Organizational capacity

The engineering design of infrastructure investments need to be simple and adequately consider post-project financial and human resources capacity for and operation and maintenance. The rationale for this project's overall design was justifiable as it highlighted Pakse as an economic and commercial center of southern Lao PDR. The choice of investments reflected the immediate needs of Pakse. However, in terms of future maintenance, the design of the landfill was considered overly sophisticated for local authorities with limited financial and human resources.

Inadequate assessment of deficiencies in technical and financial capacities to operate, maintain, and manage sanitary landfills could have detrimental impacts. The project completion mission noted deficiencies in the management of the landfill. In the absence of an effective management system, the new landfill currently operates as an uncontrolled dumping site. There is a need for proper handover procedures and transfer of management from the project to the local authorities.

Effective knowledge transfer requires adaptation to local context and the participation of stakeholders in the design and preparation of the necessary materials and documents.The project supported the development of manuals and guidelines (e.g., corporate plans, landfill operation guidelines, public–private partnership guidelines). However, preparation of the documents had minimal participation from key stakeholders and there was limited communication to explain the documents to intended users.

A database to track consultants’ performance in development projects in the country and/or region is a useful reference for the executing agencies to recruit qulified, experienced, and highly performing personnel.

The absence of a project management unit (PMU) with adequate dedicated full-time qualified staff and decision-making authority militates against the successful implementation of projects.

The lack of organizational capacity and requisite implementation skills also weighs heavily against the attainment of project objectives. Another major reason for poor performance of the PNB was its inability to scale up individual subloans through either the Renewable Energy Services Company (RESCO) or demand aggregation of smaller subprojects, be they in the commercial and industrial sector, MSME, or residential sector.

A centralized and unified real-time web portal expedites the execution of all project processing and decision-making pocedures, and is an invaluable asset to the successful implementation in this day and age. The lack of coordination among various branches across the different zones of India hampered the operations of the tranche 1 project. A beta version of a unified central web portal for the entire investment program that was put in place was not able to minimize the operational hurdles faced by PNB, due to the lack of institutionalization across all branches.

Establishing well-staffed and operational project management units (PMUs) and project implementation units (PIUs) as early as possible is essential for effective implementation. Timely recruitment and mobilization of project implementation consultants will also ensure that technical resources are in place to support the PMUs and PIUs. Delays in consultant recruitment and high turnover in specialized areas need to immediately addresses as these could adversely impact project activities.

Organizational interventions support and reinforce capacity building for institutional knowledge retention. For instance, organizational intervention, such as handover procedures and an operations manual developed as part of the DBO contract, combined with operation and maintenance staff training to ensure knowledge retention and sustained institutional strengthening in maintaining the operational standards for potable water supply prescribed by the Bhutan Drinking Water Quality Standard, 2016.

Inadequate staffing levels and frequent staff turnovers make training efforts less effective and sustainable. Under their existing structures, all the key project agencies faced challenges due to the perennial shortage of key personnel, made worse by high staff turnover. Therefore, it has been essential for ADB to continually review staff skills and capabilities and corporate structures, and implement measures to fill capacity gaps.