On moving to Goa

‘You have never been to the sea?!’ Yes, 27th July 2022, was when I headed out for Goa, and the sea, for the very first time. As usual, I had to leave my home in Bongaigaon, Assam, a day or two before my scheduled departure. Because travelling 185 km to Guwahati Airport on the day of departure, has always felt risky to me. At 8:45 AM, I boarded the flight from Guwahati, and by 2:40 AM, I was in Goa! After booking the pre-paid taxi and walking out of Dabolim airport, was when I said to myself, ‘Okay, the journey begins.’

Something about Goa that I observed and loved was the greenery as seen on my route from the airport. Before my arrival to Goa, I was assigned a task on mangroves to work on, and on the way to the city, I saw mangroves for the first time ever - it was amazing!

I was staying with one of my colleagues; after reaching, she welcomed me with a hot bowl of Koka noodles in her warm house. Strange, though this was the first time I met two of my colleagues, the warmth felt familiar. Later that day, I started house-hunting in Panjim with another colleague.

On the following day, we had a team meeting with the Mongabay-India team. While the discussions were on, we were offered some snacks; that’s when I tried bhakarwadi for the first time. It was delicious!

After a team dinner, we headed towards the Vagator beach around 11 pm. I had this kind of giggly excitement for I had never been to the sea. As it was pretty late, most shops were closed. We crossed through lanes with shops that sell crystals; ‘How fascinating!’ I wondered.

About 30 metres from the ocean, we could hear the sound of the waves crashing onto the shore. The sea was still not visible, but there was a cold breeze. A few more steps and I glanced at the sea; it gave me chills. With loads of mixed feelings rushing in, I walked head down, and only when I reached the shoreline did I gaze at the small white waves rushing in, only to return to the dark infinity. Rest of the team waited for my reaction to seeing the sea for the first time. And I never imagined my first encounter with the sea to be scary. 

I never imagined getting to do the things I was doing at the moment. Another day we drove to a local quarry to train with Varaha (our cute ROV).  Watching the turquoise blue waters that day, I regretted not knowing how to swim.

A few days later, we made our way to Caranzalem beach, not the usual way but through a narrow trail that felt like it was a scene from a movie. This time the sea was magnificent with the orange and pink hues of the setting sun. However, I had this dizzy feeling of being pulled away into the ocean by the waves. For a person who would lose balance in the pool, now witnessing such a large body of water was quite a big step towards conquering the fear of water itself.

Trail leading to Caranzalem beach.

On the weekend we drove to a point on top of the hill, where one could see the whole extent of the Caranzalem and Miramar beaches. It was early on a cloudy morning, and few fishermen were out with their boats. Some dogs accompanied others on foot, with crows, black kites, and stunning Brahminy kites flying high, just about where we were sitting. I witnessed the Brahminy Kite for the first time; in bright white and rustic orange, shining from the sun rays from the parting of the clouds that fell on it; it was majestic. It was soon after that that two tiny birds with tints of yellow and blue came crashing, fighting with each other, halted, noticed there was a human next to them and so quickly flew away. The next thing I did was I took out my phone to Google it and found out they were Olive-backed sunbirds. I was absorbed in the rush of excitement when something moved in a  palm tree nearby; it was a Greater coucal! Next, my colleague pointed toward two grey, big-headed flying birds. For a while, we watched the movement of what were most probably the same birds in a nearby tree. However, the canopy was too dense to see through. With a few glances and some Google searches later, we guessed that they were Grey hornbills. It was a beautiful morning, well-spent bird-watching and learning about them.  

The whole extent of Caranzalem and Miramar beaches.

Talking about birds, we recently went to Dona Paula beach, where we saw a big bird far away, near where the fishermen were fishing. I was sure that it was not a kite. It flew away from the beach, and I was sure what I saw was an angelic figure that had white on its body. But I didn’t know which type of falcon it was. It looked so magical. I was curious and hopeful that it would fly back, but disappointed, it didn’t, and it stayed on my mind for days. 

Recently, we went to a forested area where the river Mandovi met the Arabian sea. As we were staring up at the canopy covers of the oak trees, a big falcon came flying gracefully to the top of the canopy, displaying its white, greys, and blacks. It was the same angelic figure that I saw the other day. It was a white-bellied sea eagle, and yet again, it was playing the game of hide and seek. To get a clearer view, we walked closer to the river's embankments, but it had decided to forever play its game of hide and seek. Standing near the embankment, we saw Brahminy kites making their rounds- near the water and the fishing boats. The crows kept cawing, trying to chase the Brahminy kites away, missing their shots. And the  kites kept doing their business calmly, not minding the caws. And just when we were watching this play, there came the White-bellied sea eagle! Gracefully taking a round and vanishing into the canopy. While I was partially satisfied to see it again, its game of hide and seek only made me more eager to search for it. Apart from that, we also saw a wiggling Common Sandpiper. The white streaks on its wing bars when it takes flight are a sight to behold. And lastly, just when we turned back from the end of our trail, something flew in front of us and sat on a wire. So tiny! It was a pair of White-rumped Munias. They were very cute! We observed them for some time, and while they did not seem to be leaving anytime soon, we decided to leave. 

