Ministers to learn from Malaysian experience in project management

KATHMANDU, April 6: All the ministers, ministers of state, planners and few lawmakers will gather at Hyatt Regency Kathmandu on Sunday to learn from Malaysian experience in handling development projects.

According to the program schedule seen by Republica, the ministers and high-level government officials will participate in a workshop to be conducted by Malaysia’s Performance Management and Delivery Unit (Pemandu). They will learn about Malaysian model of economic transformation. Preparing detailed implementation programs for socio-economic transformation and things the planners must consider in project execution will also be discussed in the workshop, according to the National Planning Commission (NPC) which is organizing the workshop.

Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal will also attend the workshop.

Idris Jala, the CEO of Pemandu, will teach the Nepali ministers on ways to address poor project management – a major problem that development projects in Nepal face.

Development projects in Nepal are suffering from poor spending and time overruns, which leads to cost escalation, among others.

Established in 2009, Pemandu administers all the major projects in Malaysia. The institution is one of the reasons behind Malaysia’s recent economic progress including double-digit growth and graduating to a middle-income country. Each Malaysian earned US$ 9,768 in 2015, compared to mere $743 earned by a Nepali.

“Pemandu has eight steps of transformation that helps in project execution. These steps have become successful in countries like Tanzania, South Africa, India, and Oman,” according to NPC Member Sunil Babu Shrestha.

Shrestha was a member of a team that visited Malaysia between January 24 and 28 to take stock of project management by Pemandu. NPC Vice Chairperson Min Bahadur Shrestha was also in the team.

“We were much impressed by the Putrajaya city which was built in just three years under Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) model. Malaysia has now shifted all the major ministries, including the Prime Minister’s Office, to Putrajaya from Kuala Lumpur,” Shrestha added.

CEO Jala will share eight steps of transformation, including strategic direction, building roadmaps, problem solving, setting key project indicators and external validation on the results achieved, among others, with ministers during a four-hour session on the first day of the workshop.

“We want to institute a powerful entity like Pemandu in Nepal after forging consensus among all the participants,” Shrestha added.

The key elements of eight-step Malaysian approach are: development of implementation program, rigorous delivery and recursive problem solving, verification and validation, and reporting results to the public with the scores, according to a brochure prepared by NPC for the two-day workshop titled ‘Strategic Country Direction Workshop’.

Jala will wrap up the workshop with a briefing to NPC members on Monday.

“Pemandu also organizes an eight-week workshop lab to prepare detailed action plans for ensuring buy-in from all relevant stakeholders. But we won’t be having such labs this time,” added Shrestha.

The NPC team had visited Malaysia in the last week of January to study Pemandu and how it managed to achieve high economic growth through Economic Transformation Program and PPP model in urban development, according to a report published by the apex policy making body of the government.

by Rudra Pangeni
 

Source: myRepublica

Read the original article here.

PEMANDU Begins Transition

PUTRAJAYA 23 JAN 2017: The Prime Minister’s Office today announced that the Performance Management and Delivery Unit (PEMANDU) would commence the final transitional phase of the National Transformation Programme (NTP) work to the civil service over a two-year period

During the two-year transition, the handover will cover three types of activities based on the level of performance and competency assessment.

Under work category 1, some of the NTP work will be handed over immediately to the civil service without any need for transition. PEMANDU will hand over these activities in full to the civil service on 1 March 2017.

Under work category 2, some of the NTP work will be handed over gradually. These activities require support during a two-year transition to allow for capacity building within the civil service so that in the third year, the civil service will be able to perform this work independently without any support. To support work category 2, PEMANDU manpower will reduce its current staff strength from 133 to 45 in 2017 and 30 in 2018. No support is required in 2019.

Under work category 3, even after mainstreaming the work to the civil service, there will still be a need for NTP coordination. To manage this, PEMANDU will hand over this coordination work to the Civil Service Delivery Unit (CSDU) in the Economic Planning Unit (EPU).

The intention had always been for PEMANDU to be a small, agile unit responsible for establishing key performance indicators (KPIs), problem solving and overall performance management whilst the respective ministries and agencies of the government would carry out the implementation of the initiatives under the National Transformation Programme (NTP).

