When an organization focused on improving our national immunization and vaccine systems wants to improve itself, where does it turn?
The American Immunization Registry Association (AIRA) is a membership organization that promotes immunization information systems to prevent and control vaccine-preventable diseases. After expanding rapidly to meet the demands of the healthcare system, AIRA’s growth accelerated further during the vaccine-driven response to COVID-19 pandemic. Despite adding programs and staff, the organization didn’t have time to appropriately scale its internal structures. AIRA turned to The Collective Good for help evolving their organizational design to sustain their growth.
AIRA’s dedication and readiness to pitch in was inspiring. Still, before planning for the future, we had to better understand what working there looked and felt like in the moment.
Our team embarked on an in-depth review of AIRA’s current operations, designed to surface the relationships between four key elements of any organization: work, culture, people, and structure. This approach is grounded in the Tushman-Nadler Congruence Model, which finds that the stronger the alignment between these four elements, the higher the performance. Using the congruence framework also helps locate any tensions that need to be resolved, so that we can work with organizations to prioritize and design solutions more strategically.
We know that we have to go deep to learn what’s really going on. The Collective Good team kicked off the diagnostic process by familiarizing ourselves with the structure and current processes at AIRA, from their strategic plan to compensation to organizational charts. We interviewed team members across divisions and surveyed the entire staff about their experiences and what they saw as opportunities for change.
As with all of our projects, hearing from the people closest to the work is a critical step to truly understand the strengths, pain points, and opportunities to improve systems. In doing so, we captured a range of perspectives about how work is prioritized, delegated, and completed across the organization. This helped us identify areas of greatest alignment and misalignment across AIRA and among the team. We used a congruence framework to analyze our findings through a lens of alignment (or misalignment) between strategy, structure, work and people/culture. We then held deep dive conversations with leaders across the organization, digging into challenges and co-developing ideas for solutions and next steps.
We also mapped out their key partnerships. This helped us understand their impact on different communities and what made them truly special. By the end, our team had a crystal-clear picture of what Equal Measure did, who they worked with, and what everyone had to say.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
The Collective Good synthesized the congruence findings and discussions, and delivered a detailed set of recommendations to guide AIRA in its ongoing growth. Our plan included actionable next steps and a toolkit for achieving the infrastructure and culture shifts that AIRA’s staff had collectively prioritized. It also reflected the themes that emerged during our work together:
1) Accepting meaningful challenges by promoting DEI and shifting leadership practices
2) Trusting in existing strengths by exploring new revenue options and strategy
3) Valuing its talent by engaging and listening to staff
By following this roadmap, we are confident that AIRA can position themselves for success and mature into their next phase as a larger organization.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
One area of priority that surfaced in the staff surveys and interviews was advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) internally and externally. During subsequent deep dive conversations, The Collective Good team challenged AIRA leaders to engage on this topic in meaningful ways, for example, by asking how a focus on intersectionality and equity in immunization could support funding diversification? Our recommendations suggested specific internal actions ARIA could take, informed by staff input, such as establish and define a common understanding of DEI for the organization, articulate its commitments to DEI, and create internal DEI initiatives.
The result was a clearer mission and theory of change and a new way of leveraging their influence in the space as evaluators, conveners, and agents of social change.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
Just because a strategy worked well in the past doesn’t mean it’s the right strategy for the future. As we counseled AIRA on their path forward, we advised leaders to explore innovative avenues for funding beyond their traditional model, which relied heavily on a single funding source By diversifying business lines now, AIRA can prepare for leaner periods when the organization’s priorities and agenda might differ from available grants. This approach will also allow divisions to lean into their individual talents, giving staff new opportunities for growth, with the added benefit of improving job satisfaction and retention.
The result was a clearer mission and theory of change and a new way of leveraging their influence in the space as evaluators, conveners, and agents of social change.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
Our experience has taught us that organizational culture is shaped from the bottom up, just as much as from the top down. The Collective Good team worked with AIRA leadership to ensure that the staff we interviewed included a diverse mix of employees across differences of seniority, tenure, role type, department, and management level, as well as social identities.
Making sure all voices are included also builds a greater sense of collective ownership of the findings. We drew through-lines to feedback that originated from every team and level of the organization. In fact, our recommendations to prioritize transparency in decision-making and to align cultural norms across teams came from team member contributions.
By drawing upon AIRA’s self-knowledge and deep commitment to its health-oriented mission, The Collective Good offered an analysis and set of recommendations that were actionable, goal-oriented, and truly aligned with the vision of its most valuable asset – its people.
The result was a clearer mission and theory of change and a new way of leveraging their influence in the space as evaluators, conveners, and agents of social change.
From this process, Future Caucus gained a clearer focus on building a constituency for inclusive governing and amplifying new narratives.
If you are in the business of social impact, your work is urgent.
Reignite your team, clarify your strategic path, and grow your collective impact.
The Collective Good is a strategy firm that helps leaders drive social change by cultivating collective insight and turning it into aligned action.
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