Is scrutiny a game? It’s an interesting one to ponder. Certainly, some seem to act as if it is. They play to win, whether for party political reasons or purely for control. Equivocation and even manipulation have been employed to achieve ‘victory’ for the executive or for the non-executive.

But not every game is competitive. As you may know, dear scrutineer, there are also cooperative games and maybe scrutiny can be thought of in this way.

I recently played my first cooperative board game. It’s called Pandemic and the aim is to save the world. Each player is assigned a role with particular unique ‘powers’ and you work together to end a global pandemic (it didn’t end so well for the world population when we played, I’m sorry).

Like a competitive board game, players take turns and the context constantly changes. Whilst the actions of other players hopefully move a positive result closer, the game creates new outbreaks and new challenges at the end of every turn.

Unlike a competitive board game, whilst players are responsible for their own decisions, they can give advice to each other and agree strategies. The aim is a shared one of course. Either everyone wins or everyone loses.

It strikes me that, to be effective, scrutiny should be like a cooperative board game. I’d say the pieces are in place for this:

• Players have distinct roles and different abilities that together can add up to something greater than the sum of its parts
• Players take turns, responding to the turns of others and to any changes in the world around them
• Communication between players allows for coordination and shared approaches to emerge

And, most importantly, everyone is working towards a shared goal - ensuring the quality of policies, services and governance in the interests of citizens in the broadest sense. Perhaps more narrowly safeguarding or improving a particular service or developing a specific policy.

Of course, players make independent decisions and will have different ideas about what’s needed to achieve the shared goal, and this is partly what makes this game of scrutiny challenging at times.

And yet, one intriguing thing about a cooperative board game is the potential to teach the players something. The value of communication, yes. The importance of reminding each other about that shared goal, of course. But, perhaps most interesting of all, the problem-solving possibilities when the game is played well, when players lean on each other’s strengths and when no single player seeks to dominate.

And hopefully, next time we play, we will be able to save the world.

​

​

If you would like to see or add comments to this reflection, you can find it on LinkedIn here.