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Follow the Learning Journey on Quality, Accountability and Safeguarding
Update on Virtual Learning Session I: LEARN

The second session of this Learning Journey on Quality, Accountability and Safeguarding, facilitated by Sylvie Robert, included a panel discussion which was joined by Wassila Mansouri, from Sphere and Bonaventure Sokpoh, from the CHS Alliance to share the basics, few updates and best practices of applying quality and accountability standards such as the Sphere standards, the Core Humanitarian Standard (CHS) and the Humanitarian Standards Partnership (HSP).

Sylvie introduced the session saying, “Today, we will update each other on how various initiatives can be taken at the field level to enhance quality and accountability through increased community engagement. It will be interesting to have an update from the Core Humanitarian Standard (CHS), Sphere Standards and the Humanitarian Standards Partnership and gather views on how we are – or could – practically apply these in the best possible way.”

40 humanitarian and development practitioners from Asia and the Middle East participated in the half-day Virtual Learning Session ‘UPDATE’.

Bringing the Core Humanitarian Standard & Sphere Standards Closer to People We Serve

While discussing the content of the Core Humanitarian Standard, Bonaventure shared, “The Standard places people affected by crisis at the centre of humanitarian action, and it sets out nine Commitments that organisations and individuals involved in humanitarian response can use to improve the quality and effectiveness of the assistance they provide. The CHS has been built upon a bottom-up approach that contributes to harmonising and strengthening the coherence of humanitarian actions. We should apply the CHS not only to improve the organisation’s accountability to people affected by disaster, conflict or poverty but also to improve the efficiency, effectiveness and impact of the organisation’s work.”

Referring to the Sphere Standards, Wassila said, “Sphere has always put people at the centre of humanitarian action, recognizing that their active engagement is essential to ensure assistance meets people’s needs and supports them in their recovery. There is stronger wording throughout the Sphere Handbook 2018 that recommends working with affected people at all stages of the response instead of simply consulting them.”

Applying CHS to local contexts. Relevant Commitment and Key Actions:

“All the commitments are applicable in the context of the Syrian community and the organisations working on ground in Syria. However, our discussion identified Commitment 8[1] as most relevant as achieving this commitment will lead to fulfilling the other commitments. Consequently, one of the key actions to assign funds to strengthen the role and build capacity of individuals involved in MEAL[2] as their efficient involvement in the implementation of the standards will allow organisation to efficiently work towards achieving the standards and ensure quality, accountability & safeguarding. In addition, opportunities such as sessions, seminars and virtual events should be conducted where organisations can share experiences and best practice to increase learning.” B. S. from Syria

“We have seen that many organisations in Afghanistan are developing and enforcing policies and guidelines adhering to the Core Humanitarian and Sphere Standards. Organisations have mainstreamed the standards in their Code of Conducts and Safeguarding & Protection Policies. The mainstreaming of the standards in the project planning and designing have empowered communities and increased their participation in the interventions,” Dr. Naqibullah D. from Afghanistan

“Continuous awareness raising is mandatory for humanitarian aid workers, especially individuals working directly with the communities. Actions should be taken to make the standards available in local languages so that the communities can understand and relate to the commitments effectively.” Samreen Qaimi from Pakistan

Engaging communities while applying Sphere and the Humanitarian Standard Partnership (HSP)

“Local structures formed in the communities such as Steering and Village committees allows increased community engagement and ownership. Some organisations in India are conducting Community Accountability Assessment to assess, design, implement, monitor and evaluate community engagement and accountability activities in support of programmes and operations, especially under the themes of safeguarding and PSEAH.” Tooba Siddique from Pakistan

“Communication with the communities is key. It gives an open channel for communities and relevant stakeholders to convey the needs and ways to address the needs. Focal Group Discussions, awareness sessions, capacity building workshops and direct interviews are some few channels, which allows communities to learn about the process and relevant details of the planned intervention. Volunteers from the communities is another effective way to ensure community engagement in project interventions.” D. J. from Syria

“Communities should be motivated to be part of the impact that the projects aim to achieve. Motivation can be built through capacity building opportunities and their involvement in decision-making processes. Engaging in project interventions provides community members with the opportunity to become active members of their community and has a lasting, positive impact on society at large. It also helps communities develop civic and social responsibility skills and become more aware of what their community needs.” Fawzia J. from Afghanistan

Follow our Twitter Handle @communitywsasia for Live Updates from this Learning Journey