Malaysia is on the right track to deliver on the targets set in 2010. GDP and private investment growth has been strong; delivery of key public sector programmes has been successful and increasingly, the ministries and agencies in the government are using innovative methods such as labs to solve their problems.

These efforts have delivered results. Median income for the bottom 40% has experienced a growth from RM1,440 a month in 2009, up to RM2,629 in 2014. Furthermore, Malaysia has surpassed the target of growing the B40 mean monthly income to RM2,300 at 2015, as identified in the 10th Malaysia Plan, ahead of schedule in 2014 where we recorded RM2,537.

Private investment growth has greatly strengthened from a CAGR of 5.5% between 2006 and 2010 to a CAGR of 12.1% between 2011 and 2015, now amounting to an estimated 65% of total investment in the country, a significant increase from 55% in 2010.

The government has also delivered on large scale projects such as the Mass Rapid Transit (MRT).  The Phase One MRT Line 1 was launched on 16 December 2016 on schedule and under budget. Less than a month into operations, it has surpassed the million-rider mark.

However, there is more to be done. As Malaysia approaches 2020, there is a need to look further and ensure that the Big Fast Results methodology introduced by PEMANDU is fully institutionalised into the civil service. This is to ensure the Government of Malaysia can continue to develop and achieve the goals set for the 2050 National Transformation (TN50) in a sustainable manner.

The work done under the National Transformation Programme over the last seven years has gained recognition. The work has made global institutions such as Harvard University, the World Bank and Bloomberg sit up and take notice of the marked improvements Malaysia has made, as well as the positive impact delivered for the country.

The civil service has to be lauded in taking up the challenge and delivering on our promises. They took up the daunting challenge of setting impossible targets and the implementation of the initiatives under the NTP with clear transparency and accountability. Everyone from the ministers to the individual officers on the ground have been delivering results since the beginning of the NTP in 2010.

To that end, PEMANDU will continue to work closely with KSN and the Economic Planning Unit (EPU) over the next two years to ensure that this transition is uninterrupted and smooth. The civil service delivery unit will be assuming responsibility for the performance management of the NTP from PEMANDU and ensuring that they are fully institutionalised within the civil service.

“It was made clear when we began our national transformation journey in 2009, that PEMANDU was not intended to be a permanent fixture of the Government. Our task was to introduce a performance-based working culture and monitoring processes anchored on the NTP initiatives, so that we are able to embed them within the civil service to deliver on the NTP goals,” said Dato’ Sri Idris Jala, the Chief Executive Officer of PEMANDU.

“As a run-up to our national target in 2020 and continuing PM’s vision for TN50, the time is right for PEMANDU to mainstream our work to begin the handover process to the government between now till March 2019. During this period, there will be intense focus on building the capabilities of the civil service to take over. CSDU currently has a very small team.

“PEMANDU has over the course of the last 7 years, built up an incredible pool of talent, skillsets and experience. We currently have 133 individuals from the private sector including 26 secondees from the civil service and 2 from Government-linked companies (GLC). This was to ensure that the NTP received the best practises from both public and private sectors.

Under this transition process, all staff in PEMANDU and BFR Institute will move to PEMANDU Associates Sdn Bhd, a private consultancy firm newly established by PEMANDU management and staff.

“Staff seconded from the civil service and GLCs will now return to the government and the GLCs where they can continue their good work, while PEMANDU employees hired from the private sector will remain with PEMANDU Associates Sdn Bhd. This was done to avoid redundancy of employees.

“We remain committed to the Government of Malaysia on the national transformation agenda and to ensure this transition work to the civil service is carried out steadily and smoothly over the next two years. To this end, under our agreement with the Government on 5th January 2017, PEMANDU Associates will be deploying 45 people to the NTP work under the supervision of the Civil Service Delivery Unit in 2017. This number will reduce to 30 in 2018. The current employees not deployed to the NTP work will be doing business development work, as well as to provide consultancy services to public sectors abroad and business turnaround.”

PEMANDU, currently a unit under the Prime Minister’s Department was established in 2009 with the task of developing the National Transformation Programme and coordinating its implementation.

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