A PROPOSAL FOR DHAN ACADEMY (13th Sept. 99) (Fifth iteration - based on previous drafts written on 9th Jan.

/ 7th April/ 13th May/ 28th June. Based on initial discussions with Mr. Vasimalai in the first week of August 98, followed by more extensive discussions and comments on earlier drafts from Mr. Narinder, Mr.Gurunathan, Mr.Seenivasan, Mrs. Raghini Badri, Mrs. Umarani, Mr. Singarayar, Mr. Madan kumar, amongst other professionals in DHAN. Also based on discussions and critiques from Prof. Ranjit Gupta and Prof. Jaishankar (BIM). ) ( This draft also shown to Prof. Trilochan Sastri (IIMA) in Nov. 99) THE CONTEXT The globalization / liberalization and monetization of economies and the information revolution created by computers and satellite technology has created new opportunities and challenges. While Gross Domestic Product and stock exchange indices are shooting upwards, there is increasing concern about the plight of the traditionally marginalized poor( mainly rural and/or assetless and/or women,) and of the physical environment. For instance, Saxena (1997) a senior civil servant in the Indian central Government states that an expert group appointed by the planning commission estimated that the initial impact of liberalization on the poor has not been favorable...The percentage of people below the poverty line increased between 1991 to 1993.... It is generally believed that the overall impact of reforms on the poor in India has not been as adverse as in Latin America and African countries, but it has not been as favorable as in China and Indonesia. Per capita availability of food grains has declined between 1991 to 1994....Without a positive thrust towards the socio economic transformation of the marginalised groups, growth may bypass the poor (pg.-3). Similarly, the Center for Science and Environment (CSE) reports documents increasing deforestation , pollution of land , water and air which is accompanying increasing economic growth. (CSE State of Indias Environment - the citizens fifth report 1999). Effective responses need to be fashioned for these concerns of equity, gender and the physical environment (which can be loosely be classified under the rubric developmental.) However the history of developmental programs and action has not been that of success. Analysing the reasons for the large gap between promise and performance, Robert Chambers (1997) (quoting from the results of experiments to make Filipino irrigation more farmer centered) argued for a paradigm shift from THINGS to PEOPLE. The differences between these two paradigms is listed below (page 37 of Whose realities count - Putting the first last Intermediate technology publications, London, 1997)

POINT OF REFERENCE Mode Keyword Goals Decision making Analytical assumptions Methods/rules Technology Professionals and local people Local people seen as Force flow Outputs Planning and action

THINGS

PEOPLE

Blueprint Process Planning Participation Preset/closed Open/ evolving Centralized Decentralized Reductionist Systems/holistic Standardized/ Diverse/ Universal Local Fixed Varied Basket Instructing/ Enabling/ Motivating Empowering Beneficiaries Partners/ actors Supply push Demand pull Uniform Diverse Infrastructure Capabilities Top down Bottom up.

Such changes are occurring across a variety of sectors in the field of development activities. Saxena (1997) comments on a similar change in the forestry sector due to the Joint Forestry Management (JFM) strategy. (Page 42) These changes are presented in the following table Point of reference Objective Old forest policy New forest policy

Reduce peoples Increase supply of goods desired dependence on forest by people, from forests.. Stem based Crown based

Look of the forest Clients Timber Silviculture

Market and industry Forest dwellers and locals Main product Conversion to uniform Exotic and commercial Planting Harvesting Bye product Improvement, felling, protection

Species

Grasses, shrubs, bushes, Minor Forest Produce Regeneration Gathering

Production through Usage through

A study done on successful community enterprises run by Non Government Organizations in Tamil Nadu, (Sarma 1998) also points to the need to a similar shift in orientation in enterprise promotion, with the emphasis shifting from the conventional Markets/ product/ consumers/ profits to Local environment/ skills and raw material/ community/ sustainable livelihood . It appears to follow that administration or management of developmental 2

