Project Management Lessons learnt in the field

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Project Management Lessons learnt in the field
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Project Management

• Andrew Barber
• AgriLINK NZ Ltd
• SFF Project Involvement
• Franklin Sustainability Project
• Energy Benchmarking and Efficiency for outdoor
  vegetables and arable crops, greenhouses and
  kiwifruit
• Water harvesting
• Life Cycle Assessment - Merino wool
• The odd non-starter

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Project Management Techniques

• Refer to the SFF Management Guidelines
• Key aspects
• Group alignment
• Administration systems
• Communication
• MAF SFF
• Project team
• Community

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Franklin Sustainability Project

• Sustainable outdoor vegetable production
• Started following flooding in 1996, finished in
  2004
• Multi-stakeholder group
• Focus on disseminating previous research

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Project ManagementWhat didnt work

• Management by committee
• No single person in overall control
• Undefined goals and informal reporting
• Using an accountant for financial reporting
• No tracking of in-kind contributions

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Result

• No outcomes
• Occupying too much shelf space at MAF SFF
• Funding stopped

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What were the issues

• Work being left to a few
• Insufficient time being invested
• Other priorities
• Unresolved conflicting interests

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What worked

• First meeting
• Develop a project purpose
• What motivates you to invest your time
• Establish meeting ground rules
• Develop a meeting format

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What worked (cont.)

• Short focused monthly meetings (1 hour)
• Funding a project manager (1/2 a day a week)
• Monthly written reports following a template
• Removed budget control from the committee and
  simplified reporting
• Receiving SFF payments in advance

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What worked (cont.)

• Communication
• Pick up the phone
• Email for traceability
• Quarterly SFF reports made easy by the monthly
  reporting discipline

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What worked (cont.)

• Make in-kind contributions very visible
• Budget figure linked to a separate sheet that
  detailed the contributions and described what
  these were

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January 2003 Time (hrs) Other () Total () Description
PVGA 11 60 975 Mgmt meeting 5 x 1.5 hrs, Guidelines comments - Naranda Master 1.5hrs, Peter Reynolds 1hr, Keith Vallabh 1 hr
ARC 5 200 557
EW 58 200 5029 travel 2 x 1.5 3, meeting 2x 1.5 3, fsp presentation to EW council including prep 2x10 20, communication team erosion insert prod. 32 hrs
FDC 0.75 63 OPUS -   insert assistance - 0.75 hrs
AgriLink NZ (office) 366
AgriLink NZ (time) 7.75 654
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Public Funding

• Transparency
• Accountability
• SFF have built considerable flexibility into the
  programme
• Getting the balance right