[MUSIC] Hi everyone, welcome to this lecture on project planning and working in the field. I'm Anna Kalbarcyk, and I'll be teaching this lecture. In the first section we'll be talking about project planning specifically, and the aim of the lecture is to serve as a guide during the project planning phase to help you preemptively avoid a number of common pitfalls associated with this phase of the international experience. The key to a positive project planning experience is early preparation and communication. You want to be as clear as possible about as many things as possible. So as I show on this slide there are a number of things you want to talk about with your primary investigators and your supervisors early. The bulk of this lecture will be about the project, scope of work, practicum requirements, and aligning expectations with your supervisor. But I do want to touch quickly on these issues of housing and travel, because students often have concerns about safety, cost, and the location of their housing. And this is sometimes something you might not think about or something that, yeah, I might not think about as early as they should. So you want to be very clear about how much you're willing and able to spend on housing and what the options are nearby your work. Thinking about safety considerations which vary greatly from country to country and work site to work site. So make sure that you have those housing conversations early on, and then also conversations about travel, when you can go, is there any flexibility in that, how much travel you're going to have to do on the ground, and how that's going to be arranged. So I talk about clarity and being as clear as possible, and I have a funny anecdote to go with this. I once had a student who was working with a colleague who has a number of projects in Puno, Peru. And this student was very, very excited to go and had told all of his friends that she was going to Puno and was starting to prepare her trip. And about a month before she was due to leave, she started talking with her faculty member about her trip to India, and I say, cool, that's interesting, when are you going to India? And she looks at him with concern like, it's for your project I'm going to Pune. And he's like, no, you're going to Puno, Peru not Pune, India. So while this isn't likely to happen to you especially now that I've told you this tale. You want to make sure that you're clear Isabelle about as much as you can be so that you don't have to rearrange your tickets, retell all your friends and family that you're not in fact going to India like you thought but rather Peru, which is on a completely different continent. So you want to think about negotiating your scope of work very early on. A scope of work is a formal agreement document that specifies all of the criteria of a contract between a student and the faculty member or a supervisor. It very clearly documents your project requirements, major milestones, deliverables which we'll talk more about later, and products, documents, reports, that are expected to be provided by you, the student. So when you're negotiating the scope of work, there are a number of things you should consider. What was in the position description that initially attracted you to this particular project, if there even was one. Sometimes projects are just word of mouth. If there were things in that original position description that you're interested in, make sure that you talk early on about those key things. Because oftentimes, faculty members or supervisors will put a whole slew of possible things that you could work on in the project, but might not necessarily need the thing that you picked out that you're interested in right now. So make sure that you're very clear about what it was that interested you in this project. Think about what changes might have occurred in the project if any, and this can really span the gamut of types of changes. As there have been IRB delays has a major natural disaster hit the country where you're going to be. Has funding been delayed? Any of these things could affect your scope of work. So if you have honest conversations early on about where your project is, that will really help you as you're negotiating what you're going to do. Think very carefully about your program, and practicum requirements, and if you're using this international experience to fulfill those requirements. Make sure that you have clearly outlined that with your supervisor or your faculty member so that they know what it is that they need to do, and you need to do, in order to fulfill that requirement. Be very honest about what you actually have time to do. I think that all of us as humans have the capacity to end up overpromising and underdelivering, but you really want to do the opposite. You want to underpromise and overdeliver, so be careful when you're promising a faculty member, okay, I'll do the data analysis, I will write two manuscripts for you, and I'll write you three grants. Be mindful of all of the requirements that you have right now in your program or coursework, any other agreements you've made with faculty to do work, either thinking even about what you have to do in your personal life. So just be very aware of what you have time to do. And then, also think about what you want to get out of the experience, what it is that you want to put on your resume, and what it is that you want to be able to sell yourself as having a set of skills. But while you're doing that, also be very mindful about the skills and tools that you can bring so that you're having a collegial conversation with people. And it doesn't seem like you're expecting the faculty member to give you everything out of this experience. And that you also have something to add to their project and to the local colleagues. So again, this should be a collegial and non-combative conversation and should quite honestly incorporate input from the local partners. You want to make sure that local partners not only know that you're coming, which is definitely happened. I've had people go overseas and local partners didn't even know that students were expected. But you want to make sure that local partners have a say in your workload, especially if they're want to be serving as your supervisors so that they know what you're going to be getting involved with and are prepared for you by the time you arrive. So all of that being said, you want to get your scope of work in writing and the purpose of this is to, one, inform your program of what you're going to be doing which you often have to do anyway. Two, it holds you accountable to what you and your faculty or supervisor have agreed upon. And third, and maybe most importantly, it holds your faculty or supervisor accountable for what they need to do to prepare for you to be able to do the work. Part of this negotiation process and this scope of work is your deliverables. Thinking about what it is you're expected to provide throughout your experience and after your experience. So some examples of deliverables could be reports, manuscripts, behavioral change campaign, completing a data analysis, developing a curriculum, or even just completing a certain number of training sessions on the topic you're working on. So all of these things could be deliverables and they might be things that you specifically want to gain experience in. But make sure that you talk early on about what it is that you actually like to see as an output for your experience. Now, I think manuscripts means a little bit more about conversation here. Because this is something that a lot of students get involve in. But it's also something that a bit touchy and can have politics surrounding it, so when you start negotiating conversations around writing up manuscripts, be very clear and honest, but also try to get that honesty out of your faculty member. So first think about whether you would like to produce a manuscript or whether you're even expected to produce one by the people you're working with. And then you're going to want to engage in conversations about authorship. So start thinking about it early, and ask questions about it if you have any aims to be an author. Oftentimes, faculty members will have templates or sort of matrices that can