  1. Communities and people affected by crisis receive the assistance they require from competent and well-managed staff and volunteers.
  2. Monitoring, evaluation, accountability, and learning (MEAL)

 

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The first step of a learning journey on ‘Quality, Accountability to Affected Populations and Safeguarding’ kick started on February 1, 2022. A series of Virtual Learning Sessions and a Coaching Lab will run over a course of six months (January to June 2022)

A learning journey on Quality, Accountability and Safeguarding
Virtual Learning Sessions: LEARN, UPDATE, PANEL, CLINIC, IMPROVEMENT PLANS
Coaching Lab – Capitalisation of Experiences – Learning for the future

As part of this process, four Virtual Learning Sessions are jointly hosted and organised by Community World Service Asia (CWSA) and ZOA, for the Syria Joint Response (Cordaid, Dorcas, Oxfam, TDH Italy, ZOA and local partners), supported by the Dutch Relief Alliance. Other partners are also involved such as ACT Alliance, Act Church of Sweden, ADRRN’s Quality and Accountability (Q&A) Hub, CHS Alliance, International Council of Voluntary Agencies (ICVA) and Sphere.

This initiative aims to bring together committed humanitarians who are leaders in promoting and implementing Quality and Accountability and its relevant standards and tools throughout the project/programme cycle. The primary goal is to update them on the latest developments and tools around people centred approaches to quality and accountability, and facilitate localisation, learning and contextualisation in the humanitarian, development and peace nexus.

While sharing the strategy of the session, Sylvie Robert, who designed this learning strategy and is the lead facilitator, said, “We are all part of this learning journey. We will work together to design improvement plans in a realistic manner, tailored to your context, and provide coaching to monitor these plans to see how we are implementing what we have discussed and agreed to improve. Along the process, we will capitalise experiences at individual and organisational levels and across different organisations and regions. The learning will allow to design the next steps of the journey.”

Why are we here together?

“During the Virtual Learning Sessions, we will review what is available in terms of standards and tools, as well as how we can apply and use these across the project or programme cycle,” shared Sylvie.

65% of the participants joined the session to better understand Quality, Accountability, and Safeguarding, while 30% joined to identify practical ways of mainstreaming Quality, Accountability and Safeguarding. The remaining 5% aim to improve their programming skills.

Forty-one humanitarian and development practitioners from Asia and the Middle East participated in the first half-day Virtual Learning Session ‘LEARN’ that gave participants a platform to share experiences from a wide array of diverse locations and organisations.

The session commenced with an introductory video of the Core Humanitarian Standard.  

ASKs: While applying Quality and Accountability in your work, what limitations and opportunities are you facing in your specific working context? What key actions must be undertaken to uphold Quality and Accountability?

In response to the questions, participants reviewed, in small groups, good practices, challenges, and gained insights of different humanitarian networks and communities working on the ground on the application of Q&A.

While sharing key insights from the discussion, Qamar Iqbal from Pakistan said, “Three critical components were underlined to ensure quality and accountability in project intervention: participation, coordination, and communication. Engagement of all stakeholders in every phase of the project cycle management ensures participation of all. Likewise, effective coordination and communication of goals, expectations, successes and challenges are fundamental tenets of quality & accountability. Communities must be clear on the existing complaint response mechanism in place. To use the mechanisms in place efficiently and effectively, all processes and procedures should be properly explained to the necessary stakeholders.”

In the implementation phase, participants agreed that organisations should be able to adapt to contextual and situational changes. “Engaging communities and enabling their effective participation during the planning and assessment phases is a critical challenge for many organisations. To address this concern, several organisations are utilising cutting-edge methods such as Multi-Cluster/Sector Initial Rapid Assessment (MIRA)[1]. It is a precursor to cluster/sectoral needs assessments and provides a process for collecting and analysing information on affected people and their needs to inform strategic response planning. People First Impact Method (P-FIM) is another tool and an approach that gives communities a voice. It allows communities to identify the important changes in their lives and what these are attributable to, and reveals the wider dynamics within the life of a community.”

While sharing limitations and opportunities of applying quality & accountability, Fadi Kas Elias from Syria added, “In Syria, we have started to focus on the quality of humanitarian interventions since we are at the transition period of emergency to recovery. On the other side, we sometimes place far more emphasis on how to comply with donor requirements than on assuring the effectiveness of interventions. There need to be more coordination between humanitarian actors themselves at ground level to deliver quality assistance, share information and experiences and work together more effectively. Furthermore, we need to raise awareness within the communities we are working with about complaint response processes. Because communities are hesitant to provide feedback, we must encourage them to communicate their experiences and feedback about project interventions more freely and without fear. We can work to strengthen community capacity in areas such as safeguarding, early recovery of livelihoods, localisation, and so on, so that humanitarian actors can rely on them and maximise their influence.”

