To start this Footnote, there are three major issues to discuss, namely: (1) what and why POSDAYA, (2) what and why should we consider “best practices”, and (3) what and why would Benchmarking be essential in implementing POSDAYA program.
With regard to the first issue, many have known that POSDAYA becomes a paradigm of empowering and mobilizing family and community participation in the development. POSDAYA embarks on social components such as: education, health, and entrepreneurship to improve family and community welfare at grass root level. POSDAYA brings to the spirit of ‘working together’ (GOTONG ROYONG), and moreover, becomes a social gathering forum for all family members at all ages (from childhood until elderly) and all elements in the community. POSDAYA is expected to beak up the poverty chain in the community.
POSDAYA is an innovation to improve quality and well-being of the community, by utilizing social changes in the society, to nurture new values on independence and empowerment for the shake of the family and community. Through POSDAYA, people are taught to fight for life, not be passive and leaving all to their faith (pasrah).
Why should we develop POSDAYA, is an emerging issue as time flows, where the society keeps changing, as well as its pattern and behaviors. The changing society widens the gap between poor and wealthier people, of which this is the urgency of POSDAYA to alleviate poverty and narrow down the gap between these two socio-economic statuses.
As an innovation, POSDAYA is considered well developed, of which every change would go irreversibly, or no point to return. This point becomes the spirit of recording for ‘best practices.’ The recording is an essential part of management of change. Nowadays, the recording can be carried away more easily and completely using digital equipment, ranging from static portraits until complete video using ”streaming”.
Yet, recording for ‘best practices’ is more than just records. A sharp and careful analysis should take into account, yielding a condensed ”lessons learnt”.
”Lessons learnt” will give signs or rules of how should an activity be conducted in the future. Furthermore, what is the meaning of ”benchmarking”?
”Benchmarking” is a common procedure in an organizational management, when an organization sets an appraisal based on their “best practices” as an indicator.
Whatever occurred either above or below this indicator, gives a sign that there is something wrong or misplaced. One thing that makes this benchmarking and best pratices become tedious is that those should be broken down into meticulous elements, emerging into detailed indicators, too. The more detailed its elements, the more effective this best practice, and the more sensitive this benchmark being a reference.
The last point to discuss in this Footnote is the benefit to having benchmarking, namely:
• To overcome “paradigm blindness” – that is often expressed through this words: “… this is how I work on it, and so far it works …”
• To give an opportunity to an organization to open up for new changing or ideas.
The important point to set benchmarking is our critical mindset not only to consider an output orientation. Another essential element in benchmarking is to consider the process that is kept improved time to time.
PR/06/07 |
