Guest blog by Piotr Arak, LEG’23
In successful businesses it is typical to try out new things and evaluate the outcome because you can earn more money if you find a better solution. Governments are not so different and public officials can use similar tools as the fishbone diagram or the 5-why approach to make their countries or communities more prosperous. This is what this 10-week course was for me.
I am part of a team responsible for designing the Social Inclusion Strategy for the Polish government. This strategy has become increasingly important in light of the Russian aggression in Ukraine and the resulting influx of refugees to Poland since 2014, which has intensified even further since the start of the full-blown war on February 24th, 2022. I am interested in exploring ways in which refugees can contribute to Poland’s economic growth and become integrated into the country (in total there are about 3.5 million Ukrainians in the country, not all entered the country as refugees but as economic migrants).
Background information
Currently, there are approximately 1.5 million refugees in Poland, with half of them being women of productive age and the other half comprising elderly individuals and children. Around one-third of the children are enrolled in the Polish education system, while the rest are either participating in distance learning in Ukrainian schools or not attending classes at all.
Interestingly, around 65% of the women have started working, which is uncommon for war refugees. However, the labor market in Poland is facing challenges due to an aging society (unemployment is currently at approximately 3.5%, which is the second-lowest in the EU). However, most refugees are currently underemployed, and their children are not integrating, which limits their educational opportunities in Poland. Refugees in Poland face many challenges, including language barriers, limited employment opportunities, and social isolation. According to a new study by the central bank 24% of refugees are unemployed and 11% are economically inactive.
The problem of refugee integration in Poland is complex for several reasons. While the Polish government has introduced laws that enable refugees to start businesses, work, and pursue education, these policies may not be enough to address the complex challenges faced by this specific group.
Finding the binding constraint
The crucial problem is integration of refugees but that is a too wide goal that would be very difficult to address with targeted policies. As I learned it is better to narrow it down to the binding constraint. It is possible to achieve more significant and sustainable outcomes with limited resources if you know the best pressure point. This approach also helps to prioritize actions and resources, as efforts can be directed towards the areas that are most critical for achieving success.
Using the PDIA process, I began by constructing a problem statement, which identified the lack of adequate childcare as a barrier to refugee employment. Through the Fishbone Diagram, I was able to list the causes and sub-causes of the issue and identify key areas for immediate action using the Triple A analysis tool.
The issue that I found the most probable problem and responsible for most issues in labor activity of women in Poland is the need for childcare services. The binding constraint is the yet limited state capacity to provide services to additional 1.5 million people. These include: transportation, education, training, social housing, active labor policies.
The crucial point is the limited availability of affordable childcare services, which was an issue for Polish citizens in the bigger and smaller cities (in rural parts of the country women took part of their children hence the lower activity of women on the labor market). The refugees tend to choose bigger and more vibrant cities to stay as they provide more opportunities and where the unemployment in nonexistent. They are women with children and in order to work need to leave their kids somewhere and there are insufficient free spots in nurseries and kindergartens. This is even more of an issue for mothers with children with special needs.
How to find the positive deviant and benchmark yourself
There is no off-the-shelf refugee crisis management toolbox because countries differ so much. Poland is a member of the European Union, quite advanced in terms of economic development, with GDP per capita PPS at around 79% of EU average. Childcare services is a challenge on its own and for children coming from a different country it is another level of issues. There are several countries that have positive deviance in terms of childcare, meaning they have identified innovative solutions or strategies that address common challenges in childcare.
One example is Sweden, which is known for its comprehensive and affordable childcare system. Swedish parents are entitled to a total of 480 days of paid parental leave, which can be shared between parents, and the country has a high number of daycare centers and preschools, with a focus on play-based learning.
Another example is France, which has a highly-regulated but relatively affordable childcare system that provides comprehensive services to families. The country has a network of public and private nurseries and kindergartens, as well as subsidized childminding services, and parents are entitled to generous parental leave and child benefits.
Identify the key success factors or strategies that these positive deviants are using to address the problem or challenge. This could involve conducting interviews or surveys with the firms or organizations to understand their approach, and analyzing their business models, marketing strategies, and operational processes. There is no easy copy-paste option here. One needs to look for different solutions and iterate and the gap analysis is a great tool in order to find the best option.
How to establish a high-bandwidth organization
A high-bandwidth organization is an authorized institution that brings together different silos in governments. We learned a lot on how countries like Albania were successful in implementing such reforms, in my group we also discussed some examples from Israel when specific task forces were established in order to address horizontal challenges. In Poland we do not have such examples.
As professor Ricardo Hausmann put it nicely: “it is easier to see public-private partnerships rather than public-public cooperation”. Coordination of public institutions is a Sisyphean task. To address the challenges I was thinking of establishing new ministry of migration responsible for the Polish diaspora and helping refugees and migrants. Currently there is no institution aside of the Office for Foreigners that could be said to be “high bandwidth,” it is important to assess their capacity to provide a range of services, resources, and support that can help the new ministry achieve its goals. This might include expertise in policy development, research, advocacy, and program design and implementation.
Examples from other countries (as Albania and Sri Lanka) are successes largely due to their ability to establish partnerships and collaborations with a wide range of stakeholders, including government agencies, businesses, and academic institutions. The new ministry of migration in Poland could similarly build partnerships and collaborations with a range of organizations to promote social inclusion and economic growth for refugees, migrants, and the Polish diaspora. It can also start from a taskforce that was established to prepare the social cohesion plan.
Conclusion
I was puzzled when I heard that this course is going to take 10 weeks and there in option to do it on-site in Boston. During the learning experience I learned why. It takes a lot of time to read, reflect and re-think the challenge you need to address in your community whether it is a city, state or country. There are many similarities between countries but there are even more differences. With your group you can work on similarities of challenges e.g. what happened with refugees in Lebanon but also discuss the differences not to follow the obvious mistakes.
The questions I asked during the course were connected with authorization and politics. To follow-through on the iterative and PDIA approach in a real-world setting you need a lot of trust from the political powers. It takes a lot of guts from officials to agree on doing a reform process this way, but after learning more on how to do it properly I do wonder why in so many occasions we do it top-down with wrong ideas that sometimes make little or no sense? The question I am left after the course is how to make more people do a deep dive into the issues in public policy they are struggling so that we have more aware policy-makers in Central and Eastern Europe.
This is a blog series written by the alumni of the Leading Economic Growth Executive Education Program at the Harvard Kennedy School. 72 Participants successfully completed this 10-week online course in May 2023. These are their learning journey stories.