Diab J. from Syria shared some of the challenges and key actions with regards to complaint mechanisms, “Communities are hesitant when using the complaint response mechanisms. People fear that help will be cut off or that their safety would be jeopardised as a consequence of a lack of information. As a result, we need to ramp up our public awareness activities so that the CRM can be used productively. Furthermore, humanitarian organisations, particularly at the local level, must collaborate to overcome challenges and effectively serve community needs. To successfully meet the requirements of the communities, we need to strengthen our community mapping. Furthermore, service providers’ capacity building on various standards, such as the Core Humanitarian Standard, is critical in order to have a strong grasp of how to offer humanitarian relief while guaranteeing quality and accountability.”

ASKs for next session: How do we make it happen practically? What are the key actions we need to see functioning through the project or programme cycle?

It is imperative to review the adoption and use of Quality, Accountability and Safeguarding throughout the various phases of the Project/Programme Cycle Management. “The initial assessment and design must be prioritised since they will set the tone for the rest of the project cycle. We can connect the project cycle with the humanitarian programme cycle from the global coordination. It gives us an opportunity to advocate for humanitarian principles and guarantee coherence of standards’ application through the cycle phases,” shared Sylvie, in conclusion of this first Virtual Learning Session ‘LEARN’.

Way Forward
Participants have been asked to reflect and share their feedback on ‘How they do/would you apply Quality, Accountability and Safeguarding throughout the Project/Programme Cycle’ in their specific context’.

[1] The Multi-Cluster/Sector Initial Rapid Assessment (MIRA) is a joint needs assessment tool that can be used in sudden onset emergencies, including IASC System-Wide level 3 Emergency Responses (L3 Responses)

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“Over the last two years we have offered different webinars covering various aspects of Safeguarding. We also continue to raise more awareness in key aspects of Accountability such as establishing efficient and transparent complaint systems and protection from and prevention of sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment. Safeguarding is a key pillar to any accountability measures that organisations must integrate into their programs and working cycle,” said Palwashay Arbab, from Community Wold Service Asia (CWSA), while speaking in a webinar titled ‘Complaints and Response Mechanism (CRM)’. This webinar was the third one of the webinar series on Safeguarding and Complaints Management.

As part of the Quality & Accountability (Q&A) Week 2021, the virtual event was jointly hosted and organised by ADRRN’s Quality and Accountability (Q&A) Hub, Sphere, CHS Alliance, ACT Alliance, ALNAP and Community World Service Asia (CWSA).

Ester Dross, expert in humanitarian accountability, facilitated the session and was joined by panelist Ruby Moshenska, Global Safeguarding Lead, ActionAid International. More than 80 humanitarian and development practitioners,from Asia and Europe, participated in this 90-minute webinar that discussed a wide array of diverse expertise and knowledge on safeguarding from all over the region.

Speaking about Complaint Response Systems, Ester Dross, shared the need to understand essential components for establishing an efficient complaints and response mechanism, “Complaining is a right and every individual has this right to exercise. We, as humanitarian aid providers, need to receive and respond to complaints efficiently and in a timely manner. For this, the complaint response system should be a formal mechanism in order to deal with all complaints in the same way.”

Key pillars for a robust Complaint Response Mechanism

Ester discussed the key pillars to ensure that organizations have a robust system of Complaints and Responses.

Accessibility – By accessibility, we mean geographical, technological, multi lingual, inclusive access, thinking through different possibilities and different groups of people who would need accessibility to the system.

Transparency – People need to know the policy, procedure, timeline, who will receive the complaint, what kind of feedback they will receive and relevant details about the process.

Confidentiality – Community members must feel that they are secure and can entrust us with sensitive information, which will remain confidential and accessible only on a needs-to-know basis

Safety & Security – Security for everyone includes physical and psychological safety as well as taking into consideration medical issues. Communities must be able to access communications modes with ease.

A complaint is an expression of dissatisfaction

“A complaint for our organisations is an expression of dissatisfaction about our stated commitments. It is clearly linked to organisational policies, programs and obligations. We need to communicate and raise awareness on our commitments so that people can see if we are fulfilling them correctly,” said Ester. 

