AFoCO project managers head to Philippines for training on project management and GIS applications

AFoCO team to hold ‘Special Course on GIS-based Project Management’ in Clark Freeport Zone, Pampanga, Philippines, from 26 to 29 July 2022

Project managers of AFoCO projects play an important role in the success of AFoCO projects. At the project inception stage, the AFoCO Project manual requires among others, the formation of the Project Steering Committee (PSC) and the appointment of core project personnel. Ongoing AFoCO projects are overseen by a project manager, who assists the PSC in running and managing the respective country-specific projects. Working in closely with AFoCO, project managers provide critical guidance to local project staff and set the direction to achieve project objectives in a timely manner. To ensure that the project activities being implemented produce a set of outputs corresponding to the specific project objectives laid out in the project’s work plan, the project manager is expected to coordinate tasks such as running a project analysis by breaking the project into tasks and helping/managing the team in completing their roles and responsibilities. An efficient project manager identifies risks and finds ways to mitigate them as the project implementation proceeds without considerable delays.  Hence, it is key that project managers acquire good planning knowledge and skills, including suitable tools. Moreover, there are specific operational concerns encountered by ongoing projects that have to be addressed in a manner that is within the competencies of the project management team and at a level that can be conveniently tackled by project stakeholders. AFoCO’s project managers may have come from different backgrounds in terms of professional project management training, experiences/exposure whether formal or otherwise, such that differentiated expectations arise from all sorts of project management perspectives.  

On one hand, the development of a Project Management Information System (PMIS) to systematize project development, monitoring, and evaluation is in progress.  One key feature of the PMIS is the geo-referencing of project details that necessitates considerable knowledge and applications of the Geographic Information System (GIS).  In order to facilitate the efficient utilization of the PMIS, an appreciation or knowledge-level intervention on GIS is imperative for AFoCO Project Managers and junior officers.    

The Special Course will provide AFoCO Project Managers with an avenue to further enhance their knowledge of the basic project management principles and their applications in real-life project situations, acquire knowledge and skills on the basics of GIS tools and applications in project monitoring and information systems, and engage in discussions to clarify and improve the effective and practical operationalization of AFoCO Projects and related manuals/guidelines.

Through lectures, hands-on exercises, and structured learning exercises (SLEs), participants will be able to:

  • Level-off on the basic expectations (roles and responsibilities) of the AFoCO Project Managers at the workplace
  • Appreciate and acquire knowledge/skill level on the basics and applications of GIS in project-related tasks
  • Apply the course learnings through hands-on exercises and case-building cum problem solving
  • Recommend improvements/enhancements to pertinent provisions of the AFoCO Project Manual and related guidelines

The course will be streamed live on the Forest Management Bureau’s YouTube channel.
The Forest Management Bureau (FMB) is one of the six bureaus under the Department of Environmental and Natural Resources (DENR) of the Philippines.

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