VII. LESSONS LEARNED
Having put so much emphasis on the need for an infrastructure to capture learning systematically in the projects, the mission felt it should make a few comments on the learning of lessons through review missions of this type. Most relate to our own perceived weaknesses, which no doubt come out in the report.
1. Time allocation. Our first lesson is clearly the need for much more time. This is not a simple matter, since the need for cost-effectiveness of such efforts more or less compels that they should be squeezed into a time-frame similar to what we confronted. However, it is not possible for even experience, country-knowledgeable team members to digest the amount of project documentation that we were presented with in New York in a day and a half, while spending all of our daytime hours talking to staff members instead of reading.
Recommendation: Where possible, documentation should be sent to team members prior to discussions with headquarters staff, in order both to give the team time to actually read the documents and to do so before talking to staff, so that staff time is used economically and with good background and focus for the discussions.
2. Country reviews. Country reviews also need somewhat more time than we had in Uganda, although our time in Malawi worked out about right. There is always a serious problem of jet-lag from the US and it results in very unproductive interviews with the senior project staff in country, since these are usually programmed into the first day or two of in-country time. We greatly appreciated the efforts of both project managers to arrange interview schedules for us, and know that this is essential -- again, for the cost-effective use of expensive consultant time, as well as a time-saving way of getting us to the persons with the most to say. However, we also feel it important that the team decide on specific individuals to talk to -- and field sites to visit -- on the basis of its own agenda.
Recommendation: Teams ought to be asked to contribute to an agenda-setting exercise before arrival, if possible, in terms at least of setting out what they think are the most important types of information they will seek. Most experienced consultants have a set of standard issues they feel it essential to address, and persons they feel it essential to talk to, and they should be asked to convey these to the country project manager in good time (ie., before arrival) to permit the latter to begin setting up appointments. Field visits ought always to be made in the middle of the team's stay in-country, so that there is adequate time to develop a reasonable interview schema, and to re-interview a few key informants after the field visits on the basis of the information gathered there.
3. Questionnaires and "virtual" team membership. The team did not take seriously enough the suggestion made by headquarters staff that a questionnaire to other projects could provide useful results. In fact, when one was hastily cobbled together after the two country visits, the results (though few) proved quite valuable in confirming some of the issues the team extracted from Malawi and Uganda. Further informatiion was gathered from a frequent UNCDF consultant via email, which could also be a useful tool for improving the coverage of review missions and greatly reducing the cost, now that we are in the age of "virtual reality".
Recommendation: Missions ought to be urged to contact projects through fax or email to elicit additional information, where appropriate, and assisted to do so either from New York or from country project offices.
4. Per Diem/DSA. The team is still totally confused about what are the standard per diems in the countries visited. Our per diem in Malawi covered only half the cost of the hotels we were booked at and recommended to stay at (these are really the only two most consultants will consider). Our per diems in Kenya and Uganda were more in line with international standards. However, what we were advanced and what we were quoted as the location-specific rates in faxes before reaching New York were completely different, and since we were only provided with travel advances one hour before leaving for the airport, we had no opportunity to clarify anything.
Recommendation: Overseas travellers are budgeted for and the authorizations are made a few days before travel, we would assume. The process of organizing travel advances should begin then and should be the first rather than the last order of business when such travellers arrive in New York.