activities and programs ( as a separate discipline or a profession ) also needs a paradigm shift. It is interesting to note that such paradigm shifts seem to be occurring over many disciplines, whose key elements were outlined by Schwartz and Ogilvy (1979 - The emergent paradigm: changing patterns of thought and belief Menol Park, CA - SRI) DOMINANT PARADIGM ----------------> EMERGENT PARADIGM From ----------------------------------------> Towards Simple Probabilistic laws Hierarchy Mechanical order Determinancy Linear causality Blueprints MANAGEMENT EDUCATION Halse (1980) states that management as a skill that could be taught through structured classroom sessions, is thought to have been initiated at the Harvard University in 1908. It took Harvard twelve years, before it advanced significantly teaching on a problem oriented basis, through the celebrated case method. This employed the use of actual business problems as teaching tools - not merely as illustration of a technique, but as a means of seeing the gestalt or the whole situation in which a decision maker has to use a technique or a skill. This approach of the analysis of the total situation, created new knowledge - as illustrated by the Hawthorne case which prompted the emergence of Organization behaviour as an object of study in its own right. (Pg.5) The transfer of teaching technology to India by Harvard resulted in the creation of the Indian Institute of Management (Ahmedabad) and its two year postgraduate program of business administration in the 1960s. (Which perhaps is the pioneering MBA program, establishing management as a separate discipline and a profession, in India). The programs initially targeted investor oriented business enterprises. But, as Tushar Shah (1995) notes , Ravi Mathai, the first director of IIMA drew a sharp distinction between a management school and a business school and insisted that IIMAs concern should be with understanding the operating system of the economy as a whole and not with just enterprise management...(but) ...its flagship Master of Business Administration (MBA) program relentlessly drove the institute away from larger management concerns to pure business concerns (pg. 21). One of the efforts to make management as a profession more socially relevant was the initiation of the Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA). The Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA) was established in 1980 as a sort of informal collaboration between the Indian Institute of Management and the National Dairy Development Board( The conceptualizers, the initial faculty and the design, teaching material and cases of the first program, the two year program in rural management - PRM-were all from IIMA). IRMA was initially established to meet the need for trained managerial manpower of commodity cooperatives promoted by the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB). The IRMA Asian workshop report on the role of cooperative HRD institutions in the emerging markets (1995) states, IRMA was created with a conception of the role of management in society very similar to Ravi Mathais. The conception recognized that, 3 Complexity and diversity Heterarchy Holographic order Indeterminancy Multicausality Morphogenesis

besides the investor oriented business organizations serving as engines of wealth generation the building of wholesome society needs a plurality of organizations and institutions. It recognized the dangers facing a development society in which the national and multinational business enterprise completely dominates the socio economic and political space: and the overarching needs to promote and support the other enterprise - such as cooperatives, NGOs and peoples organizations - as a counterpoise to the capitalist firm. This was the consideration behind the establishment of IRMA (pg.21-22). Halse (1980) argued that the new institute of rural management was also a new developmental discipline - stating that what happened in the villages in say the procurement function of milk cooperatives, (involving knowledge of village social structures, ability to generate consensus on matters of mutual interest, a flair for selection and training of village functionaries, and working knowledge of cooperative law,) went far beyond the conventional purchase management techniques taught in Harvard or IIMA. He noted that literature on the nuts and bolts of how they do their job was scarce. (Pg.8). Within fifteen yeas of its existence, IRMA appears to have achieved a unique identity somewhere in the middle of the continuum between state controlled growth models and market oriented growth models - by focusing on strengthening management capacities of other enterprises which are controlled by users of services rather than by capital suppliers. (Asian workshop report on role of cooperative HRD institutions in emerging markets, 1995) .(pg 7) However this success has also accompanied a derailment of the postgraduate program with the leakage rate of the PRM graduates to the business sector rising sharply during since the 1990s. (Pg.25) As the report pointed out the new macro economic policies which were unleashed in 1991 had the dual impact of stopping the growth of the cooperative sector ... depressing the demand for PRM graduates in the sector...while a significant market began to emerge for the PRM graduates in the agribusiness and mainline business sectors... The cultural impact on the youth produced by the new macro economic policies ...led to the ascendance to a yuppie culture in metropolitan cities, which began to make many development oriented young people feel like suckers ( pg.25). This has led to a drying of the supply of IRMA graduates to the development sector - ironically at a time, when the demand for such human resources is becoming all the more important due to tensions created by macro economic policies. ORGANIZATION CONTEXT OF DHAN Foundation PRADAN (Professionals for Rural Development and Action) was initiated in 1983 to provide professional expertise to the development sector - by professors and PRM graduates from IIMA and IRMA. The growth strategy of PRADAN evolved through various twists and turns. It initially concentrated on being outside consultants to Non government organizations. It later shifted the strategy to implementing programs directly, and finally to facilitate development of user organizations to implement the programs. In 1997 pursuant to a Board resolution, PRADAN hived off the south Indian programs, to become DHAN Foundation. Dhan Foundation has two major programs. - Formation of women self help groups for savings and credit which are linked with commercial banking institutions. These self help groups are federated at the administrative block level for linking with very large national financial institutions. Around forty thousand women members exist, who have presently federated to around ten federations. NABARD had set a national target of forming one million groups with around twenty million women by 4

