Job Descriptions
Project Director
The Project Director is directly appointed by the ADATS Governing Body. His/her responsibilities are to:
- Ensure that the activities undertaken in various Taluks are within the philosophical and strategic framework of the intervention strategy, implementation technology and time frame matrix evolved by ADATS.
- Conduct weekly Situation Meetings and provide an overall programme direction.
- Write project applications, activity and progress reports, and coordinate the annual Effects Monitoring exercise.
- Introduce systems and procedures based on the principle of total and exception-less transparency in order to enhance accountability.
- Make budget realisations transparent and understandable to all the Staff and Coolie Sangha functionaries, encourage discussions and invite suggestions for the better handling of finances.
- Negotiate with potential buyers and get the best possible price for high quality carbon credits in the voluntary market and ensure that every single Rupee of carbon revenue is given to End Users who generate them.
- Represent ADATS on all matters regarding various projects and programmes to funding partners, finalise budgets and sign bilateral agreements with them on behalf of and binding on ADATS.
- Coordinate digitization efforts and maintain the ADATS/Coolie Sangha intranet and website.
- Share experiential learning at ADATS with other grassroots NGOs. In this responsibility, the ADATS Project Director is the Convenor of an international network on Climate Change, the Fair Climate Network.
Asst Project Director
The Asst Project Director is directly appointed by the ADATS Governing Body. His/her responsibilities are to:
- Appoint Staff, train, orient and place them in various Taluks and/or thematic fields.
- Have a final say in the handling of the discretionary budget for the health coverage of Staff and their immediate family members.
- Ensure that all economic and target oriented projects remain subservient to the goals and processes of Coolie Sangha building.
- Ensure that internally evolved management systems for the implementation of various economic projects and target oriented activities are appropriately developed and introduced.
- Treat all expenditure as "investment" on poor families, and not as a mindless "spending" of project finances.
- Examine budget realisations and call for comments on variations.
- Examine budget realisations and call for comments on variations.
- Ensure that these systems are within the framework of the 2 Organisations policy, promote the twin principles of grassroots planning and coolie participation, and that they are furthered into an efficient planning monitoring & evaluation system that the Member Coolie families can themselves manage.
- Compare the actual achievements of economic projects against projected targets, study variations, and develop indicators so that the Staff can themselves assess the impact of all material and non-material activities.
Finance Director
The Finance Director is directly appointed by the ADATS Governing Body. His/her responsibilities are to:
- Safeguard the financial and inventory interests by introducing appropriate check and control mechanisms; especially central bank cheque books, passbooks, vouchers, and all other title/financial records and documents.
- Ensure that all project operations are/perceived to be open, transparent and answerable to Coolie Sangha Members and functionaries.
- Ensure a smooth cash flow.
- Ensure that Mediclaim and vehicle and other insurances do not expire.
- Scrutinise and verify the authenticity of the final books of accounts before they are submitted for audit by the Chartered Accountant; receive and act upon comments, reports and recommendations made by such Chartered Accountants.
- Comply with statutory requirements of FCRA, Income Tax, GST, Professional Tax, Registrar of Societies, and all other bodies and authorities.
- Recruit, train and place Desk Workers at various Taluk headquarters.
Desk Workers
Desk Workers are appointed by the Finance Director, stationed at and responsible for one or more Taluks to manage finance and administrative functions.
- Point persons at the assigned taluk headquarter.
- Office running, electricity, internet connectivity, building taxes, computers, furniture, campus maintenance, hospitality, etc.
- Exercise effective control on all bank accounts, including village level CSU and CCF accounts, and train women Cheque Signatories selected by their respective CSUs/Mahila Meetings.
- Safekeep bank cheque books, passbooks, vouchers, and all other title/financial records and documents of village CSUs within their assigned Taluk(s).
- Safekeep motorcycles, GPS machines, cameras, tabs and other material/equipment given to staff for official work.
- Use the Budget as a guideline to scrupulously invest project finances in a manner that gives maximum returns to the poor people and their village CSUs.
- Support every expenditure with authentic and authorised bills, invoices and/or statements.
- Digitally maintain books of accounts using InfoNeeds Accounts or Tristle Transact.
- Identify suppliers, ensure quality, and negotiate prices for material purchases.
- Maintain registers and safeguard stock stored at the taluk headquarter and/or central villages.
- Assist the Finance Director with timely statutory compliance and filing of returns.
Area Field Workers
Committed Coolie youth who are well versed with ADATS and the Coolie Sangha by virtue of having first worked in their own villages as VLWs and then somewhere else as Community Workers are selected by the Coolie Sangha to work as Area Field Workers in ADATS. Area Field Workers are appointed to work in an Area of 25-30 village CSUs and report to the Asst. Project Director.
Their being both, Staff members of ADATS as well as Member Coolies of the Coolie Sangha, place Area Field Workers in a delicate position requiring them to play a balanced and mature role in the ADATS Organogram.
After spending the mornings at the offices to deal with Coolies who visit the Taluk headquarters, Area Field Workers leave after lunch, every single afternoon, to compulsorily attend Cluster Meets of their Area and as many CSU Meetings as possible.
Area Field Workers have an intimate knowledge of village situations, CSU functionaries, and individual Member Coolie families. They ensure that there is no caste or communal discrimination in the CSUs, and that there is a positive discrimination in favour of Coolie women.