The White-bellied sea eagle in the middle.

Goa, for me till now, has been amazing. From meeting my colleagues for the first time to meeting the sea for the first time. From meeting a lot of new birds to having a crush on the White-bellied sea eagle. Moving to Goa has been wonderful!   

On Hiring at TfW Foundation

In September 2021, we put out calls for applications to fill three positions at Technology for Wildlife Foundation. As of January 1st 2022, we have a team of five full-time staff, as well as a number of consultants and volunteers working on specific projects. This post describes the remote process we used to select and hire our new staff members at the tail-end of 2021.

Sankey Diagram depicting the process for all the candidates across all three advertised positions.

We had a clear idea of the positions ready in early 2021, which were incorporated into our requests for funding. Once our funding was secured, we prepared detailed job descriptions which were used to inform the Google Forms that were our first point of contact with our applicant pool.

A screenshot of a section of the Conservation Geographer application form.

Our call for applications was straightforward; we provided information about the job profile, the salary range and the requirements of the position, as well as of the required and preferred skillsets. At this stage, we asked the applicants to provide their name, their CV and to answer just one question: in their own words, why did they want to work as the <advertised role> at Technology for Wildlife Foundation. For the communicator role, we also asked for a link to an illustration/design portfolio.

We sent out the call for applications, along with the link to the website page, on our social media channels as well as through our networks. Applications were open for a two-week period, from September 6th 2021 through to 20th September 2021. We received a total of 232 applications for all three positions, which exceeded both our expectations as well as our capacity to process them within our expected schedule. We had 50 applicants for our Conservation Communicator position, 90 for our two Conservation Geographer positions and 92 for our Ghost Gear Research Consultant.

Sankey Diagram depicting the process for the Conservation Communicator position.

Our initial set of eliminations was based solely on their answer to our singular question. We weren’t looking for command over the language, length or even expertise. This round was simply about understanding whether the candidate had put some thought into answering the question, along with an understanding of our purpose at TfW Foundation. Candidates whose answers solely expressed an interest in drones or maps, without any interest in conservation, or conversely, those which expressed an inchoate interest in wildlife or conservation, with no reference to our approach, were eliminated at this stage.

Sankey Diagram for the Conservation Geographer positions, including the test component.

For the second round, we looked at the CVs of the remaining candidates, and used an interview matrix, with a point-based system, to assess whether they had the required and preferred skills as advertised. Based on this, we were able to reduce our candidate pool. We also provided our Geographer candidates with a technical test, and reduced that pool of candidates further, from 18 to 7.

We then conducted semi-structured interviews with those remaining at this stage. Our goal here was to find candidates whose interests, motivations and career aspirations were aligned not just with us, but with the role they’d applied for. A primary requirement was that they would be capable of working independently and with minimal supervision; while this is my personal preference in terms of work culture, it’s also essential when operating during a pandemic.

Sankey Diagram depicting the process for the Ghost Gear Research Consultant position

For each of these final candidates, we re-assessed their CVs, their answer to our initial question and their professional conduct as expressed over emails and during the interviews. Clear preferences emerged, and we prepared a short-list of our candidates. Each candidate at this stage was asked to connect us with their referees, who we communicated with over email. The sole purpose of the reference check was to verify whether the candidates had portrayed themselves honestly over the course of their interactions with us.

Finally, in early November, we were able to make our first offers! Once we finalised a position and closed applications, we sent out an email to every candidate who applied, letting them know that we would not be taking their application forward. Our final employee joined us on January 1st 2022, and we were able to close this, the second phase of our hiring process.

We deliberately chose to make the salary range visible at the beginning of the application process, and to ask for references only towards the end of the process. There’s enough information out there, as well as substantial anecdotal experience (shout-out to www.reddit.com/r/antiwork), to indicate that this works to the benefit of both applicants and to the hiring organisation.

P.S.: The Sankey Diagrams were made by our Conservation Communicator, Nancy Alice, using SankeyMATIC.

