When Growth Changes the Questions : How TAP's Program Implementation team evolved from supporting schools to navigating systems.
- 4 days ago
- 3 min read
By Juhi Jiten Shah (Associate Manager - Program Implementation)
At The Apprentice Project, program implementation did not always exist as one unified function. For a long time, the work was split across two separate teams.
One team focused on operations—managing schools, ensuring sessions happened, tracking implementation, and staying close to classroom realities.
The other focused on government partnerships—building relationships with stakeholders, securing permissions, and expanding access to schools.
Both teams were doing important work. Both teams were committed. But they were operating independently.
And over time, the cracks began to show...
Partnerships and implementation could not continue as two separate conversations. They were part of the same journey.
A Shift in Accountability
Source : Program Implementation Team, The Apprentice Project
That realisation led to one of the most important shifts inside TAP. Operations and Government Partnerships were brought together into a single vertical: Program Implementation.
On paper, this looked like a structural change.
In practice, it was a shift in accountability.
The same team that built partnerships would now also carry the responsibility of ensuring those partnerships translated into meaningful implementation on the ground.
The ownership became end-to-end.
Conversations became more realistic because execution challenges were no longer distant from partnership discussions. Planning became more integrated. Expectations became sharper.
Teams started thinking simultaneously about access, implementation, sustainability, and outcomes—not as separate functions, but as interconnected parts of the same system.
Source : TAP, Program Implementation Team conducting an induction in Delhi
From Schools to Systems
But even after the shift, another question remained unresolved:
How do you scale meaningfully?
Until last year, most expansion happened at an individual school level. Schools were onboarded one at a time. Relationships were built school by school. This approach had its strengths. It created strong relationships, allowed deeper engagement, and helped teams stay closely connected to schools. But it also meant that scale remained incremental. Reaching more students required proportionately more effort.
And eventually, another shift became necessary. This year, the Program Implementation vertical began moving from a school-based approach to a systems-based one. Instead of focusing only on onboarding individual schools, the work started moving toward district-level engagement.
Source : TAP, Program Implementation Team in Moga and UP Classrooms
Working With Systems
The idea sounded simple. But it required an entirely different way of operating.Because working with systems is fundamentally different from working with institutions.
It means:
Navigating multiple layers of administration
Aligning with district priorities instead of only program goals
Building trust across stakeholders operating at different levels
Accepting that progress will not always look immediate
System-level work is slower. Less linear. Often less visible in the short term. But it also creates the possibility for scale that individual outreach alone cannot achieve.
Today, this shift is reflected in the scope of TAP's work:
16 districts in Uttar Pradesh
Municipal Corporation of Delhi and Directorate of Education Delhi
Moga district in Punjab
Pune district across Pune Municipal Corporation and ZP
Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation
Mumbai and Thane districts
What Scale Really Means
Naturally, this has also changed what implementation itself means.
The work is no longer limited to ensuring sessions happen on time.
It now involves aligning with district priorities, translating approvals into consistent school-level execution, building trust across administrative structures, and maintaining quality while operating at scale.
Because one of the biggest lessons in this journey has been understanding that:
Scale is not simply about expansion. It is about alignment.
A shift:
From tracking activity to understanding impact
From focusing on inputs to evaluating outcomes
From managing tasks to navigating systems
And perhaps that is the most important transformation of all. What began as two separate functions—operations and partnerships—has gradually evolved into a more unified understanding of implementation itself.
Not as isolated execution.
Not as relationship management alone.
But as the work of designing systems where impact can travel further.
Across classrooms. Across districts.
And eventually, across public education systems themselves.
"Meaningful scale rarely comes from simply doing more work. It comes from rethinking how the work is designed in the first place."