2009, at an international seminar on alternative finance organized by DHAN Foundation in 1999. DHAN Foundation had publicly committed to meet five percent of this target, that is fifty thousand groups, or one million women members federating into around two hundred federations. This national goal is one of the important driving force for DHANs expansion plans. - Creation of Tank Farmer Associations with the command area farmers of irrigation tanks. These TFAs rehabilitate and maintain their irrigation tanks with their own funds and funds generated from the District Rural Development Agencies. TFAs in a district federate into a Tank Farmers Federation. Three TAFFs have been formed. Around 220 TFAs exist in five districts in the state of Tamil Nadu Andra Pradesh and Pondicherry, with around six thousand members. There are around 120,000 irrigation tanks in South India, which indicates the potential for expansion for this program. An important strategic shift is the decision to work on a cascade of tanks instead of individual tanks - which implies moving to a more holistic perspective from the present piecemeal one. Dhan Foundation presently works in around one thousand villages, in two states and one union territory in South India. It presently directly employs around eighty professionals - in professions as varied as business management, rural management, agriculture, agriculture engineering, social work, accountancy, nutrition and home sciences. The SHG - Federation model seems to have been standardized and appears to be in the phase of upscaling. The TFA - TAFF model appears to be still under experimentation, requiring innovations before it can be standardized (?). Two staff functions programs exist - the research and rural center (RRC), providing research and documentary support. The Human Resources Development cell (HRD), is responsible for recruitment, induction, and upgrading skills of professionals, and other human resources associated with DHAN Foundation.. HUMAN RESOURCES SYSTEMS The human resource stock of Dhan Foundation, can be broadly categorized into three segments - Professionals usually with accredited qualifications, and their support staff - Community level workers, who are usually employed by peoples level organizations, like Block federations and TAFF - Community leaders and functionaries of SHGs and TFAs. The present proposal is dealing only with the professional category. Recruitment - Most of the professionals especially those related to agricultural disciplines are recruited through campus interviews advertisements in newspapers, and rarely through the alumni network. Most of the recruits are freshers. Mid career entries are rare. This has given the organization a very young age profile with the mean age of professional staff being below thirty years of age. Induction - The induction process consists of two phases (a) Associateship (for thirteen weeks) (b) Apprenticeship ( for nine months)

The Associateship exposes the potential recruit to the grassroots reality - under a Field Guide (a DHAN professional working on the site). This phase gives the recruit an opportunity to assess working in the villages as a career choice. The processes in this phase includes community interaction, doing an assigned field project, reviews with the field guide, and writing three reports, commenting on feelings about the work, issues faced, career goals, and an essay on my role in development. On completion of the twelve weeks, a designated committee appraises the candidate and if found fit, is asked to join the apprenticeship program. The potential apprentice is expected to be motivated for rural development grassroots work, able to adjust to physical discomforts, and is comfortable with the back home social milieu while making this choice to work in grassroots development. The objective of the apprenticeship program is to provide learning opportunities through grassroots action, to make a rooted career choice to spend a few years, with Dhan Foundation. The process includes support of a field guide, maintaining a daily dairy, quarterly learning reports, village study as a living system, reading relevant material, participation in two reflection workshops, and an essay on My role in Dhan. The appraisal of the candidate if found fit, will lead to an executive position in an ongoing function of Dhan Foundation. The executive is expected to perform program tasks, become a functional team member, get skilled in community organization, understand the larger program context, and develop appropriate attitudes as expected from an executive working in a village situation. Compensation packages - DHAN has adopted wholesale the PRADAN policy of compensating professionals. Every professional, irrespective of his/ her degree starts at the same scale - the starting year being determined by the year of graduation from the professional institution. Every professional gets the same perks and increments according to the number of years of service put in after graduation. A midcareer professional joining DHAN is placed in a scale commensurate with the number of years of experience put in. Pay is delinked with heirarchical status in the organization - thus creating a sort of an egalitarian cooperative / collective culture within the organization. Skill upgradation - Formal systems of skill upgradation for professionals are still in the process of evolution. The present structured mechanisms for skill upgradation are - Sponsoring to structured MDPs in reputed executive training programs. - attending in-house and external workshops and seminars - Structured in house Maps. Performance Appraisal systems - Formal systems which link skill upgradation to specific weaknesses spotted in appraisals are still in the process of evolution. Areas of HRD which need immediate strengthening - Presently two areas appear to need strengthening in the HRD systems. (A) Rate of attrition from recruitment interviews to finishing apprenticeship. The following data taken from the HRD files indicates the efforts put in to recruiting professionals.

