Branding a Region - Promising Ways of Establishing Foresight Networks

Branding a region - promising ways of establishing Foresight networks.

On the example of networks in the Baltic Sea Region

Hiltgunt Fanning (Stralsund, Germany)

My home town of Stralsund, which has a population of about 50,000, is located on the shore of the Baltic Sea in the German federal state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, one of the poorest federal states of Germany.

The most successful era in the history of my town and my region were the Middle Ages, when there existed a powerful trade alliance of Towns around the Baltic Sea, called Hanseatic League. In this alliance, Stralsund was second in importance and wealth behind the town of Lübeck, to which a number of buildings from that period testify.

Stralsund’s importance of those days gradually disappeared, and when today our region is mentioned, what is considered is mostly the only remaining important industrial centre, the town of Rostock, and the largest German island and a centre of tourism, the island of Rügen.

Knowing this, it does not come as a surprise that my home town and the region it is located in are dreaming of re-establishing the glory of Hanseatic times. There have been a number of attempts at achieving this since the Wall came down.

However, the ideas about successful approaches have changed over time.

In the Baltic Sea Region in general and in my home region in particular, since the beginning of the 1990s, a large number of organisations and networks have been created with a view to improving the economic, political and cultural development of the regions.

At first, organisations were created which focused entirely on chosen aspects of a region’s development. Examples are:

• The Council of the Baltic Sea States, which is an organisation uniting the foreign ministers of the states of the Baltic Sea Region (BSR)
• The Baltic Chambers of Commerce Association brings together representatives of around 50 chambers of commerce from the BSR
• The organisation HELCOM dedicates it work to the protection of the environment

And there is a multitude of similar organisations in the Baltic Sea Region. And although it may be said that the Baltic Sea Region is one of the most rapidly developing regions in Europe, it needs to be stated that not all subregions are equally well developed, and that we are far from having re-established the success of Hanseatic times.

Not only in my opinion, the main reason for this is that the approach to creating organisations and building networks is not sufficiently broad. As a result, two trends may be observed:

Firstly, new organisations and networks have been formed and are forming which unite representatives of most, if not all, spheres of society, that is businessmen, politicians, administrators, educators, experts, scientists and ordinary citizens. One organisation mirroring this principle is the Baltic Development Forum.

Secondly, a number of towns and subregions of the federal state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania are devising their own regional visions and strategies, based on the principles of Foresight, the desired result being the creation of unique regional brands, which will result in significantly raising the regional development in the spheres in question, e.g. business, education, culture.

One of the projects which I have chosen for today’s presentation is the creation of a vision and development strategy for the town of Stralsund for the period 2006 to 2015.

This project was carried out from March to July 2006 under the joint leadership of the town administration, in particular the Department for the Promotion of Commerce and Industry, and a renowned business consultancy.

The aims of this project coincide with the aims of Foresight, viz. envisaging new development options for the region, formulating development priorities, identifying the most competitive sectors, devising a strategy of activities and implementing the decisions taken.

The entire project was based on the following principles:

-Representatives of all strata of the town’s population need to be involved, i.e. businessmen, academics, administrators, members of the town parliament, representatives of organisations (charitable, cultural, political, social), ordinary citizens interested in the project.

-Speed is an important element – if a town or region lag behind the general development, they need to take over best practices from others as soon as possible. This often means that not all details of a project may be elaborated in the preparatory stage. Instead, a certain amount of correction will characterise the implementation phase.

This criterion is best expressed in the saying: “The business of the future is either dead or fast.”

-The success of the project needs to be measurable.

-The final say in all decision-making rests with the businesspersons and the town citizens, not with the administration or theoreticians.

In agreement with these principles, the town administration invited all inhabitants of the town, all firms, all educational institutions to participate in the project.

The beginning of the joint work was marked by a general meeting in Stralsund’s town hall, where the term “vision”, the time frame and the rules for working together were explained.

Following that, a steering committee and four working groups were formed – one on the economic development of the town, one on culture and education, one on living conditions and one on tourism. For the results of the activities of the working to be meaningful, experts in the field were invited in person. The term “expert”, however, always included two kinds of persons – scientists/analysts on the one hand and people with practical experience in the field on the other.

In the weeks to follow, the four working groups met for three half-day sessions, in which they developed the above-mentioned main strategies for the development of the region and ways of implementing these. In this process, the “Disney method”[1] was applied, which distinguishes three clear-cut stages, carried out in separate “rooms”:

1. the ‘room of dreams’, where ideas are created without assessing their feasibility
2. the ‘room of realism’, where practical considerations of implementing the ideas are discussed
3. the ‘room of doubt’, where are possible obstacles for implementing the idea(s) are discussed.

