Proprietary assignments
Multi-client Projects EcoPlan and The Commons
Over three decades of successful international operation EcoPlan has developed a rather original and effective structure of organization and work in support of its far-reaching projects and assignments. The main elements of this include:
- An established core group, working with state of the art communications and computer facilities as needed to support sophisticated research, effective international networking and collaborative projects across international borders.
- Long term concentration in a limited number of technology areas which constitute the central core of all our work.
- Professional cooperation on a continuing basis with an outstanding network of senior partners and associates, specialized research organizations, experts and thinkers in related technical and policy areas around the world.
- A practice of close team work with sponsors and clients who, though they often have at hand much of the knowledge and resources needed to deal with their problems, can at times benefit from independent analysis and counsel, and longer term strategic perspective.
The people and institutions with whom we have collaborated over the years are, together with our basic philosophy of work, among the central assets of the group. We have taken great care in building creative long term relationships with thoughtful and committed individuals as well as institutional clients. These established alliances and shared interests regularly result in new ideas, projects, contacts, and assignments.
Each assignment is planned, negotiated and executed under the direction of a Senior Partner with world-level credentials and experience in the subject area. The partner who initially represents EcoPlan and negotiates the contract has full responsibility for all aspects of the assignment up to its successful completion. He is supported as required by staff researchers and external collaborators with specific technical and area competence. He also remains available for follow-up work and further consultation.
The group's work involves both proprietary assignments for individual clients and multi-client or group projects.
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Proprietary assignments for individual commissioning clients constitute the main core of work at EcoPlan. They are funded both on a contract and, occasionally, on a retainer basis. These assignments require that our databases and international contacts be kept thoroughly up to date, and are in themselves an important professional tool because they give us an opportunity to work closely in both the early search/research as well as the implementation phases with industrial and financial clients around the world.
There are considerable variations in terms of size, objective and methodology, but what typically these assignments have in common is that they all have a strong technology core, involve international business issues in a climate of accelerating technological change (and often with strong shifts in environmental and public policy frameworks), require close interaction with the client throughout, and aim at informing corporate policy and decision-making at the highest levels.
Assignment scoping and objective setting is carried out in close direct collaboration with the client, whether in face-to-face meetings or through careful use of the phones, mail and state of the art electronic communications. We do not accept assignments that involve going through intermediaries. Critical brainstorming on goals, objectives and alternative methods of project execution is strongly encouraged at these earlier stages.
All assignments are organized on the basis of a succinct contractual document written in simple English which is co-developed in several iterations with the client. Close contact of the principals throughout the project is considered critical. Reporting procedures are kept simple and streamlined, with emphasis on timely communication of relevant findings and results rather than on formal printed reports, per se. Confidentiality arrangements are specified in the initial contractual stage.
Because the main thrust of our competence and work is strategic and aimed at informing high level policy decisions, we have found over the years that an EcoPlan assignment to be fully effective must report directly to the highest levels of management. This requires particular care in initial project organization and communications, to ensure that the busy senior managing partner is able to follow progress, without at the same time being troubled with unnecessary details.
For longer or more complex assignments, we strongly encourage our clients to install teleconferencing facilities where ISDN or higher speed lines are available in order to maintain the level of contact that we consider to be appropriate for such challenging work.) We also find it often useful to set up a private Web site with restricted access (usually encoded) where interim results can be posted and commented. (These sites turn out to be particularly useful in assignments with international groups where more than one location may be involved or wish to follow the results.)
More than two hundred major multi-client projects have been carried out by the group, a sample of which are listed below.
These projects mark important milestones for the group since they have given us an opportunity to develop in-depth databases in areas in which we are active in our proprietary work, while at the same time permitting us to extend our industry and government contacts. Each of these investigations has required the careful coordination of multidisciplinary teams, and often a number of external specialists and cooperating sources. Many have benefited from the extensive participation of our clients and subscribers.
This listing is far from complete, but it shuld serve to give you an idea of the breadth and sheer bulk of the work that has been turned out by the group. If you require further information on any of the titles which are indicated here as links, brief summaries are available here by way of first introduction.
A listing of past subscribers to these reports and assignments will be found here.
From the vantage of EcoPlan as a professional advisory group, the great variety of work that is going on under The Commons, and the other people, groups and places to which it links in turn, help us better to fathom the tectonic process of economic and social transformation which is underway today and which is going to provide the new rule set for tomorrow.
Proprietary assignments
Multi-client Projects
In 1993 EcoPlan set up The Commons on the Internet as a public service: as an open, entirely free and shared World Wide Web site to support collaborative international projects and programs, which, each in its own way, would be trying to advance some part of our common understanding and mastery of the inextricably connected issues of Technology, Economy, and Society. Each of the dozens of programs and activities going on under The Commons is supported by a growing array of associated communications technologies and sharing arrangements.
EcoPlan and The Commons
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Updated 7 July 1999