Case1-April-2012
The Fourteenth Retreat event of DHAN Foundation was organized on March 19-22, 2012 in the Mahatma Gandhi Auditorium at Naryanamoorthy Center for Excellence, Hebbal Mysore, a training centre for new recruits for Infosys established in a sprawling 300 acre campus with good infrastructure for training. As innovation is one of the core values of the institution, this event was different from the earlier events in that it was scheduled in two phases- the first phase for professionals at Mysore and the second phase for all the other DHANites in Kanyakumari. Secondly this event was a starter for the strategic planning process of DHAN Foundation, the plan document of which is to be ready by September 2012 and the process hence being guided by the professional trainers Dr.G.K.Jayaram from Institute of Leadership and Institutional Development.
The event started with the value song of the institution. Mr.M.Karthikeyan, Programme Leader, DHAN Foundation the overall facilitator for the event, introduced Dr.Jayaram and his associates Mr.Arun Nathan and Mr.Suresh Sharma from Jawaharlal Nehru Institute of Leadership and Development, New Delhi.
Mr. M. Kalyanasundaram read the message from Mr. Thulsiraj, Treasurer, Board of Trustees, DHAN Foundation. Mr.Thulsiraj, in his message shared that strategic planning process is a good initiative since past strategies may not work in future and new strategies which are sustainable and scalable must be worked out considering the future challenges.
Mr. Mathew, the Director, Narayanamoothy Institute of leadership and Institutional Development, in his speech shared his experience with various development organisations in India and said he is here to learn from DHAN's experience. He stressed that values, vigor and vision are the three essentials for the organization and event like retreat will help to bounce back to strengthen the organization.
Mr. Vasimalai, the Executive Director of DHAN Foundation in his opening remarks stated that the event being held at Mahatma Gandhi Auditorium is a sheer coincidence since the DHAN was born on the birth date of Gandhi in the year 1997. He said, the fourteenth retreat is unique and it focuses on strategic plan considering the changes in the macro environment. The mission statement of DHAN Foundation has been revised twice since the beginning of the organization. He stated that this strategic planning event is the beginning of the six month process of evolving the strategic plan and it will be finalized by September 2012. Ideas generated will be given due importance and exclusive working group will be constituted to finalize the plan.
Dr. Jayaram in his address asked everyone present in the hall to reflect honestly on "why you exist in DHAN?" and " Why DHAN exists" which can help a lot in the strategic planning process. He also quoted intensity, integrity and intelligence as essential characteristics of social entrepreneurship and is important for the growth of any organization. He also shared about the growth of Infosys which was achieved without compromising the values and vision. He said the vision, mission and values of the organization stands as a roof of a 'Mandap", the strategies are the pillars and the human resource, financial resource and the different centers of DHAN are the foundation of the Mandap. Strategies should be formed after good understanding of the vision, mission, values and goals of the organization and the strength of the foundation. The strategic planning process will enable us to conclude which we should retain, what we can expand, which we should withdraw and what we can introduce so that the organizational sustainability and growth can be ensured. He also stressed that while arriving at the goal statements one should be careful that goals are quantifiable and that a definite time period is attached to achieve this goals. He said effectiveness (doing right things) and efficiency (doing things right) are important for an organizational success and this should be kept in mind during the strategic planning process.
Mr. Vasimalai briefed the challenges that the organization has to face in the future and asked the participants to get involved in the process to evolve a concrete strategic plan to overcome the challenges and proceed ahead with our developmental interventions.
Revisiting the mission, vision and goal statements of DHAN to fine tune them to the present situation and make them precise relevant and sufficient formed a part of this strategic planning process. Ms.A.Umarani presented the existing mission and vision statements and asked the participants to critically review and suggest for changes and refinement wherever needed. To facilitate this the participants were divided into sub groups and asked to deeply introspect and reflect "Why one exists in DHAN?" And "Why DHAN exists?". Answering these questions will enable us to come out with the appropriate vision, mission and goal statements. As suggested the Vision, mission and goal statements got refined during the sub group discussions and they got synthesized during the sub plenary. The outcomes of the subgroup discussions got shared through posters for everyone to learn. The same was presented to the organizations strategic forum members for follow up.
