PROGRESS REPORT

100 PROGRESS REPORT OPERATIONAL SUMMARY 101
Human Resources
Since the inauguration of program activities in
July 2011, the ATA has grown from an idea on
paper to an organization with 317 employees
(as of July 2015). While this rapid growth has
occurred in a relatively short time frame, the
growth has been deliberate, following a wellstructured
and planned process.
A clear understanding of the ATA’s HR status
can be gathered if one looks at the issue in a
disaggregated manner, across the three different
parts of the organization: Core Staff, Project Staff
and Regional Staff.
Staffing by Organizational Area
Core Staff at the ATA are positions approved by
the Ministry of Civil Service, including Program
and Operational Staff. These staff members
are responsible for supporting and tracking the
implementation of the Transformation Agenda
deliverables by working closely with the MoA
and all deliverable owners to provide real-time
problem solving and analytical support. They
also provide capacity building and coordination
support to ensure that deliverables are well
aligned with other activities being undertaken
within the Transformation Agenda and more
broadly across the agriculture and other relevant
sectors in the economy.
Total Number of ATA Staff by Organizational Area
G.C.
E.C.
15
0
11 4
July 2011
Sene 2003
132
4
30
98
July 2012
Sene 2004
The Ministry of Civil Service approved 144 Core
Staff positions in the ATA during GTP I. Since this
work is central to the execution of Transformation
Agenda deliverables, considerable effort was
placed to quickly fill these positions. By the
second year of operations (2013), 91%of Core
Staff positions had been filled. There has been
very little variability since then, with attrition and
recruitment of new staff keeping the percentage
of Core Staff positions filled between 90-95% in
2014 and 2015.
Project Staff at the ATA work on specific
deliverables within the Transformation Agenda
that the ATA has been asked to jointly own and
implement. These staff members, who are
hired for specified time periods, are not only
responsible for the execution of the deliverable
but also for building the capacity of the joint
owner of the deliverable in the public sector.
In July 2012, the ATA had 30 individuals
classified as Project Staff, working exclusively
on two deliverables, the largest of which was
the EthioSIS soil mapping project. In 2013, the
number of deliverables for which the ATA served
as the joint owner had increased to five, with
the number of Project Staff increasing to 55.
Similar to 2012, the EthioSIS project accounted
for the largest segment of Project Staff in 2013,
but other jointly owned deliverables, such as
Rural Financial Services and Extension Capacity
Building, were also initiated during that year.
By 2014, the ATA jointly owned 13 deliverables
with 96 Project Staff members. New jointly
owned deliverables initiated during this period
included: Direct Seed Marketing, Community
Based Seed Multiplication and Groundwater
Mapping. Finally, by the end the GTP I period, in
July 2015, the ATA jointly owned 20 deliverables
with 154 Project Staff. The major deliverable that
the ATA was asked to jointly own in the final year
of the GTP I period was the ACC Initiative.
The final component of the ATA’s staff are the
regional ATA offices, located in the capitals of
the Amhara Region (Bahir Dar), Tigray Region
(Mekele), Oromia Region (Addis Ababa), and
SNNP Region (Hawassa). Initially, the ATA
expected that 1-2 staff members in each regional
office would be sufficient to facilitate integration
of the Transformation Agenda deliverables
into the plans and activities of the regional
governments. By 2013, feedback from the RBoAs
and other stakeholders indicated that a more
robust approach was necessary. As such, the
ACC initiative, which requires a larger number of
regionally based staff, was launched in late 2014.
As the various positions in the ACC design began
to be filled throughout 2015, the number of ATA
staff in the regional offices increased, from 11
individuals in July 2014 to 31 in July 2015.
Hybrid Staffing Model
Another key aspect of the ATA’s organizational
and HR structure is its unique hybrid staffing
model. By and large, the ATA aims to attract
and retain the highest quality local Ethiopian
professionals within a salary scale approved by
the Transformation Council. However, there is
also a recognition that the ATA and the country
as a whole could benefit from expertise and
skillsets that might not be found at the level of
the government approved salary scale. As such,
the regulation establishing the ATA allows for
the organization to hire staff with “rare skills”
in key positions to bring such expertise to the
organization and sector.
“Rare skills” staff at the ATA are found in four
different parts of the organization: 1) Senior
Management; 2) Program team leadership;
3) Technical experts; and 4) Analytics. In
consultation with the Ministry of Agriculture,
the ATA has developed a clear and differentiated
approach on the tenure and role of the “rare
skills” staff in each of these different areas.
Consistent with this approach, the percentage
of “rare Skills” staff has fallen every year since
inception, from 27% in 2012 to 8% in 2015.
“Rare skills” staff by organizational area
317
Rare skills staff in each role as
Rare skills staff
27%
a % of all rare skills staff
as % of all staff
31
11%
Senior Management team
Directors
244
12
Total Staff
26%
19%
Technical Experts
154
Regional Staff
199
14
14%
16%
Analytics
Project Staff
96
13%
55
Core Staff
22%
26%
20%
19%
8%
33%
19%
130
136
132
27%
37% 45%
N/A
34%
27%
27%
July 2013
July 2014
July 2015
G.C. July 2011
July 2012 July 2013
July 2014 July 2015
Sene 2005 Sene 2006
Sene 2007
E.C. Sene 2003
Sene 2004 Sene 2005
Sene 2006 Sene 2007