The 100-Day goal
Ten pilot teams across eight Area Councils in two Eastern and two Central region districts each took a construction-linked results goal. Crucially, the goal was never the building itself. As the CBRDP National Director put it, the goal is not a school building but what the building should do: reduce absenteeism, or lift enrolment.
Results achieved
One team reduced pupil absenteeism from 49% to 16% over the 100 days, alongside building a three-classroom block with office and store.
The cost result was the one that travelled. That three-unit block with office and store cost 173 million cedis, roughly 18,740 US dollars. The same block through conventional channels cost around 300 million cedis, roughly 32,500 US dollars. The World Bank Ghana country office verified the cost figures in December 2006. Across the ten teams, classroom blocks, a nurses’ quarters and other infrastructure were completed inside their 100 days.
Who was on the team
Cross-functional community teams that included traditional authorities. In one community the chief himself was mixing mortar. The initiative was run by the Community Based Rural Development Project under director Brown Matthew Oppong, with the Rapid Results Institute and Robert H. Schaffer & Associates, and local coaches drawn from existing CBRDP staff.
What was done, and how the results were achieved
The cost savings came from several moves the teams made themselves. Funds were devolved to Area Councils rather than routed through a large contractor. Teams negotiated lower rates with local artisans by appealing to their shared stake in the community, and using local artisans rather than an outside contractor was also credited for the build quality, because, as one member said, the artisans’ own children would attend the school and so they insisted on the highest standard.
Transparency was engineered deliberately. One team leader held a weekly Gon Gon meeting with the whole community every Saturday to share the week’s finances. That openness broke the usual assumption that project leaders were pocketing money, and once the community trusted the process it contributed materials it had never contributed before. Many teams posted a community member to check in daily with the construction workers. One summed it up: tight supervision, no cheating.
The teams also improvised around the blockages. When funds were late, one worked with traditional authorities to loan money in the interim and with an NGO to mobilise books, and set an attendance rule so volunteers arrived on time. When rain stopped the materials truck, the Ongwa teams carried 200 bags of cement half a kilometre to the site, because, they said, they had to keep the 100 days.
What is being sustained, and how
CBRDP leadership stated plainly that they were after sustainability and scalability, not donor showcases. The clearest mechanism was the coaches: the Rapid Results Institute trained CBRDP staff in every region as Rapid Results coaches, and these were redeployed supervision staff rather than an added cost. The Deputy Minister of Decentralisation attended both regional wrap-ups and pledged to push all other regions and districts to adopt the approach. The report is honest that this was a beginning, and that only time would tell whether the aspiration held.
