Staff Development

Quality Service Rules ensure smooth growth of the organisation, minimising grievances between employer and employees and ensures their rights. In order to clarify the procedure of Service Rules among the staff members, RMMRU administration had conducted an orientation on the policies earlier this month.  The capacity building training on Service Rules had been conducted for in a half-day session.The training workshop was conducted by HR and Admin Department of RMMRU. It focused on the different important issues of Service Rules like Classification and Gradation; Recruitment and Removal; Record of Service, Seniority, Increment, and Promotion; Penalties, Procedure and Appeal; General Policy on leave and joining time; Working hours and Bonus etc. The training workshop gathered 33 participants from RMMRU head office and field offices.

The training workshop was moderated by Dr. Tasneem Siddiqui, Founding Chair of RMMRU. The workshop used different tools such as Power Point presentations, question-answer sessions and an open discussion.  Participatory methodologies and innovative learning techniques had been used in that training session. 1^st session on PowerPoint presentation gave the participants an overall idea on the management of human resources by RMMRU authority. The question-answer session created a clear concept on the Service Rules of the Unit. The third and last session reflected on areas in need for further development.

At the end of the workshop, participants were asked to evaluate the workshop through their feedback, questions related to the overall quality of the workshop and of each session, skills concepts acquired, and recommendations for improving the quality of the training. Ms. Shatadru Saha, Research Associate of RMMRU mentioned that in comparison to other organisations, RMMRU’s Service Rules are more rights-based. On the other hand, Ms. Rifa Rizwan, Field Facilitator of RMMRU said although she read the service rule, yet she did not understand many of the procedures. The training cleared them all.

This report has been prepared by Nayan Mitra, Admin and HR coordinator

On 6th May, 2021, RMMRU hosted its 2nd capacity building workshop on one of its major service rule, gender policy. This training was aimed to enhance the understanding on gender equality of every staff member of RMMRU. Along with strengthening the capacity of the new staff, the training also encompassed all staff and executors from both head office and field offices. The main agenda of the workshop was to broaden knowledge as well as ensure the integration of gender equality on every level. Md. Redwanul Islam Chowdhury, Research and Communication Officer, Santa Rani Sutradhar, District Coordinator, and Anika Tabasum Barsha, Research Assistant jointly carried out this interactive workshop.The training was executed as an open discussion with an interactive quiz session with more than 40 staff members of RMMRU present. Dr. Tasneem Siddiqui, the founding chair of RMMRU moderated this session. The training consisted of 4 interactive sessions. Each of the sessions involved a separate Q&A section targeting the participants. The opening session was conducted by Md. Redwanul Islam Chowdhury comprising of the principles, goals and objectives of the policy. This session highlighted gender equality and equity, scope of the policies, act of tokenism, ensuring a right-based environment, gender-based dignity and opportunities. Afterwards, Anika Tabasum Barsha presented the next session, Code of conduct and core gender rules. Key issues such as, gender division of work, staff development, recruitment, leave, deployment and transfer, workload, financial and other benefits were emphasised under the session. The third session, policy implementation was delivered by Santa Rani Sutradhar. This session put emphasis on the significance of gender strategies on programme level especially in programme planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation along with concluding the policy and glossary terms. As the complex terms of this policy were specified clearly throughout this workshop, it helped the participants to understand the policy comprehensively. The training worked as a window of opportunity for the participants to learn and connect to gender aspects to their respective activities. The concluding session ended with recalling the key aspects of the workshop. Later, participants provided their invaluable viewpoints and remarks on scope of improvements of the policy. Mr. Parvez Alam, IT Senior Officer (IT and Communication) said, “The term third gender should be excluded from gender discussion because if there is third gender, who will be the first gender?” Mr. Fazle Zahid, project manager suggested that, “In the definition of RMMRU Staff, ‘irrespective of their sex’ should be mentioned everywhere”. The opinions were taken into account to make the gender policy more effective.