Area Field Workers are Process Owners of 6 crucial activity processes:
including grassroots exercises to contribute to Problem Tree and Objectives Tree making, translating and sharing the LogFrame in all villages, conducting meetings of Secondary Stakeholders, conducting annual Effects Monitoring exercises.
including annual declaration of family income, payment of Sangha Tax, renewal of membership, and updating of family demographic data.
when implementing the SCNZ supported child sponsorship programme from 1997 to 2011, separately appointed Case Workers implemented this activity. From 2012 Area Field Workers took over this function in their respective villages.
till 2020 separate Mahila Trainers attended women's issues in each Area. Post 2020, five Mahila Trainers promoted themselves to Area Field Workers and it was decided that both, male as well as female Field Staff should support the Mahila Meetings and actively promote a feminist agenda in village CSUs.
during the construction phase of the BCS-FCF CDM Project from late 2009 to mid 2013, separately appointed Biogas Case Workers performed this function. Post construction, Area Field Workers took over this function with village volunteers overseeing usage and reporting on repair and maintenance issues.
including the making of bi-annual Customer Demands & Satisfaction (CD&S) surveys in each and every village, liaising with government offices, assisting Member Coolie families to access civic and anti-poverty benefits from the government (without involving touts and agents, mediating to settle inter-CSU and intra-CSU squabbles, and monitoring implementation.
Field Workers ensure that procedural requirements designed to keep these activities subservient to larger socio-political goals are not compromised. Field Workers are directly responsible to ensure that qualities of representation (as opposed to leadership) are developed in the CSUs.
Project Coordinators
Project Coordinators, capable of building and leading efficient implementation teams, are appointed by the Asst. Project Director for specific time and target bound projects like Biogas, Woodstoves and Farm Forestry CDM Projects, Children's Schooling, etc. Their responsibilities include:
- Contribute and take ownership of the strategic plan and related documents.
- Coordinate with resource persons, centres and organisations.
- Provide leadership to the Climate Team comprising Case Workers, Masons, Village Monitors, etc.
- Develop village volunteers as a strong, independent, powerful and effective cadre.
- Put in place a robust post-construction/post-implementation usage monitoring, repair and maintenance system.
- Ensure high functionality, survival rate and performance in climate projects, farm forestry and children's programme, respectively.
- Promote the concept of community ownership and management.
- Facilitate End User women to become "business women" providing an environmental service to society at large and compensated with carbon revenue.
Jobs and tasks to fulfil these responsibilities are:
- Select, appoint and train local youth as Case Workers.
- Plan realistic outputs, set time-targets, and monitor performance of Case Workers.
- Coordinate the Case Workers' functions, assign Gram Panchayats, give monitoring permissions in the Tristle solution, and ensure that mutually agreed-upon targets are met.
- Take a final call on quality and price of material, saplings, etc. sourced by Case Workers.
- Hold weekly/fortnightly meetings of Case Workers to share analytical reports generated by Tristle solution; obtain learning to improve efficiency.
- Ensure that demographic, energy usage, construction and usage data is maintained in real-time with the Tristle monitoring solution constantly updated.
- Develop a close rapport and intimate relationship with End User women/farmers.
- Post-construction/installation/planting, arrange for the selection of village volunteers — schooled youngsters who have a technical aptitude to undertake maintenance, teaching and monitoring tasks.
- Ensure that Village Volunteers monitor and perform their tasks and major ones like biogas repairs, sapling replacement, etc. are done in a timely manner by Case Workers.
- Arrange skill and conceptual training for the Climate Team through monthly meetings and encourage innovative attempts to solve practical and strategic problems.
Farm Forestry Case Workers
From 1996, when Member Coolie families started switching from field crops to tree crops, Area Field workers oversaw their digging pits, procuring saplings from government nurseries, arrange fending, watch and ward, etc.
In 2007 when this effort was taken up more systematically, it was still a regular self-financed Coolie Sangha activity. It is only after transition to Gold Standard and the first verification in 2015 that we collated our experiences and adopted a strategic plan in September 2019.
4 Case Workers were appointed to exclusively implement the Farm Forestry programme:
- Visit participating farmers at least once a week to check activities and address implementation issues and keep Area Field Workers informed on developments.
- Ensure that demographic and energy usage details of all participating farmer families are up-to-date in the Tristle monitoring solution.
- Take GPS readings of plot corners and hand these over to the Desk Worker in order to delineate discrete plots using the Tristle Polygon Recorder.
- Record baseline carbon stock (girth and height of pre-existing tree species) on the plot where the participating farmer family will plant, and record these in the Tristle monitoring solution.
- Accompany specialists to visit each participating farmer and recommend tree species best suited for the plot, based on soil type, water availability, etc.
- Check out watering arrangements made by participating farmers, especially those without their own bore wells, to ensure that it is feasible.
- Assist participating farmers procure high quality saplings from government and private nurseries at the best price; ensure that proper bills and receipts are obtained by them for re-imbursement from the project and/or government.
- Accompany participating farmers to annual training sessions on tree cropping practices, monthly meetings, etc. and ensure they understand and follow recommended practices.
- Select Village Monitors and impart in-field training on organic pest and disease control, give them basic equipment like mixing drums, sprayers, etc. and keep a tab on their usage.
- Advise and supervise participating farmers to dig farm ponds as per specifications, get them inspected by MG-NREGA staff and ensure that payments are credited into their bank accounts.
- Monitor tree growth (girth and height) of each cohort of planted saplings once every quarter and record in the Tristle monitoring solution.
- Arrange for replacement of saplings that have died in the previous year. Record each species as a separate cohort in the Tristle monitoring solution.