The wider and long-term objectives of a complaints mechanism is to create a safer environment for the most vulnerable members of a community and increase community voice and power. “Establishing a complaints system that suits the community needs and helps them exercise their right to complain is critical. Contextual information is essential to design an appropriate community complaints mechanisms and to ensuring that the pillars described above are grounded in reality.”

Committees can be established who will be responsible for receiving and responding to community complaints, ensuring that the community is aware of their right to complain, and providing avenues to channel their complaints on activities being implemented by the organisation. “The roles and responsibilities of the committee should be defined and the committee should follow a code of conduct. These committees can be established internally or externally and can include staff or experts. On the other hand, we can have focal points focused on various aspects including complaints, PSEA[1] or safeguarding. They are often responsible for training and awareness raising on PSEA and CRM and are involved in logistics for complaints handling.”

Who is responsible for decision making on complaints?

Who decides on which complaint is relevant?

Who is going to investigate the complaint?

These questions were raised by Ester Dross while talking about the Decision Tree and Responsibilities, “We need a formal system in order to address all complaints equally and in a timely manner. A decision making tree acts as a decision support tool, displaying roles and have clarity on who is responsible to make decisions in every stage of the complaint system.”

Complaints Mechanisms – People Centred Approaches

“I want to emphasize that we are on this journey as well of strengthening Safeguarding. This is something we are developing and we are always trying to strengthen too at ActionAid. The stronger we all are, the better. Every feedback and complaint is welcomed consequently,” said Ruby, while presenting her slides on complaints mechanisms.

When it comes to establishing and managing a complaints mechanism, there are several factors to consider. “One of the most important lessons we have learnt at ActionAid is that one-size-fits-all approach does not work for everyone. People should be able to file complaints in a variety of ways. Furthermore, the complaint takes precedence over us. We need to concentrate on making the complaints process simple for the person filing the complaint, not on making the process simple for the organisation.”

Safeguarding that excludes anyone is not good Safeguarding. “The complaint mechanism has to ensure that the approach is inclusive, adaptable and accessible to everyone. A strong complaints management approach cannot stop with Safeguarding. We need to create an organisational culture where people can raise concerns and take actions from everyone.”

It is key to create inclusive and accessible complaints mechanisms when working in communities.

According to Ruby, all staff, partners and communities should be aware of why the complaints mechanisms exist, how to use them and how they will be monitored. “Transparency is absolutely critical here. In addition, working with communities to develop complaints mechanism is key and as part of that to work with them to assess risks and map needs. Here we need to ensure that the mechanisms are accessible to groups that are traditionally marginalised such as persons with disabilities. We are also seeing a lot of work being done with children and young people to develop complaints mechanisms that are relevant to them and ensuring these mechanisms are developed for people with diverse literacy capabilities and communities with oral traditions.”

Key Messages

  • Have diverse ways that people can raise complaints – work with staff and communities to create accessible systems that are easy and safe to use
  • People want to report to someone they know and trust – train staff, leadership to respond safely and responsibly to concerns
  • Create a safe working culture – encourage people to raise concerns in all areas, not just Safeguarding, and walk the talk at all times

[1] Prevention of Sexual Exploitation and Abuse (PSEA)

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“This humanitarian assistance will enable me to meet my family’s food needs for more than a month. The millet seeds will assist me in reviving my agricultural livelihood, which I want to pursue with the help of my nephew and son-in-law in make a better living. This will enable me to send my girls to school so that they may receive an education and have a brighter future. This help came at the perfect time, just when we were struggling to afford a single meal a day even,” Seeta explained.

The Village Management Committeeⁱ of Sheedi Jo Tarr village identified Seeta as a project participant under Community World Service Asia and UMCOR’s relief projectⁱⁱ. The project is supporting climate induced disaster affected families with the provision of food packages and seasonal seeds for harvesting in the upcoming farming season.

Seeta, a widow belonging to and living in Sheedi Jo Tarr village of Umerkot district, does not have any children of her own but has in fact adopted four daughters of her nephew and has raised them as her own. “I got married at a very young age. I was only 16 years old. While my husband was alive, we decided to adopt two of my nephew’s daughters. We have nurtured them as our own, and we adore them. We married our eldest daughter off at the age of 20 in 2009. It was a very joyous moment for us,” shared Seeta.

