Resource Mobilization dashboards launched for better tracking and decision making

A screenshot of the Resource Mobilization dashboard launch Photo: ICRISAT

ICRISAT’s projects, proposals, donor and pipeline funding information is now available to all staff to assist with their Program resource mobilization. The information is provided in real-time, is interactive and is broken down by research programs and regions where the work is undertaken.

“This dashboard is the first step towards collating our resource mobilization data in a more accessible manner so that we can all have access to it and is also an effort to make the outputs and outcomes more transparent,” said Dr Jacqueline Hughes, Director General, ICRISAT, when undertaking the launch. She further stressed that the dashboard is important in tracking ICRISAT’s progress within the larger scenario of One CGIAR and will help with identifying, tracking and ultimately improving partnerships.

Ms Lakshmi Pillai, Manager, Grants Management, provided an overview of the five dashboards that have been made available on the intranet: Projects, Proposals, Private sector and CSR, Pipeline and Funders.

The RM dashboard on ICRISAT’s intranet. Photo: ICRISAT

All dashboards break down data by region where the work is being carried out and by research programs, and categorize projects and proposals by project grant size of small, medium and large. The Projects dashboard provides total funds pledged and trends, current year funding and future pipeline funding information. The Proposals dashboard provides trends and lists donors that proposals are being submitted to.

The Pipeline dashboard provides predicted funding for the next five years based on a formula of approved or approved in principal funding, submitted proposals with a 40% success rate applied and concepts being worked on with a 20% success rate applied. A five-year seasonal average is also calculated to provide a benchmark. The predicted pipeline is also presented by program and region as well as being presented with only the confirmed funding.

The Funder dashboard mentions ICRISAT’s top funders and can be viewed by each research program and region. Funds pledged by the Private Sector and through CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) are extracted and tracked in its own dashboard.

The system is built on the Salesforce platform and uses PowerBI to transfer the data to dashboards on ICRISAT’s Intranet. The Salesforce system also has been used to set up many other major advancements including online clearances of all grant related items (e.g. proposals, donor reports, MOUs, No cost extension, agreements etc). This is accessible on the web and as a mobile application to make clearances faster and convenient.

The Salesforce system has also been used to automate a lot of requirements, from the generation of reports and reminders of donor due dates to semi-automation of fundraising newsletters. It also automatically updates project information on the website and is used as the main contacts database. ICRISAT’s grant management data for the last seven years has been uploaded onto the system.

Speaking about the development of the system, Mr Pradyut Modi, Head, ISU, informed that the platform is based on Salesforce platform which is world’s leading customer relationship management (CRM) software. It is highly customizable, user-friendly, secure and provides useful analytics for decision-making.

“The storage with CGIAR Office 365 account has been integrated with Salesforce. Also, using Microsoft’s Power-BI platform, the data has been made available through dashboards to all users,” he further said and added that the Salesforce platform has been integrated offline with HR information to keep workflow information update. Salesforce integration with the platforms provides an opportunity to replicate the model disseminating data/reports/dashboard for data from other areas also.

“We went through a very rigorous and methodical process to set up this system and had three big lessons learnt from the process,” said Ms Joanna Kane-Potaka, Assistant Director General – External Relations, ICRISAT. “These include 1) the data collection, cleaning and migration was a much bigger job than expected and took about a year to get this in really good condition and going back 7 years; 2) This can be achieved without it being a large expense, having costed US$ 26,000 to date; and the success was also based on strong cooperation and coownership between Strategic Marketing and Communications (SMC) and Information Systems Unit (ISU).”

The Resource Mobilization dashboards can be accessed on the intranet at:  http://intranet.icrisat.org/IcrisatLocal/co/salesforce.htm