PARTICULARS Applications generated Selected for interview Attended interview Selected for exposure Attended exposure Selected for apprenticeship Joined Community banking Tank program Expected to join Community banking Tank program

Progress in 97-98 637 226 153 69 47 33 2 11 9 7

THROUGH RECRUITMENT CAMPS AND DIRECT Tamil Nadu Placement talks held Applications received Selected for interview Attended interview Selected for camp Attended camp Selected for exposure Selected for final placement Joined credit Joined tank 4 183 134 59 27 25 17 11 2 9

Andhra Pradesh 3 172 92 54 ? 13 7 6 2 2

The ratio of professionals interviewed to those who stay after apprenticeship is very low. This has implications in unnecessary resources expended - especially precious managerial time for interviews, travel, appraisals, field guiding, etc. In view of the number of executives required each year for expansion (around twenty to thirty), this definitely retards expansion plans. (B) Structure of the apprenticeship program - The associateship - apprenticeship program is a carryover from PRADAN systems. PRADAN appears to have evolved these systems to induct professionals from IIT/IIMs who were probably unexposed to grassroots realities. Also there appeared to be e no clear cut programs, with objectives meshing in with larger goals set by state and central governments. In this context, the emphasis on reflection, and making a rooted career choice to work in development made sense as goals. Dhan has standardized a community banking program for large scale expansion - which requires professionals who are sufficiently trained to slot in directly as executives in an ongoing block federation, or start the program in a new location. Similar too is the case of the tankfed agriculture program - the universe of the program has been specified in terms of irrigation tanks located in South India. Professionals require specific inputs to innovate within this context, to arrive at replicable models. Thus the induction systems need to be reoriented to become program focused - with sufficient conceptual inputs being given to enable assimilation of field experiences to aid more effective and efficient action. 7

ENRICHING THE APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAM The structured nature of Dhan Foundation programs lends itself to more structured learning situations - where the existing corpus of general and rural management knowledge can perhaps be used to add value to the learning process. For instance the training needs of professionals joining the community banking program, would include amongst others Village analysis from the viewpoint of credit systems Catalyzing processes of self help group formation and its federation Setting up information systems on crucial indicators like membership, costs, and recovery spreads Knowledge of banking laws and regulations Understanding impact related issues in terms of quality of life, gender, empowerment, . Management accounting systems, financial management, costing and budget systems Similarly the training needs of professionals joining the tankfed agriculture program would include Designing peoples organization around land and water resources Material management tools including scheduling limited resources Cashflow planning Impact related issues on the environment, gender, quality of life, food security,etc Knowledge of relevant legal acts like the 73rd amendment relating to panchayats. The present associateship - apprenticeship systems cannot allow for such skills and knowledge to be picked up. These require more structured training learning situations in terms of formal classroom sessions, with cases and teaching notes. Modules of classroom training can alternate with fieldwork - to allow classroom learning to be integrated and grounded into action, keeping alive the original focus on hands on learning through action. Hence qualitatively action would be enhanced through use of proven management techniques - and learning enriched through allowing formal space for reflection and integration, and providing conceptual tools to analyze the experience. THE NEED FOR DHAN ACADEMY The enriched apprenticeship program should in time cover the length of the present program that is one year. Ideally half of this time should be spent in structured classroom sessions and half the time in the field. ( using the one year program model used initially in IRMA in 1980 81, as outlined in Halse(1979). The classroom sessions should be held in a space which allows for unrestricted and creative thinking, hard analysis, in-depth reflection, and dialogue. Such processes should be unhindered by program needs for hierarchy and control - if the field learning has to be fully reflected and integrated into ones sense of managerial identity for future action. This space for learning and integrating managerial skills needs to be conceptualized- with classrooms, seminar halls, library , teaching material preparation and reproduction, etc. Such managerial courses have to be residential - which implies working on food and stay, as also the softer culture which should exist in the campus in terms of respect of tradition norms and values relating to food, sex, use of alcoholic and other stimulants, etc. (Which usually is ignored in conventional management schools, and even in