Seeta’s husband, Geneso, died of a heart attack in 2010. Following Geneso’s death, Seeta’s nephew’s other two daughters became close to her, as her nephew left them with her when he and his wife went to work in the fields. Seeta would care for the three children by herself all day, and the two younger daughters grew to love her and refused to live with their parents. As a result, Seeta has been caring for the three children on her own since then. Her nephew had a meagre income and would give Seeta a portion of it to help her care for his children. However, this was insufficient to meet all of the children’s necessities. “My husband worked in the farming industry. He had rented acreage and cultivated a variety of crops on it. I occasionally assisted him in his agricultural endeavours. However, after he passed away, it became impossible to make a decent living, as I was caring for my three girls alone. The money did not come in as frequently as it used to. I could not work in the fields on a regular basis because I had to care for my house and girls. However, I used to be able to pick cotton and chilli occasionally to earn a little money. 

Our neighbours and relatives sometimes offered cash assistance, but it was insufficient to meet our family’s basic needs. At 69 years now, working to earn a living for my family has become too exhausting for me. My daughters help me at home, but I want them to go to school so they may have a better future. My ten-year-old daughter has completed her basic schooling. The two younger ones, who are five and three years old, on the other hand, have not been enrolled in school yet. Unfortunately, I am unable to cover the costs of their schooling,” Seeta explains.

Seeta received the food package on October 8th, along with 516 other families at a distribution activity held in her village. The food package consisted of wheat flour, rice, cooking oil, pulse, sugar, tealeaves, iodized salt, matchbox and millet. “Since receiving the food package, we have been eating wholesome meals on a daily basis. My nephew and son-in-law have offered their assistance in preparing the field for millet seed sowing. We now have hope of making money from our agricultural efforts, and I intend to enrol my girls in school,” Seeta concluded.

ⁱ A community-based structure consisting of key community members, both men and women, who coordinate with and support the project team during project interventions. 

ⁱⁱ Humanitarian and recovery support to the vulnerable communities continuously affected by recurrent disasters

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Format: Webinar presentation, discussion
When:  2nd February 2022
Time:  2.00 PM-3:00 PM (Pakistan Standard Time)
Where: Zoom – Link to be shared with registered participants.
Register: here
Language:  English
How long:  60 minutes
For:  Safeguarding focal points, senior managers of national, international and regional NGOs and aid/development networks

Moderator and Trainer:  Ester Dross

Background:

Community World Service Asia (CWSA) is a humanitarian and development organisation registered in Pakistan, addressing factors that divide people by promoting inclusiveness, shared values, diversity, and interdépendance. CWSA is highly committed towards people centered aid and Accountability to Affected People. Over the last two years, we have offered different webinars, covering various aspects on safeguarding and aiming to raise more awareness on key aspects of accountability such as establishing efficient and transparent complaints systems and protection from and prevention of sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment. Safeguarding is a key pillar to any accountability measures that organisations must integrate into their programmes and working cycle.

When people we work with or for feel unsafe within their workspace or global environment, this has critical negative impacts on the quality of our work and the objectives we intend to reach. It is therefore important that we are more aware and increase our efforts for a better understanding of the issues at hand.

This webinar is part of a series of 6 one-hour webinars, covering safeguarding, key policies and minimum requirements, Complaints systems, Complaints handling and managing investigations and communication. The last webinar will be dedicated to experiences sharing and best practices.

We are now reaching the second part of our 6-session series. We spoke generally about safeguarding and how three organisations set up their safeguarding framework, followed by an interactive session where participants explored the key policies and guidelines they need to have in place in terms of safeguarding. The last time we met we spoke more in-depth about complaints systems, the necessary minimum requirements and how to ensure they are appropriate and user-friendly.

Objectives:

During our 4th webinar on the 2nd February 2022, we want to dedicate more time to explore how to manage investigations. If we were successful in setting up our safeguarding processes, if the complaints systems we set up are confidential, trustworthy, accessible and transparent, we should have an increase of complaints as a result. We therefore need excellent processes to handle these complaints and guarantee safe, independent and fair investigation processes.

