APPLIED PERFORMANCE TECHNOLOGY GETS

RESULTS IN DONOR-FUNDED DEVELOPMENT

M. Mari Novak, CPT, MA Steven J. Kelly, CPT, MA

Donor agencies are examining how they develop, deliver, and target aid. Pressure is high
because significant accomplishments have not been consistently demonstrated despite decades
of activity. This leads to a great need for systems thinking and human performance technology
skills to achieve the desired effectiveness. This article demonstrates that it is not enough to have
the intention of doing good; it must also be done well.

ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL development in a country or
region is assuredly an extreme challenge of a complex and
multilayered system. Development projects are delivered
at every level of the system, but the clients are often peo-
ple who are living on under a dollar or two a day and who
face brutal hardships and lack of opportunity. As the
“development industry” opens up to more opportunities
and recognizes the value of applying performance princi-
ples, it sets the stage for contributions from the field of
human performance technology (HPT).
Applying the methods and techniques are not with-
out challenges, beginning with an understanding of the
term development itself. Just one sample list to choose
from on how to refer to the receivers of aid ranges from
“less developed” to “developing” to “redeveloping
countries.” One could argue that none of these terms is
adequate, as they place the receivers in a position to be
viewed as downtrodden. HPT professionals would do
well to consult a dictionary to get their bearings.
Merriam-Webster uses this definition: “to unfold grad-
ually or in detail, to bring out the possibilities of, to
make more available or usable, to go through the natu-
ral process of growth and differentiation, to become
apparent.”
Just as “development” should be redefined as “growth,”
the historical economic models used over the past 50
years have been gradually discredited by the donor agen-
cies as well as the critiques and researchers, leaving a void
in operations (see Table 1). This has created a new tension
as effort continues to be placed on responding to national
or multilateral, multifaceted political and security issues,
Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com) • DOI: 10.1002/pfi.20136
yet at the same time it is clear that the alignment of the
elements in this area is out of whack. Conflicts lie between
theory and agency polity, agency polity and project
administration, program administration and country or
regional offices, office managers and procurement, pro-
curement and effective objectives and measures, and still
others. These gaps are generally self-reported. HPT is
slowly being invited to step in with a reliable response.
Most of the critiques and analyses of aid and develop-
ment focus from the top down, including serious ques-
tions and conflicts at the second level––culural––of
Gilbert’s (1978) six levels of system intervention, and
specifically, linking cultural values with polity. These
affect mission, values, and to whom and under what cir-
cumstances aid should be offered. This article turns the
table on that discussion and considers issues from
the bottom up. HPT can instigate breakthrough thinking,
organizational renewal, realignment, and results. The cri-
tiques and analyses themselves can use HPT to resolve
their issues. In the gritty world of development, real
change is often made by one person—one person with a
clear idea and systemic perspective.
There are four key roles that HPT practitioners can
play (and increasingly they do) to shift the focus and
enlarge the perspective to the systemic objective, thereby
increasing the chances for the durability and sustainabil-
ity of the (new and improved) technical arrangement.
This is no slight matter. The billions of dollars already
spent have not been met with either radical improve-
ments or sustainable improvements. If this is worth
doing, it is worth doing well.
Performance Improvement, vol. 49, no. 3, March 2010
©2010 International Society for Performance Improvement
35
 health clinic staff. The third section was devoted to an
TABLE 1 explanation of how agricultural yields had been radically
increased. Success! Superlatives!
EVOLUTION OF DEVELOPMENT APPROACHES Then we talked with the clients, the end users. The
health care training topics and objectives had been devel-
DECADE BIG IDEAS RAMIFICATIONS oped two or three years ago, with a long delay between
procurement and delivery. The clinics had reorganized
1940s Reestablish stability Institutions, restructuring themselves in the interim. The training topics were gener-
alized and no longer applied in both urban and rural set-
tings, each of which had specialized needs. Training was
1950s Modernization Made more poor
people not as relevant anyway, as many of the clinics were closing
due to a lack of funding. The business registration fees,
now radically reduced, previously funded community
1960s Technology transfer Unequal distribution
health care. With the clinics closing, people had to travel
much farther and often had to go outside the regular
1970s Economic development People passive targets channels to get help, opening the door to corruption.
