As part of SMERU’s on-going organisational change agenda, all SMERU staff spent three days in Yogyakarta in mid-November 2016 for a strategic planning event. One of the agenda items was visiting six research institutes in Yogyakarta to learn how best to manage sustainable organisational development. A main lesson coming out of the exchange was the importance of involving senior managers in strategic planning processes as an effective way to improve organisational cohesiveness. The visit was part of a new promising horizontal and cross-learning system facilitated by the Alliance for Research Excellence (link), focussing on collective action and collaboration through relationship-building, clarifying organisational goals, development of shared understanding, and bridging differences in approach, culture and perceptions.
