Office Life

Since I really got the feel for how things will be when at work this week I’ve decided to devote this entry to my work.

Before even arriving I knew that my “boss” (I prefer the term supervisor) would be away for much of October on field missions. It was decided that I would meet with Delger the day before he left which just so happened to be the day right after I arrived. Things went well though and I was introduced to most of, if not all, the staff and was given a general overview of what my responsibilities would be over the long term and most importantly what they would be in the short term (i.e. for the two weeks while he is away). In short my responsibility was to first understand as much as possible about Pro-Poor Public Private Partnerships (5Ps) and then revise a template which will be used to document three successful 5Ps in Nepal. The overall goal is to find out what lessons were learned and what were the core principles and methods used that resulted in these initiatives being a success.

So that was the main task but there was a lot of other things going on that I became involved in. Shortly after getting into my second week I was asked to comment on a Power point presentation that was going to be delivered at a management board meeting. I guess they liked what I had to say because I was asked the following day to review, comment, and edit where need be for all of the presentations being delivered at a meeting of heads in Bratislava next week. Over this last week I must have re-formatted, edited, reviewed, revised at least a dozen presentations, and in the process learned a good deal about Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007s features. It has been a little bit of a trial by fire which personally I like. I find gets you moving without wasting time in the build up. You will know immediately whether you can cut it or not. Also keep in mind that the UN complex is under a phase 1 security alert due to the political unrest which is literally on the UN’s doorstep. What this means in real terms is that you may be asked to work from home (happened twice) or be sent home from work (happened once). The security system here is top notch though and I have at no point felt that I was in the least bit of danger at any time.

That’s it for now. I’m hosting tonight with was an open invitation for the young staff and interns. Since half of the tenants in my apartment building work for either for the UNDP or UNESCAP there is bound to be a few people coming. I’ll write about how the party went (and perhaps start posting pictures as well) next time.