Sadly, corruption—not the level of fees, which the
1980s Human and social People regarded as
business community thought were reasonable—had been
development beneficiaries the main issue with the entrepreneurs and business man-
agers in the first place. The issue was where the fees were
going: to the health clinics or into officials’ pockets? And
1990s Sustainable development Environmental
considerations fees were no longer so much of an issue because many of
Training for results
the businesses, most in the agricultural sector, were clos-
ing anyway.
2000s Institutional strengthening Studies not validated The agribusinesses were all affected by improved
Policy formulation; Progress slow to date yields, but because of political trade barriers, the market
UNMDG
was closed. In fact, the increased amounts of food led to
lower prices—lower than farmers’ and suppliers’ costs.
Emerging Value performance ?? So although there appeared to be success on paper, a
shifts Reestablish stability more dynamic and inclusive perspective must be intro-
duced. A look at the system—the entire portfolio from
the perspective of the end users and the internal work
processes of the donor—made it clear that the port-
folio projects had to change. They had to be integrated.
WHOLE SYSTEM ORIENTATION TO THE
Communications had to be changed. Office communica-
PROJECT tions had to be integrated. One person’s input using HPT
The first and highly valuable service and application is the skills radically improved the approach to managing the
basic and most powerful: systems thinking. In the face of template of interrelated projects and outcomes. Damage
administrative requirements, priorities and pressures, had been done, but consultation on systemic perfor-
budgets and time lags, management skills and mea- mance was able to resolve the disconnects, focus on the
sures, it is rare that players in this game have the luxury, root of the problems, and reorient interventions in a sup-
experience, or motivation to think systemically. It is portive way.
enough work to stay in your own silo, and often there are This systemic approach is most commonly used in a
organizational punishments for straying out of it. troubleshooting or evaluation mode. Ideally this would
An example is appropriate. When we were working on a be built into assessment and design. However, the com-
broad country assessment, project successes were the first plexity and dynamics of development are such that con-
information received from the client office. Presented as a sideration of the system dynamics must be taken at
packet, with the luxury of a performance system vantage regular intervals. Political and macroeconomic issues
point, each unique project showed positive outcomes. The intervene. Local agencies and staff move ahead with prob-
business development sector was proud of its success to lem solving and restructuring. Energy being spent on
reduce business registration fees radically. Behind the sec- maintaining administrative structures may in turn be
ond report tab was a list of training classes delivered to reallocated to solving the next problem.

36 www.ispi.org • DOI: 10.1002/pfi • MARCH 2010

BUILDING HUMAN PERFORMANCE
FACTORS INTO TECHNICAL
ASSISTANCE
Second, there is a vital role for HPT in sector technical
assistance programs or individual projects. Most techni-
cal assistance projects do not have a performance tech-
nologist built into the project team. It would not be
cost-effective relative to the budget and duration on first
consideration. And in fact, most administrative and
program managers are not aware of systems and per-
formance technology, or of its value or opportunity.
Coupling HPT with specific technical assistance can rad-
ically increase project success. How?
Technical assistance introduces new techniques,
processes, work flow measures, information, and more
into a function. That new approach is usually the consul-
tant’s expertise, the industry standard or best practice, or
a model chosen for the circumstance. But models need to
be adapted. Organizational systems must be readied and
the application of the new technology managed. Insertion
of a new process cannot work if it is not linked to the
other processes. Staff must accept the technical assistance
changes as the new norm, and the motivations and incen-
tives must be recalibrated. This is seldom addressed in
projects, even though they are frequently commented on
as a recurring problem by the users or recipients. HPT
deals with these requirements.