The second day started with Dr.Jayaram's speech. He said by going through the first day process and the vision and mission statements of DHAN, he could understand and summarize DHAN Foundation works as follows
DHAN Foundation works under different thematic programs and these programs in turn have their own vision, mission and goal statements. These statements should get well accommodated in the overall vision and mission statements of the organization. To know their relevance and how far they are in tune with DHANs statements, the respective program anchors were asked to present their vision, mission, values and goal statements. The program anchors also shared the challenges in the present scenario and challenges ahead in long run in achieving their goals.
Dr.Jayaram asked the participants to go through the inputs from the presentation carefully and suggested the sub group deliberators to include the following areas as lead questions.
Apart from different thematic programs DHAN has different centers like Center for finance, Center for Human Resource development, Center for Development communication, Center for Research and Center for Policy and planning which Dr.Jayaram said are the foundation for any organization. Mr.Vasimalai suggested the centres to present their status so that the foundation of the "Mandap" is also known to the participants, so that it aids the strategic planning process. Mr.Vasimalai suggested the centres to make a presentation the next day. He also said that the strategic forum members of DHAN Foundation will be involved in finalizing the vision, mission, goal and strategies of the organization, taking into account all the ideas generated from this retreat process and also the second retreat to be scheduled by April, 2012.
The program wise vision, mission and goal statements were discussed in the sub group process that followed and the outcomes were again consolidated in the sub plenary and submitted to the strategic forum committee. It was interesting to note that all the sub groups unanimously agreed that the vision, mission and goals of the programs are well in tune with that of the organization. Moreover good suggestions also came for simplifying the vision, mission and goal statements.
DHAN Foundation in the coming years is to focus more on improving the livelihood of the poor through its different thematic programmes. To make the participants aware of the different livelihood activities that is being implemented currently in different regions a livelihood exhibition was organized in the venue of the meeting which provided a platform for cross learning. Charts, photos and other documents of their efforts got displayed.
The third day proceeding was started with the prayer and recap of the Day-2 minutes.
The proceedings of the special Strategic Forum (SF) meeting on the revisited vision, mission and goals of DHAN Foundation and its collectives were briefly shared by Ms. A.Umarani. The vision, the mission, and the goals were scanned through two broad dimensions, viz. structure or format of the statements; and its content. Though the team had a hectic task of going through all the ideas and suggestions, they sorted out relevant and appropriate suggestions to carry forward.
Subsequently the Executive Director appreciated the pro-active initiatives of the Strategic Forum by taking up the challenges on the spot. He also introduced the Strategic forum members calling them to the dais
Continuing to this, Dr. Jayaram stated that three styles of strategic planning exist in all the organisations and they are information sharing, involvement and joint planning. In information sharing, the top management takes all the decisions related to strategic planning and shares the information to the staffs. In case of involvement style of strategic planning, the leaders of the organisation invite the staff for inputs but decisions are taken by the top management. In joint planning style, everyone in the organisation sits together, analyse the issues and chose best alternative together. In a democratic organisation, the joint planning style of strategic planning predominantly exists.
As it was decided in the previous evening, all anchors of our five centre presented their roles and goals to facilitate in achieving the organisation's commitment.
This was followed by a training exercise of forming a strategy and a activity chart to accomplish a goal. Each subgroup was given with a goal and ask to evolve strategies for that particular goal. Then the subgroups were asked to work out a detailed action plan based on one specific strategy for which a tool was provided by Dr.Jayaram. Questions for clarification on the process were asked by the participants which were answered precisely by him.
