180 Degrees Consulting and the MDP Student & Alumni Advisory Council Working In Partnership

The Master’s in Development Practice (MDP) is a two-year graduate degree program focusing on sustainable development practice. The program was launched in 2008, established at Columbia University in 2009 and has rapidly expanded to about 38 academic institutions (and growing!) in 26 countries since then. Hundreds of students have graduated from the program, joining a pool of alumni and students in what is known as the MDP Student & Alumni Advisory Council (SAAC).

In their recent expansion efforts, SAAC sought to create a brand new program called Development Practitioners Without Borders (DPWB) to support better the many MDP students and alumni worldwide able, capable, and interested in doing consulting work on sustainable development issues for organizations, government ministries, and businesses, for example.

In developing DPWB, SAAC faced two key challenges - retaining operational talent year over year and becoming financially sustainable in the long-term. Such thinking required creative, rigorous, and entrepreneurial thinking, something comparable to what McKinsey & Company offers its clients, but not at the same price point. The 180 Degrees Consulting Team at the University of Pennsylvania met the high expectations and did even more. They worked with SAAC and the MDP Secretariat for 12 intensive weeks on the creation of a business plan for DPWB, emphasizing areas of growth ranging from turnover models to retention strategies.

During this process, the 180 Degrees Consulting Team met frequently, asked detailed questions, and worked with SAAC and the MDP Secretariat to transform an idea into reality. Their weekly insights provided all involved the opportunity to examine and re-examine every aspect of DPWB and, ultimately, led to the buy-in of all the MDP graduate students and alumni who participated in this process across the globe. Overall, the 180 Degrees Consulting Team’s constant inputs and thought-provoking insights completely changed the way the alumni and students thought about the development of the DPWB program.

Although the project outcome wasn’t clear at the beginning, the 180 Degrees Consulting Team helped develop a fully implementable roadmap and other key deliverables such as a compensation model, funding model, and marketing strategies. With their guidance and advice, SAAC members are now creating a strategic plan for DPWB with the necessary vision, mission, and goals. Such a project can launch as a program of the MDP students and alumni that is financially sustainable in the not too far future.

For more information on the MDP program or SAAC, please visit www.mdpglobal.org or contact the director of the MDP Secretariat, Lucia Rodriguez, at lucia.rodriguez@unsdsn.org.