Annex 10:

10PR: A Strategic Personnel Development Program for Latvia: Developing a Competency-Based Career Training and Professional Development Program for Latvia

1. Project description

2.  Project purposes and goals 

The main goal of this project was defined as the development of a training agenda for an integrated personnel development program that addresses the issues of professional competence, policy responsiveness and the creation of a service culture.

The primary issues to be addressed were defined as:

1.       What are the barriers to enhancing the qualifications of current public employees?  (Salary? Morale? Management practices? Institutional barriers?)

2.       What tools and techniques that are culturally and politically sensitive can be applied to address these problems? (Focused training, employee development programs, Integrated, career-long training tracks; more effective performance appraisal systems?)

3.       Identifying what culturally sensitive management techniques exist for introducing, implementing and institutionalizing a culture of organizational change.

4.       What does it mean in institutional and practical terms to create a future-oriented human resources policy?

The study focused on the development of a professional development strategy that recognizes the short-term (less than ten years) problem of conflicting views of management within the agencies, and also addresses the long-term need for a comprehensive integrated strategy of professional development. This study was expected to have three components: a SWOT analysis, a review of alternative approaches and the development of an implementation strategy. 

The barriers to enhancing the qualifications of current employees were expected to be examined from two perspectives.  First, the organizational and structural problems that face a “new” nation trying to establish a systematic approach for effective public services within a democratic regime.  There is a gap in the current system of professional development. While the School of Public Administration provides a broad range of short-term training initiatives, there is no mid-range and long-range employee development or management development programs that could then be linked to the University setting; there are a few undergraduate classes in public administration, but no formal degrees.  Second, the internal problems that result from a limited experience as a democratic regime (most recently, barely a dozen years).  There is a need to affirm the importance and centrality of the public service through effective and citizen-centered performance rather than through authoritarian control.

3. Project realization

No problems occurred during the project realization. The project team actively cooperated with the government officials; the project implementation went as planned; the project timeline was kept on target; and all team members and other participants actively cooperated in the project and fulfilled their roles and responsibilities on time and with quality work.

4. Project outputs, outcomes and impacts

The main output is the paper entitled “Developing a Competency-Based Career Training and Professional Development Program for Latvia”. The paper consists of the following parts:

-          Introduction     

-          Junior-Level Training: State Management Certificate Programs

-          Senior Management Training                                                                

-          Analysis and Lessons                                                               

-          Framework for Professional Development                                                         

-          Next Steps                                                                                                     

- Appendices                                                                                        

As the outcome, the proposals for Competency-Based Career Training Programs are included in the State Chancellery Order to Latvian School of Public Administration: Training Program for New Civil Servants, and Middle and Top-Level Civil Servants (two separate modules).

Concerning impacts, the project has considerable potential to influence the quality of training of public servants in Latvia, especially because the Latvian School is a governmental agency with direct links to top civil service management structures.