IRMA).This space over time should also start preparing the teaching material and cases for the classroom programs. This space can be termed an academy - defined by the Longmans dictionary of contemporary English(1994) as a school for training in a special art or skill. Here the skill relates to that of developing and managing peoples organizations relating to community banking or tankfed agriculture. The organizational context in which these programs operate has been named DHAN - which too has a meaning. DHAN in Sanskrit and the related DHANAM in Tamil ( one of the worlds oldest spoken languages) means TO GIVE. Here professionals are expected to to give their professional skills to villages. The Academy in turn is expected to give professional management skills related to development to these professionals. Hence the academy could be termed DHAN ACADEMY. Its logo could be VIDYA DHANAM - the giving of knowledge or more precisely the process of learning. Conceptually the relationships between the three main entities, DHAN Foundation, program related peoples organizations, and DHAN Academy can be represented by set theory. The universe would be the South Indian political economy which in turn would be linked to the larger national, regional, and international political economies. Three interlinked sets within this universe would each describe the domains of DHAN Foundation, program related peoples organizations, and DHAN Academy. The domain of DHAN Foundation would include linking with the larger policy entities - like the Government, funding agencies, (Government and corporate), recruitment of professionals and their career planning, and bulk purchases of material and equipment, where economies of scale merit the same. The domain of program related peoples organizations (Block level federations, /TAFF) would be direct implementation of the program, developing a second line staff to backup the professionals, creating its own linkages with commercial banks/ Dreads, and develop village level organizations,( SHGs or TFAs). The domain of DHAN Academy would be providing, space, resource people, resource material for programs for training, reflection, and dialogue. An attempt can be made to flesh out the interfaces between the three domains. The DHAN Foundation / DHAN Academy interface would be providing space and resources for professionals and other human resources, holding of seminars and workshops related to professional tasks, . The DHAN Academy / program related peoples organizations would be providing space and resources for training and dialoguing with community leaders and community staff, The DHAN Foundation/ program related peoples organizations would relate to program content, and linking for funds, providing professionals, bulk purchases of materials, etc.

PROGRAM STRUCTURE OF DHAN ACADEMY

The program structure of the proposed DHAN Academy can be represented by the following three into three matrix. TARGET SEGMENT Community leaders People organization functionaries Professionals GENERAL ? ? MAP CREDIT /GENDER Workshops/ ? Commty. a/ctnt trng TAP - credit LAND & WATER RESOURCES Field based trng/? Federation staff training TAP - Tank

It may be noted that some of the cells have been filled up by adhoc programs, created for immediate training needs. Thus within the professional segment, two week general management appreciation program(MAP) has been standardized for project executives. A one week Thematic Appreciation Program for Community Banking has been successfully tested for professionals , who have finished MAP. A one week Thematic Appreciation Program for the tankfed agriculture program is under development. A certificate course for community accountants working in the banking program has been successfully tested. Workshops and field based training has been held for community leaders for both the community banking and tankfed agriculture programs. The future programs of the DHAN Academy could build on the experience acquired from these experiences. The following part builds on the experiences of MAP and TAP for proposing a structure for the enriched apprenticeship program. DESIGN OF THE ONE YEAR ENRICHED APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAM. The one year enriched apprenticeship program could logically build on some of the experiences of running the MAP and TAP programs, as well as the original PRM program of IRMA, and the post graduate program of the Indian Institute of Forest Management. Both IRMA and IIFM started in the early 1980s, with technical support from IIMA - with clear clients and constituencies (the commodity cooperatives for IRMA and the forestry sector for IIFM). Both designed their program to constantly switch between the classroom and the field, as a matter of deliberate strategy - both relied heavily on the course structure of the IIMA postgraduate program, as also cases and teaching notes- adapting , adding and deleting some courses, and contextualizing the cases and teaching notes to their sector. Objectives - The enriched apprenticeship program can possibly have as its objectives (a) Building relevant managerial skills for professionals recruited by DHAN, so that they become executives in the TAFF/Block federation context. This would be done by simulating decision making situations in the classroom, saving organizational time and cost, which would be otherwise lost due to learning from action only. (b) Shaping of appropriate attitudes, values, and behavior for a development professional. Participants - The participants in the program would be professionals recruited by DHAN. The mode of recruitment presently followed could be enhanced perhaps through using standardized management aptitude tests - say the Management Aptitude Test (MAT) conducted by the All India Management Association (AIMA) for MBA schools in India.

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Pedagogy - The main pedagogy to be used would be structured fieldwork/ organizational studies, which would alternate with classroom sessions.(Three field segments and three semesters). As is the case with the initial IRMA PRM and with the IIMA PGP, all the classroom sessions would be structured around case studies - which simulate the organizational environment for a decision. The first two semesters and the first field work would be common to all participants. The second field work , the organization training segment, and the last semester of the one year program would be specializations - with the choice being tankfed agriculture and community banking. PROPOSED LEARNING MODULES FOR THE ENHANCED APPRENTICESHIP PROGRAM INTRODUCTORY/ REMEDIAL COURSES Structured broadly on the rems of IIMA/IRMA. The objective is to create functional skills and knowledge without which classroom learning and field assignments would not be possible. The following courses could be structured English language - including writing with correct grammer and spelling, and use of dictionaries and thesaurus. Mathematics - a revision of knowledge of algebra and number theory, and some simple (bivariate) statistical analysis. Computer skills - using document and spreadsheet packages. (WORD & EXCEL/LOTUS) Behavior - a process laboratory on exploring the self to integrate the following field experiences and classroom concepts. FIRST FIELD SEGMENT Studying a village system. Using a prestructured format, some data has to be collected and presented in a form of a computer printout. Language skills will be tested through the report compilation. The mandatory use of the computer for generating the report, will test the computer skills. The collection of some basic numbers and its analysis would test the statistical skills. Some sort of behavioral insights would be generated through a "debriefing process lab and/ or through a written report. (Roughly the first field work of the old IRMA curriculum). CLASSROOM BASIC MANAGEMENT SKILLS This segment would be roughly equivalent to the first semester of IRMA. The courses that could be covered would include Rural environment and production systems (which will use the WAC/MAC/MOC pedagogy). Basic management accounting (the same content as in Bhattacharyas book with relevant contextual cases). Managerial economics (analyzing the economics of the firm/farm household using demand, supply, costing and pricing concepts).

