The benefits and challenges of drafting by committee

I think it is no small secret that universities love a committee. Whether you call them committees, working groups, task forces, advisory groups, steering committees, or something else entirely, it would not surprise me to learn that your university has these in abundance. If there’s a problem, there’s probably a committee being formed to find the solution.

But I jest. Committees (advisory groups, task forces, etc.) are an integral component of collegial governance. And in many ways, there are indisputable benefits to having a cross-institutional committee weigh in on policy decisions that have broad campus impacts.

Benefits such as:

• Breadth of expertise: Universities are awash with subject matter experts and their expertise can help ground the policy in the context of the university’s campus culture and history.
• Cross-divisional representation: Including representation across different divisions of the university helps create well-rounded and inclusive policies and ensures relevant application in all areas.
• Proactive stakeholder consultation: Early input from relevant stakeholders can speed up the policy approval process by identifying and addressing issues right away.
• Improved uptake: When more people have been involved in the policy process it creates a sense of shared ownership which can lead to better buy-in and uptake during the operationalization of the policy.

However, the question at the heart of this blog post is: Is drafting by committee the most effective strategy for policy writing? And I’m not so sure that it is. While we want to ensure we are capitalizing on the wealth of expertise available on campus and gathering the relevant people in the room, we also run the risk of the proverbial “too many cooks in the kitchen.” And when we have too many cooks in the kitchen, we can end up with a policy that includes everything and the kitchen sink.

Drafting by committee can lose sight of the overall objective.

The challenge with drafting by committee is that we can quickly lose sight of the overall objective as everyone starts getting into the weeds about what the policy needs to say and how it needs to be said. People come to the table with their own personal objectives of what they believe the policy needs to cover, and if they successfully convince the rest of the committee to include each of those objectives or pieces of information, we can quickly end up with a policy draft that is unwieldy.

Drafting by committee can cause logistical challenges.

Challenges such as coordinating meetings, keeping people on task, waiting for each committee member to weigh in on decisions, coming to consensus with there are differing opinions and perspectives, time spent wordsmithing the language so that we can land on a message that's not only precisely accurate, but accurately precise while also artfully exact, with every word pulling its semantic weight. Or at least that’s what the linguists in the room tell me.

So how and when can we use committees in our policy process?

My personal preference is to capitalize on existing committees as part of an early consultation process. As we covered at the start of this blog, it is highly likely that you already have a plethora of committees at your disposal. There is likely one, if not two or three or four, committees scattered across campus that include relevant subject matter expertise and cross-institutional representation that you could utilize to help inform the policy without actually asking them to write it. Why ask people to form and join yet another committee when you can simply go to them? Instead, consider:

• Take the existing policy (or the plan for a new policy) to the committee and ask the committee members to identify their top one to two pain points with the policy.
• Take that information away, and use it to help inform the new draft.
• Bring the new draft back to the committee for feedback.

The key to this process is to let the committee know they are not “the owners” of the policy, you are there seeking their feedback and expertise, but that ultimately the policy drafter is making the final decision on the scope, content and language of the policy.

This process can be repeated with however many relevant committees or groups exist on campus relative to the topic of the policy being drafted or revised. Utilizing existing committees in this way helps reap the benefits, while sidestepping the challenges.

Whether you always write policy by committee, never write policy by committee or occasionally find yourself writing policy by committee, this blog post has hopefully sparked some reflection on the value and pitfalls of drafting by committee.