A wise and wonderful teacher once explained, “Every
system works perfectly; every system does not work at all.”
Dale Brethower explained that for some people, it is
working; for others, it is broken.
Movies are made about the disasters of management
changes because management did not take the work-
force into consideration. Consider the case of a quasi-
governmental unit that decided, with the support of an
HPT professional, to make a success of its makeover. The
unit had a corruption, image, and mission problem. It
also provided a vital, unique, and multifaceted service.
It was clear that the unit was overstaffed and certain
people were just too comfortable with the old ways: a
reduction in force was the first step. And critically, it was
followed up with clear and repeated communications of
the vital nature of the unit, in particular, the pride in
clean, efficient operations. This was backed up by an
investment in the physical plant by upgrading technology
and painting offices.
Staff members were involved in documenting and
streamlining procedures. They were not only writing the
procedures down, but publishing and posting them for all
users to see—and to know in advance what paperwork
was required and in what time frame people would get
serviced. This commitment to service was quite revolu-
tionary. When these promises were delivered on, shock
and awe hit the populace and the staff. It could be done!
And so what else could be done?
Management was bold and clear on the objectives, ask-
ing for assistance in four major areas: strategy develop-
ment, reconciling the four key managers’ and functions’
different perspectives on the mission and approach of this
agency, drafting job descriptions and performance expec-
tations (with required resources, incentives, and con-
sequences), and reviewing other (national) models to
understand the criteria and methods to streamline the
interface with other governmental units on security and
transfer of data.
All of this resulted in a perfect combination of techni-
cal changes—new work processes—coupled with organi-
zational support to integrate and support the changes.
The pride, the visibility, and the effectiveness have been
sustained for years. Now the management recognizes
when there is slippage from the high standard and, with
follow-up support, is devising a renewal of the system.
APPLYING PERFORMANCE-DRIVEN
PROJECT MANAGEMENT
The third value that HPT expertise can offer in this con-
text is performance-driven project management. Project
management has been discredited when disparaging
maxims are commonplace and droll, such as, “Take the
time initially planned, double it, and raise the unit of
measure, meaning we’ll shift from 2 months to 4 years.”
Often based on personal experience, the form of project
management is often in place, but the function seems to
be increasingly lost. The forms, charts, and checklists
exist, but the valuable and worthwhile result has gotten
lost in the reporting shuffle.
There are those projects of legend, as with the project
that crept up to $90 million and then finally, and quietly,
was cancelled. Not only was the budget out of control, but
it was no longer providing a function or improvement that
could be implemented. Recently when we worked with a
multiphase project, the organization dutifully met each
Monday to assess the status: it was always behind schedule.
Interestingly, each week tasks were added or changed,
budgets shifted, resources were reallocated, and contracts
were renegotiated. And all of it happened quietly, with-
out discussion, by email. A subtle shift in objectives was
noticed, but there was no opportunity to discuss or recal-
ibrate what the outcome was going to be. The validity, that
is, the process of getting there, was no longer as much a
concern as that somehow the process would (just, finally)
end within the new, final, lower budget.
Performance Improvement • Volume 49 • Number 3 • DOI: 10.1002/pfi 37
 Project management that is
performance driven is a
rethinking of the why, what,
and how of your activity.
Work hours were skyrocketing, and, as a consequence,
the executive walked away. The project degenerated. Staff
were considering leaving the company (there was nothing
to be professionally proud of) or hunkering down for the
paycheck and hoping for a miracle.
Troubleshooting project management is a key HPT
service, especially when it is coupled with change man-
agement and a keen sense of the result, which is articu-
lated, and concomitant alignment of organizational
requirements and tasks.
Project management that is performance driven is a
rethinking of the why, what, and how of your activity. It
goes beyond doing it right, and back to the maxim: doing
the right thing, this time in the context of the perfor-
mance system.
