Finally, a short section highlights follow-up actions to be taken by the village society, the division-level working group, and the state-level working group.

This format evolved after Forest Department officers complained that they did not have time to read longer reports. Now if they see an interesting issue or decision highlighted on the cover sheet, they can read about it in more detail inside. Before monthly meetings of division-level working groups or periodic meetings of state-level working groups, the process documentation reports can easily be reviewed. Moreover, the section highlighting actions for follow-up can be used to develop the agendas for working-group meetings and/or for meetings of the village societies. The agendas then reflect results-oriented actions and decisions, whether they are policy corrections or specific guidelines to individual officers in the field to remove an obstacle in implementation. Minutes are taken in the same format, with process-related observations being made where possible and appropriate. These minutes are signed by the officer in charge and shared at the operational level. They become, in effect, implementation orders and instructions for action.

These documents have provided a continuous operational feedback system between village communities and the Forest Department. They have established channels for the flow of information and a data base of field experiences. They are useful in policy tuning, in training, and in planning at all levels.

Process documentation is a simple approach accessible to both the village-level organizations and forest departments. Development of process documentation has allowed forest department staff to move away from a monitoring system focused on achieving conventional target measures of success, such as the number of nurseries established or the number of meetings held. Instead, it emphasizes an understanding of development as a social process and establishes continuous feedback systems that allow department staff to identify problems and respond in a timely fashion. With process documentation, the views of local people can be integrated into the planning system and institutionalized in mainstream forestry department practices.