The project, one of the many initiatives of a State Government in India, as part of the Modernizing the Government Program ,was intended to strengthen the leadership at the Local Self Governance level and bring in accountability and performance orientation among officers belonging to various functional departments who headed their respective functional areas in the local self governing bodies. The end objective was improvement in effectiveness and efficiency in service delivery to the citizens.

The team faced the following key challenges
• The presence of various stake holder groups and lack of consensus among them.
• Resistance to devolution of authority and powers and presence of entrenched unhealthy practices and processes.

The team worked with the client counterparts to institute operational reforms and change how the functionaries approached their work. Drawing on extensive field work and research, new roles and responsibilities were drawn out. Interrelationships between the various entities and stakeholders were redefined. Performance indices to reflect the changed paradigm as well as the end objectives of service delivery to the citizens were defined. A “consultative” selling process was instituted to gain acceptance of the reforms. The staff evaluation process was also revised.