The webinar today will explore the following topics:

  • The decision making process on external or internal investigation processes
  • How to plan an investigation and manage an investigation team
  • What to communicate around complaints and investigations
  • Taking into account Data safeguarding and protection

Moderator & Presenter:

Ester Dross—Independent Consultant

Ms Dross is an indépendant consultant with over 25 years of expérience, specializing in accountability, prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse, gender and child protection. Ms Dross has had extensive exposure to humanitarian certification systems and accountability to affected populations while working with HAP International as their Complaints Handling and Investigation Advisor, later as their Certification Manager. She has been closely involved in the Building Safer Organisations Project since 2005, dealing with sexual exploitation and abuse of bénéficiaires, particularly focusing on gender and child protection. Over the last 6 years and since working as an independent consultant, Ester has been leading a pilot project for FAO on accountability and gender mainstreaming in emergencies and working with numerous NGOs including ACT Alliance members, supporting and training their staff on gender issues, child

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Applying – Contextualising – Learning Principles, Commitments and Standards through the Project Life in Humanitarian-Development-Peace Contexts

Virtual Workshop

2022 First Semester

Learning Sessions – Coaching Lab – Capitalisation of Experiences

When: Starting February 1st, 2022

Target Audience

  • National organisations first! Gender-sensitive selection.
  • Gender-sensitive selection
  • Both humanitarian and development actors
  • Participants from Asia, MENA Regions

Participants:

  • Aid workers engaged in promoting Quality, AAP and Safeguarding
  • Have interest/ experience in implementing Quality, AAP and Safeguarding approaches and tools, and in managing projects or programmes,
  • Have a ‘good enough’ command of English,
  • Commit to attend all sessions (management endorsement, certificate of attendance).

Aim & Learning Objectives

This virtual workshop aims to gather and learn from committed professional humanitarian and development actors who are leaders in promoting and implementing Quality, AAP and Safeguarding throughout the project/programme cycle, update them on the latest developments and tools, and facilitate contextualisation, localisation and learning for future improvement.

By the end of this event, participants should be able to:

  1. Identify key initiatives and tools contributing to CHS-related topics.
  2. Outline the opportunities and challenges faced by humanitarian and development workers in contextualising and applying collectively principles, commitments and standards throughout the project/programme cycle.
  3. Describe strategies and means by which they and their colleagues can collaborate and coordinate better.
  4. Design an improvement plan on Quality, AAP and Safeguarding tailored to their context and assessed with a Do-no-harm lens

Methodology

  • Five half day online sessions combining plenaries, debates, personal or pair assignments and studies, guided discussions in sub-groups, etc.
  • Coaching sessions to support the design of an improvement plan
  • Improvement plans with monitoring details, and
  • learning follow up through 2022

Shortlisted candidate will be informed through email by January 17, 2022.

Contact us at: qa.support@communityworldservice.asia

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When: 17th -19th February, 2022
Where: Murree, Punjab, Pakistan
Application Deadline: 20th January, 2022.
Register: Click here

Covid-19 has challenged the traditional leadership style and forced leaders to adapt their leadership approaches in dealing with the uncertainties brought about by the virus and its effects. NGO leaders have also been faced with dilemmas and ambiguities that they have never been exposed to.

Leading in Complexity and Uncertainty training will be directed at the senior staff of NGOs. It will use the ‘Authentic Leader’ model and provide opportunities to the participants to reflect on their leadership style and its relevance and effectiveness in the context of Covid-19. It will give them knowledge on leadership competencies based on research with contemporary leaders. They will also have opportunities for practicing and sharpening their personal leadership skills and competencies.

Methodology of this training includes self-reflection and analysis, working with buddies, exercises (but considering social distancing). These will be interspersed with lectures by the external trainer and experience sharing by prominent leaders from the development and corporate sectors. Coaching and mentoring support will be provided to 30% of participant organisations to help them apply their learning.

Objectives

At the end of the training, participants will:

  • Understand the different leadership styles and competencies.
  • Reflect on their leadership style based on their self-assessment and others’ perceptions/feedback.
  • Sharpen/strengthen their leadership competencies.
  • Develop action plans for peer support and coaching/mentoring.

Methodology

The approach used in this training is the ‘Blended Learning’ approach developed by CWSA’s Capacity Enhancement Project (CEP) in its previous phases. The approach is participatory and needs based in nature. It consists of selection of participants from diverse organisations at different levels, content and methodology designed with and based on the needs of the training participants, use of experienced and knowledgeable trainers, flexible content and methodology during the training, development of action plans and follow up refreshers and coaching and mentoring support.

Number of Participants

18-22 participants will be selected for the training. Female staff and those with disabilities and from ethnic/religious minorities are encouraged to apply. Preference will be given to participants from organisations based in underserved areas.