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Quantitative methods - 1 (Logical reasoning using numbers, probability, sampling design, testing hypothesis). Introduction to village and community organizations (Reasons for collective action, methods, case histories). Dyadic and group behavior (process labs and cases for TA/motivation/ communication/ conflict resolution/ dominance/ cooperative and competitive behavior/ leadership).

STRUCTURED VILLAGE ORGANIZATION STUDY The unit of analysis would be a village based organization - either the SHG or the TFA. The concepts learnt in the previous semester would be applied to this village organizational context. The village production systems would be detailed. The village organization accounting systems would be described and alternate systems (seetu) etc. critiqued. The micro behavior of the village organization (whether credit or water) would be analyzed using theory learnt. Some sort of quantitative data would be collected for which sampling and hypothesis would be required. The theory of community organization would be grounded by applying it in the specific village context. A process lab could be used for debriefing and reflecting on the outsider/ insider dichotomy inherent in development initiatives and how the concept of the self and of relating to others has changed due to a specific task based experiential learning. CLASSROOM ADVANCED MANAGEMENT SKILLS This segment would be roughly the second semester of IRMA. It would build on the fundamentals taught in the first semester and internalized through the village organization fieldwork. The courses that could be covered could include Marketing to village contexts and marketing of village products Financial management tools and costing techniques Macro developmental issues like the impact of the monetary and fiscal policies, patent acts, national and state budgets on village economies. Quantitative Management - 2, which would OR/POM techniques like LP/optimization, Pert/CPM, decision tree analysis , layout, material management, scheduling). Rural organizational behavior (including issues related to task organization such as procurement, processing, marketing, personnel policies, stakeholder issues, and conflict resolution procedures, etc.) STRUCTURED COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION STUDY This segment would be equivalent to the summer training/MTS of IRMA. The unit of analysis would be a block level community banking federation, or a district Tank Farmers Federation, or similar organizations floated by sister NGOs like SIFFs, RTU, BAIF, etc. This segment would have two components A structured organization study using a format A project applying the tools and techniques learnt in the classroom segment. A process lab could be used for debriefing and reflecting on the expectations of the community leaders, the appropriate leadership style of professionals, the areas of conflict and its resolution, the areas where there is a need for collaboration.

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SPECIALIZATION This segment would have two streams - one for credit/ community banking working on issues related to gender - and another for tank/ land and water management working on environmental issues. This segment would be an expansion of the present TAP and would require more intensive conceptualizing. Some of the issues that would be handled in this segment (preferably through a seminar/ group assignment pedagogy) would include Planning and budgeting systems The developmental policy context The human resources issue peculiar to the theme The community organization issues related to the theme The village impact issues of that theme. The technology issues. A process laboratory would round off this segment to prepare the participants for the more demanding professional tasks that lie ahead of them. The way the program structure is built up conceptually can be depicted by the following matrix. It must be noted that each classroom segment is followed by a village or field component - where the participants experience first hand a reality, with tools given for analysis - which experience is again later brought into the classroom for internalizing the concepts taught. Thus the first remedial gives the participants rudimentary language and quantitative skills to understand the village reality. This learning of the first field work of studying village systems, is brought into the first semester, where new concepts are introduced from management to understand the same reality. With this enhanced skill of analysis, the participants shift to taking a village organization as the unit of analysis in the second field work (as per the specialization). This rudimentary understanding of the environment and the organization it fosters allows the participants to appreciate the more advanced management concepts introduced in the second semester. This is followed by an organizational/ management training segment where the participants are placed in a community organization (TAFF/Block federation) for applying their management skills through a project, as also undertaking an organizational study. The organizational/ management training segment will be followed by the last semester which is the specialization - with the participants undertaking very detailed analysis of the issues , problems and organizations in the sector they are going in.