help determine who's going to be an author based on how much work you do. But remember that many of these relationships with local partners, there are a number of political things going on that you might not even be aware of. So authorship isn't always as easy as, I've done this amount of work, therefore, I'm getting this position in authorship. So never assume anything about authorship and definitely ask about it if it’s something that you're interested in. And in thinking about partners, you want to try to connect with your partners as early as possible. As mentioned in the assigned reading by Uma and Demaris, the missing factor in many program designs which sends students overseas is feedback from local partners. And what I want to stress here is that, that feedback can start very, very early. Even from the student selection portion, but also in determining your scope of work and what you're project is going to look like. So try to be involved in calls and emails prior to your travel. Watch and mirror levels of formality. So remember that partners are often much more formal than we might be and unless you're given permission to call someone by their first name. You really want to make sure that you're addressing them the way that they're either signing in their emails or the way that your colleagues are. So be very careful about formality because it's a sign of respect. And then, rely on your partners for more than just logistics. While most partners are really happy to help you arrange travel from the airport to where you're going to be staying or even from where you're staying to where you're working. For the most part, their primary job isn't to just service you in a logistics level and you're going to be working with them on the project. So the more that you can talk to them about the type of work that they're going to be doing, any backgrounds that they have, anything that they would like from you. That's a really nice question to ask, what can you do for them. And then even start talking about aspects of the culture that you might not be aware of. I think that these are conversations that are important and show that you are invested in working with these people and in this community more than just having people arrange your travel for you. You may want to be weary if you are not invited to speak with local partners anytime during the planning phase. Often times, connecting with local partners during the interview phase or during the planning phase, is a good way to gauge if you feel that you are a good match for our project or programs. So not just if the supervisor feels you're a good match but whether or not, you feel like you're going to be able to work in this community, work in this office with the people that you're connecting with. There could be barriers you haven't even thought of like language barriers. Is there something that you would be able to tackle in the next couple of months with a few lessons on Rosetta Stone or Duolingo, or is it something much more deep than that you actually can't get resources for? And think about what would happen if you can't effectively communicate with your partners. So the earlier you connect with partners, really the better off you'll be throughout the entire project dates. You want to be as flexible as possible. During the project planning phase and really every phase of your experience. So I know that I just encouraged you to negotiate a scope of work and even get it in writing, which kind of sounds a bit inflexible. But that whole process is really meant to serve as a protection measure for your experience, and to ensure that everyone has discussed what your experience should be, and will most likely be. But in global health, things can change quickly. Funding can disappear. IRBs can hold up a project. A country may experience a natural disaster or dissolve into revolution while you're right there. So these are the things to think about and make sure that you are flexible and realize that projects can change. And so even though many of you are on a timeline for degree programs or for practicums, you have to get certain things done. Remember that there are many external factors which affect the progress of a project, not all of which are controllable. And also try to remember that as frustrated as you might be in this process and you have your deadlines. So do the partners who might have scheduled an entire month or two around data collection for this project that no longer happen. So as your faculty member who might have other projects waiting in the wings, but this one is the one they could handle right now. So you're not the only person who's going to be frustrated with an IRB hold up or a funding change or whatever the case may be. So, you try to keep that in mind and have some perspective. And then the other point about flexibility is that it can often open up doors for you. And you can work on whatever is needed rather than just what you are thinking about working on. And that can give you skills you never really thought that you would have an opportunity to acquire, even if it's not your first choice. Communication is one of the first and most important places where student and supervisor relationships get in trouble. And this can happen very early on in the planning process. And one of the best places to fix this is as early as possible. Communicate early and often. And gauge whether your faculty is on the same page as you in terms of communication, and what your expectations are and what they're actually willing to do in terms of communication. If your supervisor isn't communicating with you early on, it's not likely to get better when you're overseas. You're out of sight, out of mind, it's only harder, so determine early on what you are and not comfortable with. Sometimes the most important part of an overseas experience is having a good relationship with the people for whom you are working. Not necessarily working on the most interesting project in the most interesting place. The people can make all of the difference and the best way to ensure that you have a good relationship with people is good communication. Establish a plan for when you're overseas and you can do this in your scope of work or it can be something that's separate, so that you actually have something agreed upon with your supervisor for when you're traveling. Think about how you're going to communicate and how often. And then, what's needed versus what's wanted. So some of us may want to have an email with our faculty member only once a month. But that might not be what's actually needed. You might need to have a little bit more communication than that and vice versa. You may need to also renegotiate this communication plan once you're on the ground but that will be a lot easier if you've already laid down a framework for what communication is supposed to look like and what your expectations are. And then finally you want to determine exactly who your supervisor is going to be and this can often be confusing when you're interviewing with a faculty member here but working overseas with a different set of partners. So think about who's going to be the person you're reporting to, who is it that you're turning your reports into, are these different people for a different projects. Sometimes, this can be really unclear but the earlier you establish your supervisor, the better it's going to be. In part in parcel with all of what I've talked about here, issues around communication, issues around housing, and travelling, and project planning. The most important thing is to align your expectations, talk as early and often about what it is that you're expecting out of where you're going to be staying, where you want to work, what the work situation is going to look like, what your deliverables are going to be. And make sure that they actually align with the faculty members, because if your expectations aren't aligned, you're just working for two different goals. And you're not going to come together to make sure that this experience is positive for you, but also positive for the project that you're working on. In the next section, we're going to talk more about what it actually looks like to work in the field, and what some of those challenges are.
