Beyond reengineering
By Mahieash Johnney of SLRCS/IFRC in Sri Lanka
01/09/2012 – Colombo, Sri Lanka: A feedback-oriented workshop took place recently in Gampaha to assess the society’s approach towards the reengineering process which is the flagship of the society in recent times.
Earlier on the Sri Lanka Red Cross Society (SLRCS) underwent a vigorous re-engineering process in order to streamline its service for a better and an effective delivery and made key changes to the Governance and the Management giving autonomy to both entities, so that interference to each other does not take place and the end result would be a better served national society.
The process took place in 2011 under the guidance of SLRCS President Jagath Abeysinghe, who lead the society and ensured that the process becomes a success.
The reengineering process recommends new steps that needed to taken in HR, Management and service delivery and especially in public relations. These were implemented periodically and systematically since 2010.
Three phases were put into effect.
- Phase 1 – Towards Governance & Management excellence
- Phase 2 – Good to Great
- Phase 3 – 180 day intensified capacity building programmes
After the process was concluded in early 2012, the Society has been structured and functions as per the new recommendations.
The recently held workshop was aimed at assessing the progress since the reengineering and to assess the recommendations are practical for branches to implement them.
Addressing the gathering President of SLRCS Jagath Abeysinghe told the gathering “ We are on a path to self sustainability, which means that all branches should be able to implement programmes with home grown funding. The reengineering process is a vehicle to take us there. So today we are looking whether this vehicle is capable to take us to our destination”
Vice President of SLRCS Bharatha Jonnikkuhewa, Director General of SLRCS Tissa Abeywickrama, Head of PASS Sri Lanka Samantha Pathirana, PASS Consultant Gamini Pinnalawatta, and the Chairman of SLRCS Gampaha branch Anton Victoria were present at the event.
This workshop was conducted initially for six branches, where Branch Executive Officers from Anuradhapura, Colombo, Gampaha, Kalutara, Kurunegala and Puttalam were present at the workshop.
“The objective of this exercise is to make sure that we understand whether the recommendations made in the reengineering is practical enough for us. At this workshop the management and the governance came together and suggested that we need to have a structural frame work and to implement a programme that would work for all branches” said Vice President of SLRCS Bharatha Jonnikkuhewa.
“We have taken the feedback from this workshop and are in the process of designing a programme that would be within the recommended guidelines and which is something that all branches can implement”
Steps will also be taken to set up a website dedicated for the Reengineering process where all reports, forms, and other articles of the process will be in one place so that reference would be easier for the public.
Read the full report on the reengineering of SLRCS – Click here