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FOCUS BEHAVIOR

FIRST SEMESTER

SECOND SEMESTER

THIRD SEMESTER Community Organizations in Credit and Tank (International and other experiences only the people organization part and organization structures) Costing & Budgeting, MIS, control, in specific context using international and other experiences) Economic issues in community banking, from monetary and gender perspectives. Economic issues in land and water resources, using environmental economic perspectives Analysis of top ten organizations in the particular theme POM with reference to the area of specialization. Will also include technology of the sector. The specific development policy context for the area of specialization .Issues relating to impact analysis

Individual and Group Organizational issues Behavior ( TA (OD, Personnel Mgt. Leadership, group HRD, climate, culture) behavior)

ACCOUNTING AND FINANCE

Management Accounting

Financial Management and Costing

MANAGERIAL ECONOMICS

Micro ( demand Macro ( Development analysis, supply, perspectives in pricing, break-even) monetary, welfare, agriculture economics, development economics - analysis of budget and live issues like patents, etc.) COLLECTIVE Introduction to Organizational analysis ACTION collective action and of community commty organizations organizations. QUANTITATIV Univariate/ Multi Use of optimization E AIDS TO variate analysis of techniques using more DECISION quantitative data, using advanced computer MAKING computer spreadsheets. packages.( OR & POM) RURAL ENVIRONMEN T Village environment and production systems (Some sort of introductory rural sociology) . To be taught through MAC/WAC methodology. Marketing to and from village environments. Policy making in developmental contexts.

MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMS As with the experience of IRMA and IIFM, stand alone MDPs can be evolved after the one year program has been stabilized. ( IRMA Workshop report 1995).

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RELATIONSHIP WITH CLIENT CONSTITUENCY The client constituency for the proposed DHAN Academy is clearly the community /people organizations created by the banking and tankfed agriculture programs. (Block federations and TAFF). As detailed in the earlier section on domains the relationship between the DHAN Academy and the client constituency can be detailed as Researching for teaching cases which can create solutions for live field problems, as also server classroom training needs. Providing professionals trained to fit in directly to work towards organization needs. The fieldwork components would serve the purpose of the peoples organizations getting to know the DHAN Academy activities better. Standalone programs can be organized for community /people organization functionaries and leaders - for which separate thinking needs to be undertaken and separate proposals written. The recruitment of professionals (even through the MAT) will be left entirely to the DHAN Foundation - as also their stipend and allowances - to ensure that appropriate controls is exercised while placing the end products. INSTITUTIONAL FORM THE STRUCTURING OF THE PROPOSED ACADEMY CAN BE A REGISTERED SOCIETY (LIKE IIMA AND IRMA) - WITH THE MEMBERS BEING THE PEOPLES ORGANIZATIONS WHO WILL BENEFIT FROM THE SERVICES IN TERMS OF RESEARCH, TRAINING OR CONSULTANCY. PRODUCTION OF CASES FOR DHAN ACADEMY PROCESS The process of casewriting is usually as under (a) Identify themes/ areas in which teaching cases are needed (b) Identify case lead with the relevant organization/ person. (c) Get formal permission for writing the case (d) Arrange logistics of data collection - research assistants, food, stay, travel, access to documents, etc. (e) Create the frame for data collection. (f) Collect the data (g) Write the case (h) Quality check of case by renowned case writing experts, like Prof. Gupta (i) Formal permission of organization to release the case (j) Test the case in the classroom (k) Release the case Some teaching cases have been written on a pilot basis for both the community banking and the tankfed agriculture program, both of which require to be tested rigorously in the classroom. While most of the cases will be written from the program context of DHAN, if opportunities are made available cases can also be written from other organizational contexts - which would enhance learning through variety. The collaborations DHAN is organizing 15

