Serious gaming to support professionalisation of energy cooperatives in The Netherlands

Abstract

Energy cooperatives are non-profit civil society organisations that promote the energy transition by mobilizing public backing and increasing private investment. However, energy cooperatives often face various challenges that hinder their success. Within literature, it appears that the barrier professionalisation has to be addressed to allow them to engage in more (complex) projects towards the energy transition.

However, professionalisation remains a vaguely defined concept in the energy cooperative literature. Based on literature and interviews with representatives of organisations that work with cooperatives on a daily basis, the description of ‘organisational capacity’ of cooperatives matches professionalisation. Organisational capacity consists of leadership capacity, adaptive capacity, management capacity and technical capacity. Especially leadership capacity appears to require special attention for young cooperatives.

Furthermore, another question that arises with professionalisation is that, given the extent it can be a barrier for energy cooperatives to professionalise, if there is not an alternative route with lower complexity. It is argued that professionalisation is mainly needed to allow cooperatives to expand project portfolio and complexity while assuring long-term sustainability of the organisation. Options for collaboration as a substitute for professionalisation typically do not cover issues in leadership capacity and focus more on managerial and technical capacity. Other alternatives are stagnation, exit or merging – yet these carry significant barriers that can harm the community and its involvement.

Further analysis has been conducted to understand the success factors and barriers that need to be addressed for professionalisation to occur. A set of ‘professionalisation pathways’ help cooperative boards understand what developmental pathways cooperatives typically take. The pathways include an innovator pathway, broad local pathway, and a local energy efficiency and savings pathway. Each has their own requirements for professionalisation. A plurality of success factors for professionalisation are identified, matching these pathways. It appears that strategic thinking is an essential first step towards a professional organisation yet lacking in cooperative boards, and therefore needs to be prioritised.

However, one thought that inevitably follows here is how one might address insufficient strategic thinking of board members. There are a variety of options, yet the format of a serious game could stimulate long-term strategic thinking. As a result, the cooperative game called ‘EcoCoop: road to 2035’ was created. After a draft was made, the game was optimized through testing with students. The resulting game ‘EcoCoop: road to 2035’ was expected to support strategic thinking, as it enticed players to think further ahead as a team: players are required in-game to invest in organisational capacity in order to execute projects and vice versa and prepare for upcoming technologies, all in order to meet goals specified for in approximately 10 years.

Whether the game can actually increase strategic thinking in board members was evaluated through 4 tests with energy cooperative board members using the Triadic Game Philosophy, which includes the dimensions of reality, meaning and play. The results indicate that the game might help cooperatives think strategically towards long-term goals, however, the study points to the need to increase playability to motivate deeper strategic thinking.