This Report has been prepared by Anika Tabasum Barsha, Research Assistant and Md. Redwanul Islam Chowdhury, Research and Communication Officer

RMMRU organised a half-day online capacity-building training for its staff members on Sexual and Gender-based Harassment policies at the workplace. The purpose of the training was to provide a clear understanding of the policy for both head office and field level staff members so that they can get acquainted with its provisions and rigorously follow them at the workplace and beyond. The training was conducted in three sessions. Each session contained Q&A using a unique polling system followed by session-wise presentation and discussion. The first session was conducted by Rabeya Nasrin covering the Introduction and Key Definitions of the policy. She explained what constitutes as sexual harassment, verbal conduct, non-verbal conduct, and physical conduct and described the term ‘Gender-based Harassment’. She illustrated the definitions with pictorial methods for the participants. H M Fazle Jahid facilitated the second session on the Jurisdiction and Resolving Mechanism of both formal and informal complaints under this policy. He also introduced the current Redress Committee to the staff. Arifa As Alam conducted the concluding session on the Implementation of the Policy. She discussed the confidentiality principle and effective monitoring and evaluation system under this policy. The trainees actively participated and exchanged their views in an Open Discussion, suggested some changes in the policy. At the end of the programme when evaluation was sought, Rajib Ghush, one of the participants shared, ‘we may get to ignore little things, acts or behaviour which can ultimately turn out to be harassment. So, it was so important for us to know in detail about this policy’. Later, the participants evaluated the training and appreciated the techniques used to make it more participatory. The training was concluded by Dr. Tasneem Siddiqui hoping to continue maintaining a healthy working environment free from all kinds of sexual and gender-based harassment. RMMRU will maintain zero tolerance implementing the policy’- she added. Parvez Alam and H M Fazle Jahid provided technical support for this training.
This Report has been prepared by HM Fazle Jahid, Project Manger

RMMRU administration hosted an online capacity building training for the staff on the Financial Manual, as part of the ongoing staff capacity building online event. The purpose of the training was to improve the staff’s understanding about the financial manual and ensure proper implementation of it at each aspect of the organisational activity. With the adroit moderation of Dr. C R Abrar Executive Director, RMMRU more than 41 staff members from different levels of the organization had participated in this online knowledge-sharing event.The training was conducted in four sessions split into two parts. The first three sessions were about the financial manual and 4th session was about the financial management process of the programme. Md. Salah Uddin, Accounts and Admin Officer, SIMS Project, RMMRU, Cumilla Office had facilitated the 1st session. At starting he used the quiz poll for evaluating the common understanding of the staff members about the manual. Following that he discussed the 1st five chapters of the financial manual through a PowerPoint presentation. By these participatory discussions, staff members had extended their understanding about the introduction, objectives, definitions, accounting principles and policies, maintenance of account and the budget and budgetary control part of the manual. The 2nd session of the training covered the 6th to 10th chapter of the manual which was conducted by Mohammed Sherajul Islam, Accounts Officer, RMMRU. He had also used a quiz poll at the starting of his session. Financial management, procurement procedure, fixed asset management, different type of accounts system and the financial reporting was the learning point of this session. The participants got a clear and explicit understanding of the important procedures from this discussion. The 3rd session was conducted by Mr. Imran Ul Haque, Accounts Officer, RMMRU. He presented the chapter 11th to 15th of the manual. He shared audit system, loans and advanced, vendor enlistment procedure, auditor selection and delegation of authority according to the manual. He also used quiz-poll, PPT, open discussion and other interactive methods to make this knowledge sharing more intro-active. Md. Parvez Alam, Senior Officer (IT and Communication) provided technical support to facilitate the training. All participants shared their learnings, quarries, opinion and brought forward other issues at the end of the three sessions to make this manual more efficient and effective at the implementation level.

The 4th training session was jointly conducted by Mahmudol Hasan Rocky, Research Coordinator and Marina Sultana, Director, Programme, RMMRU. This session was about the financial activities that need to be performed by research and programme personnel. The check and balance mechanism between finance and programme was discussed here step by step from planning to execution. The indispensable issues of the programme financial management process were discussed proficiently in this session. Programme staff members got competent learning about the financial activity at the programme level.

Participant evaluated the training as a helpful step to understand and perform the financial activities more efficiently. From the participants Shatadru Saha, Research Associate, RMMRU said that “Now, I get a more precise understanding of the procurement process, vat-tax submission, quotation collection and other financial activities which we have to perform regularly. The training is a great learning opportunity for us.” Santa Sutradhar, District Coordinator, SIMS Project, RMMRU said that “The financial policy is a very strategic discussion, thanks to the finance team for making it more understandable. But we also need an implementation basis financial training. The last session on programme financial management was really very much useful for us to perform the financial activity in our programme.” Dr. C. Abrar Executive Director, RMMRU announced the closing of the training with the hope of spontaneous participation of staff members in the upcoming of trainings.

This Report has been prepared by Santa Rani, District Coordinator