Persevering with PARIVESH

I have been signing petitions and participating in campaigns to stop the clearing of large forest areas for the construction of some major road or highway for almost a decade now. Clearing of forests also involves forced rehabilitation of tribal communities and of course the habitat loss for biodiversity. In 2016 and 2017, I naively sent emails to ministers to inform them why constructing a 6-lane highway through a tiger reserve would be a bad idea. Unfortunately, all of my letters and signature campaigns fell on deaf ears. In most cases, the agencies responsible for felling trees had already secured the clearances needed to do what they were doing, and those roads would eventually be built. The projects had already been approved by various authorities, including those who were responsible for protecting those forests in the first place, many months before the protests or petitions. I could only sit back and watch forests being destroyed in the name of development. The interaction between development and conservation, and the idea of attaining a balance between them (if that’s even possible) has always been of interest to me. Therefore in 2018, I decided to study infrastructure impacts on the environment as part of my master’s thesis. It was while conducting the research for my thesis that I came across an absolute goldmine of information on a website called PARIVESH: (Pro-Active and Responsive facilitation by Interactive and Virtuous Environmental Single window Hub). This is a web-portal launched by the Ministry of Environment Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC) in 2018 which has a historic database of all new and old projects seeking environmental, forests or wildlife clearances, along with links to relevant documents and assessment reports. It also allows the user to track project clearances and review comments put forward by government officers. As a real-time clearance portal, This website seemed to be an honest attempt to bring about transparency in the approval process for development projects that require various environment-related clearances. Although not fully accessible unless one knew their way around on the website, it seemed to be a good start to know about projects beforehand. I assumed everyone in the conservation space, especially the groups who often initiated those petitions I had been signing, would be using the website extensively . I was glad about the existence of the portal and amazed with the government’s initiative to come up with it.

However, fast forward to a few months later in 2019. Whilst working with one of the leading conservation organizations of the country, I realized that the reality was that far from PARIVESH being extensively utilized by many people, it’s existence was not even widely known. This was a shock to me, to say the least, but it was also my chance to understand the PARIVESH portal and find ways to make use of the huge amounts of information it made available. This seemed like a fun thing I could do through which I could somehow revolutionize the entire process of advocacy for sustainable, wildlife friendly infrastructure in India. Naive, I know, but this was my first job ever.

I soon realized the revolution was not going to happen easily. The more time I spent on the portal the more I realized that while the government’s intentions for this portal may have been that it would make the clearance process transparent and efficient, the design, as implemented, would do just the opposite. I realized that there were a number of major issues with PARIVESH (either on purpose, or due to sheer ignorance) which made information on the portal inaccessible and unusable. For instance, anyone interested in learning more about a potential project must know some very specific keywords to find the project details via the available search options. For updates on the project, they would have to check the portal every day. The projects uploaded for approval would be in the last phase of project planning, with very little scope for any stakeholder to put forward their concerns and recommendations. Although there are some other government websites that allow one to look up new projects in the initial planning phases, those websites happen to be much more complicated than PARIVESH. One would have to be extremely patient to collate information from all of those. Moreover, PARIVESH allows the spatial visualization of projects uploaded on the portal but this useful function is not accessible to the general public. This GIS section is accessible to only government officers with state-authorized login credentials (as of October 2021). For everyone else, it’s a matter of skill, expertise and patience for they would have to download each spatial file individually before beginning any sort of spatial analysis. Finally, I cannot count the number of times the portal has just blocked my access to it, whilst in the middle of research about some upcoming problematic mining or highway development project, almost as if it knew what I was trying to get at!

Personally, having spent so much time just exploring the various buttons and functions of the portal, I believe that the only way for conservation organisations to use PARIVESH effectively is to have a person dedicated to the task. Their role would be only to monitor the portal and make sense of its information and processes to be able to effectively use it for any conservation purpose. However, it turns out there is an alternative. We can develop a better model, something that actually bridges all the gaps and limitations of PARIVESH, allowing for a smoother, more pleasant user experience. I did not know something like this could be done but, currently I am part of the team which is doing it! I am working with colleagues who have been as frustrated as I by the multiple badly designed portals and websites containing lots of crucial information for both development and conservation, lying there in inaccessible formats. We are all motivated by the vision to accomplish what the government may have initially envisioned – a user friendly, transparent and efficient portal which allows easier access to all the information on various development projects within environmentally fragile areas collated from different sources. This is something that I, as a PARIVESH user, wished existed for the past 3 years and it is absolutely exhilarating for me to be a part of something that might make it a reality. The portal would make discussions about upcoming projects in ecologically important areas more evidence-based and would allow for more effective stakeholder involvement. 

If you have ever tried to find information on PARIVESH or have signed petitions to stop the construction of roads which already had all the requisite clearances, the urgent need for the existence of a transparent system that we are building may resonate deeply with you.

Flowchart illustrating an user agency’s process in PARIVESH by Ashwathy Satheesan