In their first sessions, the participants of the working groups had to identify major trends in the spheres of world economic development, environment, demography, technology, education, culture, communication, recreation.

Following that, subgroups were formed (e.g. one for education, one for cultural life, and one for world heritage in the working group for culture and education), which chose those eight trends which they believed the most important for their field of activity and our town from the entire range described. These trends chosen by the subgroups were then presented to the entire working group.

In a final round, all group members allocated points to each trend chosen, as a result of which three major trends per subgroup emerged.

The results of the sessions of the working groups (and the documents illustrating the work) were forwarded to the steering committee, which confirmed or amended the results.

The aim of the second session was to develop a vision for the trends identified in the first session. Again, within the working groups, the subgroups came together and solved three tasks:

-they imagined their vision having been accomplished and described the situation in 2015;

-they put the essence of their realised vision in a slogan and a logo;

-they named indicators allowing to measure a successful realisation of the vision.

After discussion and clarification in the working group as a whole, the results of the second session were gain forwarded to the steering committee for comment.

In the third session of the working groups, three concrete projects had to be described by each of the subgroups, starting from a small-scale, easy-to-implement, project, leading to a challenging long-term project. The reason for demanding a small-scale project was that long-term commitment of people requires rapid success.[2] And the speedy realisation of small-scale projects will show the town’s inhabitants that the process of creating a vision is bearing fruits.

The final step in developing a vision was another general meeting, in which the steering group and the working groups presented the results of their work to the general public.

The new future vision of the town of Stralsund will be published in three major forms:

• a comprehensive reader describing all projects developed (vision, slogan, logo, indicators)
• a shorter version highlighting the major projects from all spheres
• flyers for each project

Stralsund is now in the process of implementing the ideas of the vision-creating process.

One of the more challenging projects is creating a regional brand “Made in the Baltic Sea Region”.

It is the aim of the project to identify the characteristics of competitive regional products, to significantly increase the number of such products, and to create a joint platform to market and sell them. The initial phase will focus on one sphere of production, viz. industrial design.

From the very start, the project will rely on the co-operation of local entrepreneurs, administration, educators and financial specialists (mirrored in the composition of the core project group) on the one hand, and on funding by one of the European Union’s regional development programmes for getting the project going.

So far, a contact office has been established, a draft version of the application for funding has been prepared and a number of criteria for conferring the trademark “Made in the Baltic Sea Region” have been identified.

In a second phase (to be completed by the end of 2006), partners from Stralsund’s twin cities will be invited to join the project team and suggest additions and changes to the project description and catalogue of criteria.

Main steps to be carried out in 2007 will be to submit the application for funding and the to open contact offices in their towns.

Summarising the above-said, it may be stated that after a prolonged period of division, characterised by sometimes bitter struggles of contestants in the various fields of activity – be it business, education, politics or culture, an understanding has developed that in the current situation of increased competition co-operation and combination of expertise is more advisable.

The central point in transforming this new understanding into successful activities for long-term development is identifying the major obstacles to progress. In the case of Stralsund, three points were recognised. Firstly, in a town as small as ours, high quality may be achieved only through cooperation. Furthermore, a new understanding of the role of administration and education as providers of true service to regional business was necessary. Thirdly, using all intellectual and material resources of a region requires a comprehensive approach, which involves all strata of the population.

Формирование брендарегиона – многообещающаясфера использованияФорсайта. Напримереструктуры Балтийского региона

Х. Фаннинг (Штральзунд, Германия)

Данная статья посвящена описанию опыта проведения региональных Форсайт- исследований в ФРГ.Одним из выбранных автором проектов, приведенных в статье, является разработкастратегии предвидения и дальнейшего развития города Штральзунда на период с 2006 по 2015 годы.Автор отмечает, что в сложившихся условиях всеобщей конкуренции наиболее целесообразным является сочетание и комбинированное использование опыта различных сфер (бизнеса, политики и культуры) при проведении брендига в ходе дальнейшего развития региона.

1

[1] Cf.

1)Andreas Burhorn, Stellwerk Zukunft- eine systemische Planungswerkstatt mit Erlebnischarakter, in: Managerie, 5. Jahrbuch, Carl-Auer-Verlag, Heidelberg1999, ISBN:3-89670-119-3

2)Anne Peters, Moderation nach der Disney-Methode, in: Methoden der Bürgerbeteiligung, CAF/Agenda Transfer, Bonn, 1999; ISSN:1439-1856

3)Robert B. Dilts, Know how für Träumer, Strategien der Kreativität, Junfermann, Paderborn 1994, IBN 3-87387-037-1

[2] Cf.: Vera F. Birkenbihl, Trotzdem lehren, Gabal-Verlag, Offenbach 2004, ISBN 3-89749-419-1, s. 21, 61ff.