lot may think they did not receive enough credit.
Chapter 6
6.1 Reference
2.
“Coalition Building” (Boulder, Colorado: Confl ict Research
Consortium, 1998, accessed on January 30, 2009); available through
http://www.colorado.edu/confl ict/peace/problem/coalition.htm; Internet.
3.
Jeremy Rosner (2008). Communicating diffi cult reforms:
Eight lessons from Slovakia. In S. Odugbemi & T. Jacobson (Eds.), Governance Reform Under Real-World Conditions: Citizens,
Stakeholder, and Voice (pp. 395–396). Washington, D.C.: The International Bank for
Reconstruction and Development / The World Bank.
4.
Bert Klandermans. 2003. Collective political action. In D.
O. Sears, L. Huddy, & R. Jervis (Eds.), Oxford
Handbook of Political Psychology, pp. 670–709.
5.
Membership in coalitions can also give individuals a sense
of political effi cacy “or the sense that one’s participation can actually make
a difference (internal effi cacy) and that the political system would be
responsive to this participation (external effi cacy) . . .” Michael X. Delli
Carpini (2004). Mediating Democratic Engagement: The Impact of Communications
on Citizens’ Involvement in Political and Civic Life. In L. L. Kaid (Ed.), Handbook of Political Communication Research (pp. 395–434). New York:
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
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