Managing for Development Results at ADB

Results Matter June 2006

ADB Shares MfDR and Development Effectiveness Experiences with Development Partners

With the World Bank

Participants of the World Bank workshop on improving staff capacity for managing results

It is notable that the World Bank is facing similar challenges in moving toward use of results frameworks for measuring, monitoring, and reporting results. During the workshop, the participants paid special attention to the following areas on MfDR at the project level:

• Identification of specific outcomes and outcome indicators;
• Information collection on results progress (baseline, intermediate targets, and targets) and International Development Association 14 commitment to reporting on sectoral indicators;
• Quality of Implementation Status and Results Report (ISR), equivalent to ADB’s project performance report; and
• Use of project results framework in the ISR and Implementation Completion Report process.

World Bank staff appreciated that ADB’s involvement in the workshop provided a very useful opportunity for them to learn from ADB’s experience. In particular, the World Bank was very much interested in ADB’s approach for stakeholder and problem tree analyses and for sector-level results monitoring efforts. They will consider introducing similar approaches in the World Bank appropriately. The World Bank also expressed its strong interest in participating in ADB’s forthcoming workshop on sector road maps in July 2007 and in developing a joint training program in late 2007 where World Bank and ADB teams can mutually benefit from each other’s experience.

This was an excellent opportunity in relation to both strengthening ADB’s Learning and Development Curriculum in MfDR, as well as harmonizing MfDR efforts with other development partners.

—Gil-Hong Kim, Principal Results Management Specialist, SPRU, and Andrea Iffland, Principal Project Performance Management Specialist

With the Inter-American Development Bank

A sesssion at the IADB workshop on results-oriented public management

The 3-day discussions were focused on how development partners and individual countries have been implementing MfDR in their public sector management including planning and budgeting, service delivery, human resource management, and monitoring and evaluation. Participants noted that progress in implementing MfDR in developing countries has been significant:

• Countries have increasingly introduced certain measures to facilitate the link between planning and budgeting. Examples include: Chile (management control and results-based budget system), Malaysia (results framework in budget), Mexico and Philippines (medium-term expenditure framework), and Peru (budget for results).
• Countries have strengthened the performance management process to enhance accountability of public institutions. Examples include: Chile (performance review system), Korea (performance agreement and performance-related payment), Malaysia (key performance indicators linking to payment), Mexico (presidential targets), Philippines (citizen report cards), and Peru (performance agreement).
• Experiences of other developing countries are becoming important sources for policy makers. For example, the Philippine government has recently adopted Peru’s successful tax reform policy model to address revenue collection problem in Philippines.

Participants emphasized that more efforts should now be made to practice and effectively implement tools and systems introduced by countries and that “peer-to-peer” learning could help this process. Participants proposed that practitioners further address the following issues in implementing MfDR in the specific-country context:

• political environment and political leadership,
• capacity and culture of public institution,
• proactive role of the private sector in enhancing public efficiency,
• alliance between political leadership and central agency technocrats around “shared vision,”
• weak use of results information in the budget process, and
• link performance to incentives.

In particular, participants underlined that effective development depends on the government’s capacity to manage for results. They suggested assessing the government’s readiness for more advanced reforms and helping the government institutionalize basic practices before more advanced management practices are introduced.

—Gil-Hong Kim

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