Selection Criteria

  • No previous exposure/participation in leadership training
  • Mid or senior level manager in a civil society organisation, preferably field staff of large CSOs or CSOs with main office in small towns and cities
  • Participants from women led organisations, those of persons with disabilities, religious/ethnic minorities will be preferred
  • Willingness to contribute PKR 20,000 for the training. Discount of 10% will be given on early registration by 15th February 2022 to the participants and 20% discount will be awarded to women participants. Exemptions may be applied for by CSOs with limited funding and those from marginalized groups
  • Commitment to apply learning in their work, including dissemination of learning within their organisation.

Participants will need to arrive at the venue on 16th February 2022.

Training Facilitator

Arif Jabbar Khan, Country Head, Water Aid.

Mr. Arif is the Country head of Water Aid Pakistan. Mr. Khan holds an M.Phil. degree in Public Policy from the National Defense University Islamabad and was awarded with the President’s Gold Medal. He also holds a Master’s Degree in Engineering (Water Resource Development) from the Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkok. Mr. Arif is an Eisenhower Fellow wherein he studied the “Americans with Disabilities Act” during his Fellowship. Mr. Arif is a leadership Coach and is currently coaching a number of staff members in public and private institutions. He was the Chief of Party of USAID Ambassador’s Fund Grant Programme and has served Oxfam International as the Global Head of Humanitarian Campaigns, Regional Humanitarian Coordinator for Southern Africa and East Asia, Country Director in Pakistan and South Africa, in addition to holding other portfolios. He also served as the Country Director, Pakistan with Voluntary Service Overseas –VSO, Regional Grants Manager, Asia with Child fund International, Director Programme Operations, Sri Lanka with Save the Children and Director Operations, Market Development Facility with The Palladium Group.

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When: 14th-16th February 2022
Where: Murree, Punjab
Language: Urdu and English
Interested Applicants: Click here to register
Last Date to Apply: January 31st, 2022

Training Objectives:

The training will focus specifically on developing the ability of participants to:

  • Comprehend concepts and terminologies of Project and Project Cycle Management
  • Recognize various phases of Project Cycle Management and their importance
  • Understand and sharpen their skills to use various analytical tools for Project Identification
  • Learn to use causal hypothesis and Theory of Change for project designing and implementation
  • Understand M&E essentials and learn to plan for monitoring and evaluation at the time of inception of project life cycle
  • Learn to incorporate lessons from similar projects in the designing of new projects

Rationale

The development agenda has been, for long, aimed at improving quality of life of communities. However, projects can fail to meet priority needs of communities and not achieve stated outputs. These failures can be attributed in part to poor project cycle management, such as inadequate opportunities for potential beneficiaries to participate in project identification, weak financial management, inadequate monitoring during implementation, poor linkages between project activities and project purpose, and insufficient attention to the external environment during project design. Projects are more likely to succeed when the socio-economic context in which they operate is taken into considerati9on.

The rationale for imparting training of NGOs in project cycle management to equip development practitioners with the skills and tools to identify projects, recognize roles of different groups, overcome challenges to project management and apply techniques such a logical framework for maximum output. Participants of the training will go through all critical phases of project cycle management both theoretically and practically and there will be ample room through group exercises to benefit from the rich knowledge of participants that they will be bringing from their respective fields and focus areas.

Number of Participants

  • A maximum of 20 participants will be selected for the training. Women, differently abled persons and staff belonging to ethnic/religious minorities are encouraged to apply. Preference will be given to participants representing organizations working in remote and under-served areas.

Selection Criteria

  • Participant’s organization should be registered with its respective provincial Social Welfare Department
  • Participant is mid/senior for program/project manager working in a local/national NGO
  • Participants from women led organisations, different abled persons, religious/ethnic minorities will be given preference
  • Commitment to apply learning in their work, including dissemination of learning within their organisation

Fee Details

Training fee for each participant is PKR 10,000. Fee concessions and scholarships are available for participants belonging marginalised groups and NGOs with limited funding.

Facilitator/Lead Trainer:

Ms. Sofia Noreen is an ambitious professional with over 28 years’ eventful career studded with brilliance predominantly in the area of research, program/ project designing and execution, monitoring, international development, and liaison & coordination. Her areas of focus include Gender and Women Empowerment, Climate Change/ Food Security within rural communities, and Governance issues both at policy and implementation levels. She is a dependable professional with a comprehensive understanding of Pakistani politics, the parliamentary setup, and electoral reform agenda and familiar with election management systems both for general and local bodies elections.

