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Category: Staff Picks

Public policy during a crisis: 3 Lessons learned from Ecuador’s earthquake

Guest blog written by Sandra Naranjo Bautista Last October, I was a guest lecturer at Harvard’s Executive Education Program, Budgeting Through Crisis. I talked about my experience as a minister during Ecuador’s 2016 earthquake with Salimah Samji, Director of the Building State Capability Program. Our conversation brought up memories that motivated me to write this blog. You can also…Continue Reading Public policy during a crisis: 3 Lessons learned from Ecuador’s earthquake

Working with local governments to improve service delivery in Indonesia

Indonesian team working together

Guest blog written by Karrie McLaughlin When Indonesia decentralized just over 20 years ago, it did so partly on the promise that bringing services closer to citizens would help to improve them. However, at the same moment that responsibility for the provision of basic public services was shifting to local governments, the nature of those…Continue Reading Working with local governments to improve service delivery in Indonesia

Leading Economic Growth 2020: Moving Executive Education Online during a Pandemic

written by Salimah Samji In March 2020, Harvard University decided to move all classes to online-only, in an effort to de-densify our campus and to slow the spread of COVID-19. It soon became clear that remote learning was going to be our new normal.  At the time,  Leading Economic Growth, a longstanding 5-day residential executive education…Continue Reading Leading Economic Growth 2020: Moving Executive Education Online during a Pandemic

A Reflection on PDIA in Action: Homelessness in Tarrant County

PDIA in Action group team meeting

Guest blog written by Akbar Ahmadzai, Emma Davies, Renzo Lavin, Fernando Marquez Six weeks ago, the class counted off numbers: One, two, three, four, five. Repeat. One, two, three, four, five. Repeat. Some of us were fortunate enough to have been assigned to group 2. Others convinced classmates to switch with them. Regardless of how we…Continue Reading A Reflection on PDIA in Action: Homelessness in Tarrant County

RISE Launches Interactive Data Visualisations Estimating Long-Term Learning Losses from COVID-19 School Closures

Guest blog written by Carmen Belafi COVID-19 will exacerbate the learning crisis. Causing schools to close around the world, the pandemic disrupted education as we know it. But the COVID-19 shock to education systems will likely cause severe and long-term learning losses that are far bigger than the ‘mere’ time schools were closed. Learning losses can…Continue Reading RISE Launches Interactive Data Visualisations Estimating Long-Term Learning Losses from COVID-19 School Closures

Leveraging Technology to Improve Forecasting and Monitoring of Local Government Budgets

Guest blog written by Ruth Huette Public budget uncertainty is a defining characteristic of the COVID-19 pandemic Last week, governments of France and Germany announced that their countries would enter yet another phase of lockdown as new cases of COVID-19 were on a steep rise again. As Europe is grappling with a second COVID wave,…Continue Reading Leveraging Technology to Improve Forecasting and Monitoring of Local Government Budgets

COVID Act Two: Look beyond your borders to navigate what comes next

Guest blog written by Peter Harrington and Ben French Act One of Covid is over. In places it has been frightening, in others orderly, and everywhere completely unprecedented. As we move into Act Two of this astonishing global drama, and a global recession on a scale not seen before, governments and leaders need to prepare themselves…Continue Reading COVID Act Two: Look beyond your borders to navigate what comes next

The Big Stuck: Updated

written by Lant Pritchett The PDIA approach to building state capability grew out of a sense among practitioner/academics (or “pracademics”) that (a) organizational capability for implementation was key to success—as, if not more important the adoption of new policies or the creation of new programs and (b) that the existing models (both in the mainstream…Continue Reading The Big Stuck: Updated