To pioneer a mission-led model of government that delivers visible progress on the challenges that affect everyday life.
Why This Matters
Democracy is in crisis. To rebuild trust, governments must show visible progress on the challenges that affect everyday life. But they cannot do it alone. We need a new model that activates the full potential of society.
The Context
Political systems are under pressure, and old methods are failing to produce meaningful change. A new approach to government is urgently needed – one that fosters collaboration, embraces complexity, and delivers lasting solutions for future generations. Because no single entity can solve society’s biggest problems, governments need to find a way to bring the whole system to come together in a different way. In doing so, they need to inspire radically new thinking, different partnerships and a fresh sense of confidence and hope.
However, leadership in government suffers from a crisis of collaboration, with too much responsibility for broad systemic challenges lying with a single player. The challenges we face, such as of addressing violence in society or catalysing economic growth, can only be solved by building a broad-based multi-sector coalition. Governments cannot solve complex issues alone – they need to engage with business and civil society. But it is hard to truly share accountability if at the same time there is a shared expectation that government has ultimate accountability. An inclusive, cross-sectoral approach, engaging government, business, civil society, and the communities most impacted by the issues. The nations that are the most collaborative are the ones that are overcoming their challenges with greatest impact.
The Opportunity
The Bridge Institute’s Spiral Breakthrough is a radical new approach that calls for breaking free from conventional methods through leadership transformation, collaboration and innovative thinking. It offers a practical, structured way to build trust, shared purpose, and collaborative momentum towards lasting, transformative change. By embracing this new, partnership-driven methodology, governments can begin to deliver the lasting, transformative change that is so desperately needed.
The Bridge Institute is keen to work with any government looking to solve its most pressing challenges through the power of unlocking the whole system.
Our Approach
The Bridge Institute is supporting the UK to pioneer a mission-led approach to governance - where governments collaborate across sectors to solve complex problems, starting with issues like knife crime in London.
The Outcomes Will Include
- Running one or two national missions (for example, reducing knife crime in London)
- Producing rigorous data-based evidence to show the impact of these missions
- Codifying and publicising the model to inspire broader adoption
- Building a small group of expert enablers within the UK able to enable rapid expansion of the approach
