Guest blog written by Jenna Fave, Wesley Marian, Moses Sebastian, Barbara Thomas, Jareth Wallen
The use and abuse of illegal drugs and alcohol by young people in Papua New Guinea (PNG) is a pressing problem that has contributed to many social ills in the country. Our group consisted of individuals working within the youth development space interested in exploring the problem through the PDIA.
The PDIA process helped us to construct the problem, deconstruct it, identify its causes, find ideas to work on and build the space for change. Our key learning points from the process include the following;
- Learning how to construct and deconstruct Problems. We learnt the importance of defining a clear problem by asking the five whys. By asking these questions, we reflected on who and why the problem was significant, which also helped get other people to own the problem. Another critical point was learning how to deconstruct a problem by breaking it down into a set of smaller problems. This allowed us as a small team to set out clearly our target goals and helped us take smaller steps to solve the smaller problem, which will lead us to solve the big problem.
- We learnt the importance of speaking to a broad range of stakeholders internal to the context, which was very valuable in refining the root causes of the problem where we were working as a team- this process also helps build consensus on what needs to be prioritised and gain legitimacy.
- We also reflected on the importance of understanding our change space by applying the AAA Analysis (Authority, Acceptance and Ability). This exercise was great as it helped us analyse the actions we identified as a team to take. We reflected that we need to be aware of the different synergies and power dynamics at work in an organisation, department, or even relationships – being aware allows one to find the right entry points. For instance, in our team iterations, we utilised our social capital by engaging with people we had a relationship with within the respective organisations with that we needed to build a change space.
- Finally, one important learning was the iterative process of action and learning. Small actions can generate big wins with a lot of learning. The iterative process also supports team building through teamwork. It was hard as we had to balance a lot of our own work, but the focus on action learning, collective action and building a strong team culture was important. So too was the importance of personal time management and developing reflective practice through journalling.
Our Main Problem was the increased use and abuse of illegal substances by youth in PNG. Our PDIA process was built on efforts made by our Youth Coalition in 2018 in pushing for our government for more action on reforms on outdated colonial laws and penalties related to substance abuse. Our youth coalition was headed by The Voice Inc, a development organisation of which four of our members were staff.
One of our challenges was the lack of consistency in bringing together and following up on the progress that we had made in 2018 and 2019. The PDIA process helped the team to reengage, redefine the problem, assess the change space and work on bringing back together our change coalition.
We learnt through the process that our initial recommendations, collected through our consultation of youth in our network, has taken up by the PNG Constitutional Law Reform Commission and included in their submission to our country’s National Executive Council for action. We have since learnt that these changes, however have not been prioritised and will require more push for them to be prioritised. This will require the team to re-engage coalition partners to rethink our strategy. Central to this, other than the focus on advocating at the national level, is to focus on the local regional levels to coordinate efforts in order to amplify the urgency of the matter whilst at the same time lobbying our government for action. Post the PDIA process; we will gather our coalition partners to see how we can influence and widen our change space.
Finally, a critical reflection is that the problem of our youth and the impacts of drug and alcohol abuse is important to everyone we talked to. Our challenge will be to build our change space within the government, private sector and civil society.
The PDIA process has helped us to have a deeper curiosity of the problem and to understand it from different perspectives. We know that to expect big change in a context where the state is ineffective in delivering essential services is challenging. Deconstructing the problem and working continually to act, reflect and iterate is important. The process is essential. Small wins lead to big wins.
We will definitely be applying the PDIA to our own jobs and how we work with our teams. Some of us have even used PDIA outside work in our families and local villages. The approach is simple to apply, and the learnings on team work and power dynamics is important in any setting.
We think the most important thing is to stick to the Team Constitution, show acts of kindness, and always prioritise your time so that you won’t get caught up and burn out during group discussions. Respect and work together as a team to help solve the problem, as the saying goes team work makes the dream work.
Be a reflective practitioner if you can. We have started (or are still trying to) journal. Learning is an active journey and we’ve reminded ourselves that the process is just as important as the outcome.
This blog was written by participants who completed a 12-week PDIA for PNG online action-learning program from September – December 2022. 31 participants successfully completed this program.