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Tripartite action to protect migrants within and from the GMS from labour exploitation - Final Evaluation

eval_number:

1379

eval_url:

https://webapps.ilo.org/ievaldiscovery/eval/1379

lessons_learned:

themes:

theme:

Staff capacity building

category:

Organizational issues

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comments:

ILO multi-country international labour migration projects

challenges:

Staffing arrangements were initially inadequate, with a Senior Programme Officer/Project Coordinator, a Technical Officer, four National Project Coordinators (NPCs) (Cambodia, Lao PDR, Thailand and Viet Nam), and some part time support staff. Eventually, it was recognized that an NPC was also required in Malaysia, but she only had administrative support in the final year of implementation, which impacted on the time available for the NPC to attend to her own responsibilities. Overall, administration support was underestimated; initially the project only had two administrative staff in Bangkok and 50% administrative staff at country level. This was inadequate for managing the administrative demands of the project, especially concerning the significant amount of work involved in administering 23 MRC partners in the region, including contracts, legal aid services, consultancies, and so on. This resulted in staff turnover and implementation delays. For instance, in April 2013 the ILO Regional Office changed its financial operating system, which led to serious delays in administrative procedures. The regional administrative team had to be trained and become accustomed with the new system, and even then encountered a number of glitches that further delayed the processing of contracts and payments. It also became apparent that the Finance Assistant and the Administrative Assistant were over-burdened, serving the regional team, the Thailand project activities, and backstopping other countries. As such, a new Administrative Assistant was recruited in October 2013. However, she resigned after three months, and a replacement came on board in April 2014.

success:

To redress this situation and in response to the Mid-Term Evaluation, - as mentioned - the NPC was added for Malaysia and eventually Myanmar when that component began, an M&E Consultant was recruited, an additional Technical Officer was placed in Myanmar, some administrative staff were added, and others were increased to full time. The project was also supplemented with five volunteers from the Australian Volunteers for International Development (AVID) programme, which were funded through DFAT but outside the project budget. Moreover, there was technical backstopping by the Decent Work Technical Team for Southeast Asia and the Pacific in the ILO’s Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific (ROAP) in Bangkok, in particular the Senior Regional Labour Migration Specialist, and by the International Labour Migration Branch (MIGRANT) in Geneva. These positions are funded by the regular budget of the ILO. In addition, consultants and institutions were contracted to provide specific expertise and contribute to key outputs. There was a high level of ability in the staff – both national and international, at a technical level and also in good relationship building with partners. This was reflected in the high technical standard of the project outputs, and the excellent quality of the NPCs and international technical staff has been a major factor in the commendable levels of success attained in the GMS TRIANGLE project. The quality of the reports from country level has been positively impacted by the additional support provided by the AVID volunteers with mother tongue English and the time and ability to coach national partners.

context:

The project was initially staffed by a Senior Project Coordinator and a Technical Officer in Bangkok, four National Project Coordinators at country level, and some part time support staff. The project initially had five country components in Cambodia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Thailand and Viet Nam. In the fourth year of implementation, the project added a sixth country component in Myanmar.

description:

It is important to adequately staff an international labour migration project with a regional management unit and six country components, including 23 MRC locations.

administrative_issues:

It is important not to underestimate the time required of project staff to properly coordinate and implement project activities. This is especially so in countries where the national implementing partners have low capacity. It is imperative to appreciate that underfunding project staff will ultimate affect the quality of project delivery. As mentioned elsewhere, the gender equality aspects of the project would have been greatly improved by the funding of a gender specialist from project inception. Whilst UN agencies tend to take a mainstreaming approach to gender equality with the responsibility for gender falling to all staff, in this case there was just too much work even for the two technical officers and this impacted on the quality of the gender aspects of the project. Also, as shown once the M&E consultant came on board, the quality of M&E and demonstrating impact of the project improved considerably. It would have been ideal to have this level of support from project inception. Also, a proper level of administrative support would have enabled professional staff to fully attend to their own job duties. Other tools that may assist with better use of staff time include project management software, and better coding of contracts to identify where investments are being made (e.g. according to objective).

url:

https://webapps.ilo.org/ievaldiscovery/lessons/181152

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location:

country:

Asia and the Pacific - regional

region:

Asia and the Pacific

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eval_title:

Tripartite action to protect migrants within and from the GMS from labour exploitation - Final Evaluation