Vaughn Tan: “To innovate in public policy, Chile should try out many small ideas rather than immediately opting for large-scale solutions.”
- The University College scholar, who specializes in uncertainty, innovation, and organizational strategy, participated in the Congress on Innovation in Public Challenges, where he addressed the challenges of implementing social programs in increasingly complex and dynamic contexts.
Maintaining the effectiveness of public policies in rapidly changing contexts has become one of the main challenges facing governments and organizations around the world. The need to adapt interventions as they are being implemented, respond to new implementation conditions, and revise initial assumptions without compromising impact is among the key challenges institutions face when implementing public policies and social programs.
These issues were at the heart of the Public Innovation Challenges Congress, organized by the Innovation Lab at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, the Inter-American Development Bank, and Fundación Luksic. The event brought together more than 600 national and international experts, government authorities, academics, public innovation teams, and representatives from foundations and civil society to discuss innovation, evaluation, and the adaptation of public policies.
Singaporean academic and author of The Uncertainty Mindset, Vaughn Tan, was one of the conference’s keynote speakers. He shared insights from his research on how high-performing organizations—particularly teams in cutting-edge gastronomy—develop the capabilities to operate under conditions of genuine uncertainty, “not just calculable risk.”
“One of the most effective ways to foster innovation in Chile is not to try to do something completely new on a large scale from the outset. That is often difficult, costly, and risky,” the expert explained. He added, “What works better is conducting many small experiments, testing different ideas quickly and at low cost.” According to Tan, this approach makes it possible to learn, adjust course, and discover what works “without assuming you have all the answers from the beginning.”
When asked about the challenges he identified in Chile, “as in any other country,” Tan pointed to the size of the public sector and the bureaucracy associated with it. “Large bureaucracies are slow to change, and they slow down processes and innovation,” he said. In his view, the challenge is for bureaucracies themselves to recognize when they are hindering change and actively work to simplify their processes.
Macarena Cea, Executive Director of Fundación Luksic, took part in the panel discussion Designing and Implementing Evidence-Based Social Services, where she presented the experience of Aspiraciones, a program that supports high school seniors as they transition to higher education by providing guidance and access to relevant information.
The initiative has reached more than 600,000 students in the final year of vocational and technical secondary education and seeks to encourage greater participation in higher education. Over time, it has evolved based on lessons learned from implementation, moving from in-person support provided by professionals—and in some pilot initiatives, volunteers and teachers—to an online model. This shift has enabled the program to improve its implementation while expanding its reach without compromising quality.
“Just as the most innovative organizations learn to adapt in the face of uncertainty, social programs must do the same. The challenge is not only to design effective solutions, but also to build the capacity to refine them as contexts evolve and new lessons emerge during implementation, while maintaining quality and continuously seeking greater impact on people’s quality of life,” Cea explained.
The panel also featured Trinidad Rodríguez, presenting the MACEP program; Mónica Cortés Hidalgo, representing IAMU; and Jorge Farah, who shared the experience of the IPS-ChileAtiende Virtual Service Centers. The discussion focused on how to distinguish between the structural components of a program—such as its theory of change and quality standards—and those elements that should remain flexible throughout implementation, allowing programs to respond effectively to changing contexts while preserving their core objectives.
The full conference is available at this link.
