Patience, Patience

We've moved mountains since Grenada's hotels declared their zero carbon goals with the 2012 Earth Day Declaration. Since then, there's been a rigourous effort to:

1. Research the best way to achieve that goal
2. Consult with all the Hoteliers who will be impacted by the project
3. Determine needs (something the policy industry would call a 'needs assessment')
4. Determine the recpients willingness to invest themselves in the effort
5. Shortlist preferred techological solutions & identify costs
6. Consult with donors, and international agencies involved in combatting climate change as well as promoting development
7. Consult with stakeholders outside the immediate project group who may also be impacted by or interested in the project
8. Draft a project outline
9. Negotiate terms with the local utility
10. Negotiate terms with the local government
11. Draft another project outline (based on negotiation results)
12. Submit the proposal to the donor......

No wait!~ We can't submit the proposal to the donor directly, we have to submit to the government to obtain their approval and THEN they can submit to the donor.

In our case, as is often the case - when pursuing funding envelopes that are substantial in size (over say, $500,000 USD) the donors usually require the country government to indicate their support for the project. Makes sense on a diplomatic, economic, and practical front for the donors, but it sure presents a challenge at times 'on the ground'!

Why?

Because the one thing that policy and paper shufflers often fail to include in their systems development is a good look at local, practical, operating conditions. Most developing country governments suffering from tremendous capacity strain - as a few gifted individuals (who have not succumbed to brain drain - leaving for higher paid jobs elsewhere) carry more than their share of workload burden. The rest of the public service 'bulk' is at it is in most countries - costly deadweight.

The result?

Things move slowly. Sometimes slower than backwards it seems. The Government of India has some creative ways of addressing the problem of efficiency in a sprawling bureaucracy by embedding accountability measures at all levels. I haven't been on the ground there to see whether or not it works, but in our case - something like that would benefit us.

As we wait for the government machinery to re-start it's engines after 3.5 public holiday days in 2 weeks - I can't help but lament about the time lost while the government moves at its own speed exercising its own internal due diligence before the project I designed can 'officially' move forward to the donor.

It's not the fault of the individuals responsible for getting our proposals and requests through the government system. I know well enough from my own days working in the Prime Minister's Office that no ammount of desire or will can change some elements of how fast things move in government. But gosh....from a private sector point of view where needs are seen and attended to swiftly for the benefit of good business, it's hard to be patient and wait knowing what is at stake.

And so we nudge, and encourage, and try to get things moving along.......while I work hard in the background trying to keep my clients looking credible with stakeholders in countries that move quite a lot faster than the Caribbean.