BUILDING AND DOCUMENTING WORK
PROCESSES
The final consideration of this article is work process
design. Usually one of three scenarios is taking place:
(1) nothing is written down, and with the change of
administration, the wheel must be reinvented; (2) noth-
ing is written down, yet everyone seems to know what to
do, with efficiency and effectiveness usually balanced and
often in a disquieting equilibrium; or (3) technical assis-
tance consultants have brought a model and a work
process with them. Often the process is mandated or gen-
erally accepted by similar organizations. The issue is not
the process itself, but all the ways that stakeholders get
around the process.
The design and documentation of a work process is
often the most glaring of performance gaps found in
developing organizational systems. This has been found
in huge institutions, in many countries, where people
operate based on a piece of legislation or a box on a usu-
ally out-of-date organization chart. Activity muddles
along. Referring back to Brethower again, the system
works perfectly for some and not at all for others.
Addressing these types of performance gaps in institu-
tions is time-consuming and expensive. Due to a lack of
analytical skills inside the organizations, success in this
38 www.ispi.org • DOI: 10.1002/pfi • MARCH 2010
area requires long-term placement of consultants within
the unit. Requirements often include mapping cross-
functional processes, delineating specific job actions and
interfaces, and jointly writing procedures. It all takes time
to do it right. Our experience has proven that the best
option for these types of extensive consulting assignments
is the development of know-how among local in-country
consultants. Initially they are paired with international
experts. They work on a variety of projects, with different
professionals and methods, and begin to gauge the results
and effectiveness for themselves. This is no quick fix. It
takes several years of application and the right candidates.
But in the longer run, it works according to the old para-
ble of teaching the local professionals to fish rather than
continually dropping in baskets of foreign varieties that
result in engorgement for brief periods and a rather nox-
ious odor once the funded consultant departs.
ONGOING TRANSITION IN THE
DELIVERY OF DEVELOPMENT AID
Aid and development are enduring a well-deserved and,
at long last, a valuable critique. Much of that critique
focuses on the validity and success rates of monies spent
to date (low rates of success, lower rates of durability).
The polity of the organizations and agencies is criticized
and evaluated, especially in relation to the receiving gov-
ernments. The issue of effectiveness is often avoided in
terms of return on investment and substantive funded
evaluation in the real world. The focus tends to be on the
amount of money a region, country, program, or project
receives, which equates gross amounts with significance
and value.
But billions of dollars spent have not seemed to
achieve anything near the results expected, nor has
progress in many places or projects been sustained. In a
serious and committed manner, governments, donors,
academic researchers, and practitioners are asking key
and critical questions. Still, few of these questions and
queries have to do with analysis of how performance is
achieved. There are research gaps around the alignment
and process of aid delivery.
In the days after the Bretton Woods Agreement (which
set up and defined the missions and approaches of the key
multilateral aid agencies, IMF and World Bank), organi-
zations were large, self-contained, and systemic. The
industry is much more complex now. There are many
more public and private donors, multilateral and bilateral
agreements, missions and polities, national and humane
interests, development versus diplomacy versus defense,
now adding in national security, with most of the delivery
outsourced. The financial crisis of 2007–2009 has set back
many of the initiatives and may change the nature of
funding into the immediate and midterm future.
Part of the problem was that
The challenges are many. The question is, If this is the simple, inexpensive
worth doing, is it worth doing well? That opens up two
lines of consideration. First is the premise and theory of solution was troublesome for
HPT. Gilbert (1978) spoke at length about worth and
value—not only with results, but with the value to the end agencies with huge budgets
user.
The other is the practice of HPT in this setting.
that found it much more
Systems thinking is not restricted to HPT practitioners effective to spend millions of
and does not date back only to Gilbert’s theoretical foun-
dations and practice. There are examples of such elegance dollars than thousands to
within the profession and the development world
throughout its history. Two small examples will suffice— address problems.
one positive and the other not so.
