OL 341 Assignment Six Discussion
Online Learning: OL 341: Climate Change Adaptation: Design, Fund & Manage Projects
Center for Sustainable Development
https://csd-i.org/climate-change-adaptation-online-course/

This week’s resources:
Assignment Six Homework
Magee Example Project Assignment 6

Assignment 6. How will you organize your ideas for presentation to a donor?
Organizing your project description into a beginning log frame and sharing your project with a donor.
Part 1.
In the next course, Project Architecture for Adaptation, we will be taking all of the work that you’ve done this course and turning your information into a set of management tools which will make it easier to sell the project to a donor and to manage the project once it’s been funded.

This week, in preparation for Project Architecture for Adaptation, we’re going to take your homework from week two that lays out your problem statement, project outline and goal statement, and place them in a simplified matrix: this the first step in building a logical framework.

This will only take 30 minutes to do but you will be able to see an immediate change in the organization of your project. It will also make your project more presentable to a donor.

Part 2.
A few weeks ago I asked you to discuss your project with your coworkers and community members to get ideas and feedback from them. This week I want you to meet someone a bit more challenging with your project. This could be a potential donor, your boss—or your professor if you are a student.

This exercise has several valuable benefits:
The first is to start thinking in terms of promoting projects to potential donors, and to start thinking about who might be potential donors.

The second benefit if you haven’t done this before is to have the opportunity to do it and to experience what a donor appointment is like without putting too much a risk. It’s perfectly reasonable to approach your local donor to say that you have the seed of an idea for a project and that you would just like to get their input on it before you proceed further. It is also perfectly valid to say this is part of a certificate course in project design and management.

The third obvious benefit is to get a different kind of feedback than what you’ve been getting from your co-workers and community members (and me!).

A donor, or your boss, or your professor may all have a different perspective on development projects than your co-workers do. They also have the power to let you proceed or not and so it’s very valuable to understand what their perspective is so that you will better be able to sell it to them when your concept is fully developed.

At the end of the next course, Project Architecture, you will again take your project to a donor—and it could be the same donor that you meet with this week. But your project will be much more highly developed. Receiving donor feedback and guidance this week will help you develop your project so that it will be better received in a few weeks.

A donor will also be impressed that you would seek out guidance from them at this early a stage. It will plant a seed in their mind that you could be someone good to partner with on a project. Much in the same way as we have worked to get a buy-in from our community members, we are now beginning to work to get a buy-in from the people that may fund the project. If they like what they see as the project design evolves, and truly feel that you listened to their ideas and comments, they are going to feel a sense of ownership for the project. This will increase your chances of getting a project funded.

It’s been a pleasure working with all of you over the past six weeks, there’s a very short evaluation form in the download documents menu and I would really appreciate your taking the time to fill that out. I’m hoping that you will have some comments and ideas for improving the course.

Also I certainly hope that you’ve taken the time to sign up for the second course project architecture. If it slipped your mind do it now so that we can continue working together for the next six weeks.

Thank you very much for all of your hard work

Click on homework for Assignment Six to get started.

Tim Magee