The USAID/Tatweer Program collaborated successfully with the Ministries of Oil (MoO) and Electricity (MoE) to design an innovative training program — the Public Manager Cycle (PMC), which brings the brightest Ministry professionals together for rigorous training in six key public administration areas, among these Supply Chain Management, Financial Management and Communications/Leadership.

This series of residential courses – held over a period of six months from October 2008 to March 2009 -- is designed specifically to address the needs of these two Ministries and to prepare talented professionals for senior leadership roles. The classes stress international best practices and hands-on participation within a framework of cross-Ministry interaction. It allowed two groups of participants —36 individuals representing a mix of both MoO and MoE staff — to each spend one week per month in residence at the USAID/Tatweer training facility devoting attention to a single core administrative area. The participants were vetted by the Ministries in a rigorous selection process.

Mr. Ahmed Jaralla, an administrative manager at North Oil Company, said, “For twenty years we’ve only depended on our local systems and information. We had good work experience, but it wasn’t developed according to international standards. We need these courses to develop and to bring in outside companies to help us so we can use more scientific methods for production.”

The depth of the courses has also provided direct assistance for managers facing a variety of immediate challenges. Mr. Khalid, a local director of HR training in Hilla for the Middle Euphrates Directorate said, “Previously, evaluation of employees was secret. Now after (PMC) training, we openly inform employees of the evaluation so they learn how to improve,” Mr. Khalid said. “Some of this information is new for our office, so step-by-step we will need to implement change.”

The Supply Chain Management course, in particular, has had an immediate impact on how the Ministry of Oil does business in Iraq. Specifically, the MoO was inspired to work with USAID/Tatweer to deliver a long-term contract for steel and chemicals that will serve as a template for future commodity contracts, and will help the Iraqi Government to purchase over a billion dollars worth of desperately-needed raw materials. In other words, the trainings led to the ‘template’ for commodity contracts, which will help attract bidders to GoI tenders to complete unfinished projects that are vital to the economic future of Iraq.