A small foundation program manager was evaluating
some pieces of a much bigger project that involved edu-
cating girls. One key element raised major concerns with privately or corporately funded, that carve off discrete areas
the evaluator. The girls who were educated were from vil- of action with quickly observable results, minimum over-
lages. With the resulting excellent education, the girls, head, and often little fanfare. In total, the opportunity to
now young women, sought out opportunities in the apply performance consulting to developing nations is
cities. But men in the city were not prepared to hire these vast, limitless, and potentially of great reward.
girls. And many of the young women, now away from
their villages and support networks, had to resort to pros-
titution. The missing piece was preparing the system to
receive these valuable potential employees. The men Reference
needed to be educated, and the pieces had to be linked
Gilbert, T. (1978). Human competence: Engineering worthy per-
together and built into overall delivery—in this case, with
formance. New York: McGraw-Hill.
recommendations to build internship and job search sup-
port into the future efforts.
In the other case, two company presidents looked at
the system of aid delivery and found a gap—a niche to Related Readings
which they could contribute. Filling a vital need (in these
cases, shoes and bicycles), the entire chain of activities Economics Focus: Is our children learning? (2006, July 15).
and programs fell into place. This insertion of a missing Economist, 380, 65.
piece in the process required a knowledge of the overall Food and Agricultural Organization. (2005). Applying people
process, the steps or tasks required, and the resources nec- centered development approaches within FAO: Some practical
essary. In the end, they solved the problem with a simple issues. New York: Author.
solution.
By comparison, the system was so complex that few Hobart, M. (Ed.). (1995). An anthropological critique of devel-
other agencies could see the possibilities in this solution. opment: The growth of ignorance. New York: Routledge.
Part of the problem was that the simple, inexpensive solu- Jones, A., & Seville, D. (2003). Action-to-outcome mapping:
tion was troublesome for agencies with huge budgets that Testing strategy with systems thinking. Systems Thinker, 14(2),
found it much more effective to spend millions of dollars 9–12.
than thousands to address problems. Without the per-
spective, and an outside view, the gaps could not be seen. Kelly, S.J., & Cermáková, A. (2008). Pulling victory from defeat:
There are many opportunities to apply HPT thinking The Slovak Finance Ministry builds a performance system from
and skills to the many points of entry within the develop- the bottom up. Paper presented to the CPT Performance
Improvement Conference, New York City.
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mance experts working as a power of one within donor Kelly, S.J., Novak, M.M., & Cermáková, A. (2008). Fifteen years
agencies to target healthy and effective interventions. Other of building performance in Central Europe. Performance
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M. MARI NOVAK, CPT, MA, has been working in the development arena since an assignment with
the U.S. Peace Corps in the mid-1970s. With over 30 years in the performance improvement profes-
sion, her academic record includes doctoral course work, as well as a master’s degree completed at
Western Michigan University. A partner with KNO Worldwide since 1984, she has spent the past 15
years headquartered in Prague, Czech Republic. Working with multinational and local commercial
clients to complement her focus on governmental agencies going through political, economic, and
social transition, she has worked in over 30 countries in Europe, the Caucasus, Asia, and the Middle
East. She is currently researching the applicability of performance improvement in the different con-
text of development. She is also working with the effects and value of social, educational, and finan-
cial changes for women. She may be reached at Mari.Novak.KNO@gmail.com.

STEVEN J. KELLY, CPT, MA, has 34 years of diversified experience in building high-performance sys-
tems. He is the founding partner in KNO, which started up in 1979 and has been headquartered in
Prague/Bratislava since 1991. In this role, he acts as a consultant to business and government
in Central Europe and the former USSR implementing performance improvement and productivity
strategies. He has a BS in political science and an MA in management and human relations, and
has been a CPT since 2002. He has earned military and academic honors for his leadership
and research performance. He currently serves on the board of ISPI. He may be reached at
Steven.Kelly.KNO@gmail.com.

40 www.ispi.org • DOI: 10.1002/pfi • MARCH 2010