The subgroups were given one and half hour time for discussion. Of the twenty subgroups eight were selected randomly to present their strategies and action plan for a specific goal. Dr.Jayaram appreciated the efforts and emphasised that it was only a training exercise and more detailing of the strategies and action plan with deliverables and deadlines should be worked out so that, they get implemented in the field.
Before breaking for lunch, Dr. Jayaram and his team members viz, Dr. Suresh Sharma, and Mr. Arun were felicitated by the Executive Director for their gracious support in strategic planning.
After the lunch break, a CSR supported film made on impact of our water conservation works through project taken up with ITC Mission Sunerakal suppport was screened.
Subsequently the Executive Director noted that this process of strategic planning is vital especially to the young colleagues of DHAN on getting clarity of vision, mission and goals of the organization. He also suggested that an operational framework for each goal has to be prepared by the respective programmes and should be viewed on donor perspective also to generate proposals to support the strategic plan. The strategic plan as such will be a larger document that will decide our future course of action in different perspectives.
He also graded the quality of exhibits made in the Livelihood exhibition made by the regions. He rated that Salem, Dindigul and Madurai Urban came closer to the expectations of the organization. He also added that the other regions also should rise up to the expectations to ensure quality.
Mr.Vasimalai announced 25th and 26th April, 2012 as dates of second retreat.
Other suggestions which came where:
It was felt that the two and half day long strategic planning process with handholding support from Dr. Jayaram would be useful for not only completing the process but also transferring to other colleagues.
A campus visit was organised for the retreat participants after the completion of the regular events.
After dinner the day proceedings were closed with a composite of cultural events performed by the members at ABM towers, the place of stay of the retreat participants.
The day started with prayer. The support of Dr.Jayaram during the previous three days was lauded and it was expressed that his views regarding the vision, mission and value statements will be taken care of by the organization. Incidentally, as the day fell on the world water day, DHAN Vayalagam foundation screened two documentary films, which created a bigger impact on DHANites on importance of water. Water is becoming the most wanted commodity and we should use it judiciously was the message conveyed strongly through those films. The draft national water policy is also framed by our country considering the growing demand and disputes over water. DHAN Vayalagam Foundation has suggested some changes in the policy, considering few issues and missing elements in the draft. DHAN Vayalagams new initiative for conservation of water through awareness campaigns involving Lady Doak and Fathima college has been a success and more focus to be given in forthcoming years for expansion of this to different colleges across states. Our Executive Director insisted that beyond awareness, action through Shiramadhan to clean up water bodies and demonstration of this is planned in Manamadurai.
The proceeding of the strategic forum meetings and CFM meetings held during the year 2011-12 was shared by Ms.A.Umarani. Five strategic forum meetings have been conducted last year, the one due by March last week, the agenda being on institutional processes, succession and rotation, Annual performance enabling program and regional support for states for which solid decisions like rotating and finalizing the board members of DHAN nested institutions was done. In the CFM meeting diversification of donors for resource mobilization, developing a livelihood model by collaborating with NRLM, framing of Livelihood policy and streamlining the new lending policy based on purpose wise loan implemented by Kalanjiam, Vayalagam and Tanks programs were focused.. For the CF meetings of ensuing two years Ms.V.K.Padmavathi will take over as Secretary, the post presently being held by Mr. A.Gurunathan. The twenty eighth CFM was scheduled from 15th-17th April,2012 which will have focus on the annual review program and contribution by thematic programs last year.
The update of the institution and way forward was given by the executive director, in which he shared the achievement of the different programs and centers and appreciated their efforts. He also said we should not feel complacent about our achievements and there is a long way to traverse. Followed by this was a session on Advancing Livelihoods-Focus of the year 2012 facilitated by Mr.P.Krishnamurthi of CDC. Presentation on Livelihood activities done so far was made by Ms.Sivarani, Mr.Kiran Kumar, Ms.Rama Praba and Mr.P.Lakshmanan.
The Retreat event 2012 concluded successfully with vote of thanks by Mr.Chandrasekar, Regional Coordinator, Mysore.