CASE STUDY from ASToN (2019- 2022): The team delivering ASToN
The ASToN Secretariat: The engine that coordinates and administers the project.
The Secretariat team is best kept small and lean to avoid unnecessary bureaucracy and help steer as much resource to the network itself as possible. Comprising a project coordinator, a network/community manager and an administrator, with the support and steer of a Financial Director, the most effective team blends a diverse set of experiences from across any or all of: urban affairs, international affairs, regeneration, communication, community management, economic development, administration. And then depending on the theme of the network, it’s beneficial to have some expertise on that theme in the core team.
Experts team: The deep expertise to draw on for specific moments through- out the project.
• For ASToN we had a few different tiers of expertise, from innovation method experts who oversaw the duration of the project, to technical experts on a niche topic like data management who joined the cities for just one talk to share their wisdom and experience.
• For us, we divided expertise across:
– Lead expert. The innovation strategy lead for the project. This could also be called Lead Coach.
– Thematic experts. Technical experts with deep expertise in themes relevant to clusters of the cities, (like mobility, addressing and citizen participation in our case) selected from a rooster of experts launched a the beginning of the programme
– Ad-hoc experts. Practitioners or academics with deep expertise on a more niche topic we could bring in as a guest speaker, or critical friend at key points in the programme
– Local experts. Consultants with expertise and networks rooted in the local ecosystem who could bridge communications and action across the city team, their citizens, academia, press, and any technical teams working with the city on the project
– Experimentation coaches. Innovation coaches, experts in experimentation to guide the teams through designing, testing and iterating their ideas out in the real world, and drawing learning from those experiments.
Suppliers: Other dedicated support from a roster of selected suppliers
• External evaluation
• Brand and communications
• Knowledge capture
