Pilot Projects

A strategy often used by several development initiatives to become more self-sustainable is to carry out pilot projects to put new ideas into practice.

A pilot project is a small model of a specific program which allows ideas to be tested using a minimum of resources. This “scale model” is used to evaluate how well the idea works, to gather feedback, identify opportunities and obstacles, and adapt the plan before implementing it on a larger scale. Thus, an initiative can take preventive measures to identify and address challenges and difficulties, and scale up by making better use of its resources and efforts. A regional education initiative that wants to test a teacher-training program, for instance, can start by applying its ideas in a single school. 

Many initiatives have found advantages in using pilot projects: it is more cost-effective and less risky than taking on a full-scale project or idea, and it gives an initiative many elements to plan for self-sustainability before its project scales up, assessing whether its model is comprehensive, relevant to all, and equitable. It is also easier to attract funding when there is a successful pilot project behind the development initiative and, if they work, pilot projects can be scaled up to reach other regions or populations, as is the case with initiatives that create demonstration models: they test the effectiveness of their models and then replicate them, often with support from other initiatives.

Some initiatives create workgroups to design and test pilot projects; others test their ideas by collaborating with organizations that already work with the population they mean to approach; and still others offer consulting services to help other initiatives implement pilot projects, which not only scales their own project but also provides them with added economic benefits.