with select NGOs could perhaps be a starting point for such exercises. Immediately cases can be purchased from IIMA - which has released a catalogue, with cases for many of the sessions which DHAN Academy plans to hold. IRMA too can be rich source of cases, but the IRMA catalogue does not mention all the cases it has produced. The IIFM (Bhopal) too can be a source for cases. As with the experience with IIMA and the IRMA postgraduate programs, these cases will be slowly replaced by indigenous ones, developed in-house, through a formal casewriting program. It may be interesting to note that if each session requires one case, a total of five hundred and forty cases will be required for the one year enhanced apprenticeship program. GENERATION OF TEACHING MATERIAL Teaching notes and teaching material will need to be drawn up through building up a library revolving around the themes of management, rural development, banking, and land and water resources. Collaborations could be organized with the libraries of IIMA and IRMA, for building up catalogues, and getting rare books and articles photocopied. A separate budget needs to be made for purchase of books and periodicals - purchased with the explicit objective of building up teaching material. At least one teaching note will be required for each session - thus giving a minimum of five hundred and forty teaching notes for the program. SPACE For management training programs to be effective, the experience from IRMA/IIMA/IIFM has shown that residential programs are a must. A lot of learning is generated in small group discussions outside the classroom. Group assignments and the case method pedagogy explicitly structure this element in as a learning process. It is hence proposed to keep the one year enhanced apprenticeship program a residential one. The present DHAN Academy campus at Pulloothu(leased from Boys town) is sufficient for running a residential program for twenty to thirty participants. It has been used for in-house MDPs - some cultural norms in keeping with traditional values has been introduced to ensure that some of the deleterious side effects of allowing young boys and girls to stay alone is avoided. (There is a well enforced voluntary ban on tabacco, sex, alcohol, drug stimulants, meat in force in the campus). The present arrangements could continue say till the one year is completely stabilized in three to five years time. A future DHAN Academy campus (possibly in the three acre site of PRADAN) can also be planned keeping in mind the specific requirements of this program. ( Amphitheater style classroom, hostel rooms which facilitate group discussions, open spaces strategically located for stimulating conversations, library, computer laboratories, student managed mess(?) , recreation facilities, etc. ) RESOURCE PEOPLE & FACULTY The faculty is the key resource for the DHAN Academy. Inducting good faculty and retaining them would be main challenge. If IRMAs experience is anything to go by (IRMA workshop 1995) , hygiene factors like adequate pay and facilities are the minimum essentials necessary. It is proposed to induct only as faculty those who have had adequate exposure to management concepts through structured programs, with some degree of field experience. The experience of in-house MDPs show that PRMs from IIMA/IRMA with field experience 16

suffice. However salaries, perks, infrastructure needs to be provided to attract such people especially in a small town like Madurai, which cannot boast of much to offer for the career minded. The enculturation of academic norms of excellence can only occur through the action of those recruited as faculty. To give them role models of excellence, an academic advisory committee would be constituted consisting of eminent managers and management academics, who have worked in or living in South India. These resource people would be invited periodically to visit the campus and take sessions and seminars, as also advice and critique the academic programs. Initially six faculty would be recruited (there being six courses a semester). Each faculty would have one program assistant, who would also undertake the work of research assistants, library assistants, teaching material reproducers, logistics coordinators, fieldwork supervision, etc. When these six core faculty and their assistants have standardized systems expansions in numbers could occur. CREATION OF FACILITIES The proposed coursework also includes familiarization with the latest in management technology - which facilities need to be created. Computer utilization would be integrated into some courses - which implies setting up a computer laboratory, with atleast one computer for two students, apart from those for faculty. Overhead projectors for presentations, a video recorder and player for oral communication courses, apart from a library of management video cassettes, would be required. The stay arrangement of the students would need to be enhanced through provision of small tables and chairs, a small cupboard, table lamps, discussion rooms, recreation facilities, etc. To avoid management problems transport could be hired from Madurai/ sister institutions of DHAN for ferrying students, faculty and resource people. (BUDGET STATEMENT TO BE ATTACHED WITH EXPLANATIONS). References - IRMA Publications Working paper # 1. Michael Halse, A new institution of rural management - and a new developmental discipline (1980) Workshop report # 12 Role of cooperative HRD institutions in the emerging markets (1995) Six distinguished lectures on governance and management of rural cooperatives (1992) IRMA Postgraduate program brochure of 1997 - 99. OTHER PUBLICATIONS Saxena, N.C. Policy and legal reforms in India. National research and resource center, LBS National academy of administration, Mussorie. 1997. Program brochure of Indian Insitute of Forest Management, Bhopal, 1997. 17

Date:12/01/2009 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/thehindu/edu/2009/01/12/stories/2009011250090400.htm Back Education Plus

Two-year course in Development Management

The Tata- Dhan Academy at Madurai is offering a specialised course called Post Graduate Diploma in Development Management to meet the requirement of suitable hands for development studies. This academy is a joint venture of Dhan Foundation and Sir Ratan Tata Trust. By offering this course, the Academy wants to produce quality development professionals with appropriate motivation, values and ethics besides shaping them to work for creating a significant impact on the lives of the poor. This two-year programme commences in July09 and would have four segments: preparatory, classroom, fieldwork and development practice. The PG Diploma course in Development Management aims at producing graduates capable of working in development sector. Management concepts, principles, tools and techniques relevant to development are taught in this course, a press note from the Academy said. Candidates completing the course successfully will be placed in development organisations. Selection for admission to this course will be made on the basis of a Development Management Admission Test (DMAT) to be held on February 15 at various centres in the country. In southern India, the test centres are: Chennai, Coimbatore, Madurai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Kochi. Graduates with minimum 50 per cent marks can apply for the course. Those appearing for the final year UG examinations this year can also apply. The application form can be downloaded from the Academys website: http://www.dhan.org/tda. Phone: 0452-2475318/ 2475219. Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu

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