Ensuring results sustainability of international donor programs and projects for local development in the context of decentralization in Ukraine: techniques and recommendations for project managers

In the paper theoretical and methodological approaches to ensure projects sustainability in solving local development problems, taking into account the requirements of international donor programs and projects were considered. The authors identify the main dimensions of sustainability – social, economic and environmental, which are including in the concepts and projects of local development. The concept of sustainability is considered through the prism of existing concepts in project management standards and the use of sustainability management modern tools throughout the project management cycle. The paper highlights measures of sustainability taking into account stakeholders interests and key factors, which provide an opportunity to continue to benefit from the project after the completion of the donor basic assistance. The study describes the main areas of the project approach use in local communities, which allowed to identify local development projects as a tool of systematic change management; the main mean of strategic goals / priorities implementing and the mission achieving; a leading tool for the programmed achievement of community development goals. Based on the analysis of theoretical achievements of domestic and foreign researchers, a conceptual model of the relationship between project sustainability and project success was actualized, which, unlike existing ones, allows the project manager to better understand how different dimensions of project sustainability can affect the criteria of its successful implementation. Based on the model, the expected relationships between the nine dimensions of sustainability and the six criteria of project success were formulated. The strongest positive relationships are predicted between sustainability and the following criteria for project success: «The project is executed in a controlled manner», «Project stakeholders are satisfied» and «The project prepares the organization for the future». Positive relationships are expected between sustainability and success criteria: «Project deliverable meets goal» and «Business objectives or project goals are realized». The proposed conceptual model of the expected relationship between project sustainability (in different dimensions) and the criteria for its successful implementation provides the project manager with a useful and effective tool for a deeper understanding of the concept of sustainability, and thus creates a basis for developing and implementing successful local development projects. The authors propose a tool to ensure a holistic approach to the implementation of sustainability in local development projects in the form of McConville sustainability assessment matrix, which allows to rank (score) opportunities to ensure sustainability at each project stage. This tool can be used by the project manager both during the project implementation and after its completion