Ms. Sofia has delivered multi-day training programs on train-the-trainer, team building, and other related topics. She is an articulate communicator who is highly well versed in Log Frame Analysis, Risk Analysis, and management for Result Based Management, budgeting, staff recruitment, capacity development, NGO management, stakeholder engagement, evaluation of program and projects, report writing, and manuals. Throughout her career, she has been committed to following the principles set forth with the UDHR, ICCPR, CEDAW, and other international conventions and standards.

Additional Details: The final deadline for applications is January 31, 2022. Please be assured that incomplete applications will not be entertained.

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Community World Service Asia (CWSA) is a humanitarian and development organization, registered in Pakistan, head-quartered in Karachi and implementing initiatives throughout Asia. CWSA is member of the Core Humanitarian Standard (CHS) Alliance, a member of Sphere and their regional partner in Asia and also manages the ADRRN Quality & Accountability Hub in Asia.

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As part of the Quality & Accountability Week 2021,  a webinar titled ‘Key Policies & Minimum Requirements in relation to Safeguarding’, was jointly hosted and organised by ADRRN’s Quality and Accountability (Q&A) Hub, Sphere, CHS Alliance, ACT Alliance, ALNAP and Community World Service Asia (CWSA).

This webinar was the second one of the webinar series on Safeguarding and Complaints Management. Speaking about Safeguarding, Ester Dross, lead facilitator and moderator of the webinar, shared the need to explore and understand essential policies and guidance to establish a safeguarding framework, “The first session was more about general safeguarding, what it is and what it means for organisations to setup safeguarding framework. Today, we will have a concrete and practical discussion on what it means for our organisations when we speak about safeguarding and, what essential policies and guidance we need to have in place to establish a safeguarding framework.”

More than 80 humanitarian and development practitioners participated in this 90-minute webinar that discussed a wide array of diverse expertise and knowledge on safeguarding from all over the region.

Safeguarding, a key responsibility of every organisation

76% of the participants defined safeguarding as an organisation having a set of policies and procedures in place to prevent and protect different stakeholders from sexual exploitation. Abuse and harassment.

“We want to embrace the responsibility of the organisation to ensure that their staff or operations do not harm children or adults. This is really about having policies and procedures in place, from a Code of Conduct to a safe reporting and recruitment mechanism,” said Ester Dross.

While discussing key policies and guiding documents, participants identified policies that are essential for establishing and mainstreaming safeguarding. These included a Code of Conduct, a Safeguarding policy, complaint response mechanisms, HR policy, disciplinary policy, investigation guidelines and a separate safeguarding and code of conduct policy for Persons with Disabilities (PWDs).

Participants discussed and identified key components to improve the safeguarding practices. “It is critical to establish clear definitions of safeguarding and Sexual Exploitation, Abuse and Harassment (SEAH) so that everyone understands what the organisations are talking about when they discuss safeguarding. Safeguarding and other related phrases may have different definitions from one organisation to another or even from one context to another. Certain definitions, such as sexual harassment and safeguarding, must however, be streamlined and thoroughly understood across the organisation. It is also crucial to relate SEAH breaches to contracts and disciplinary actions, as well as to regulate or prohibit sexual relationships with various stakeholders.” Ester further emphasised on humanitarian organisations to ensure effective reporting of any suspicions or incidents and create a safe and SEAH free environment.

28% of the attendees selected ‘Prohibition of sexual relationship with children from a list of rules when asked to identify key behavioural rules that would need to be included in a code of conduct in terms of safeguarding.

Minimum key rules and commitments that organisations require to include in their code of conducts for safeguarding and prevention of sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment to be compliant with UN Secretary General’s bulletin and IASC Inter-Agency Standing Committee’s[1] key commitments on sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment were shared in the webinar:

Sexual exploitation and abuse = Gross misconduct
Sexual activity with children (-18 years) is prohibited
Exchange of money, work, aid, services against sexual favours is prohibited
Sexual relationships between beneficiaries and staff are prohibited

We need to have an effective, accessible, safe & non-retaliation complaints response & recruitment mechanism

Clear definitions on complaints and how to address anonymous complaints are essential to having an effective policy and systems. It is also important to emphasize on maintaining confidentiality and protection and how to deal with whistle-blowers among staff. “Clarity on key commitments such as the procedure of registering and addressing complaints, disciplinary action, appeals process and references and vetting are essential,” said Ester.

Yasir Khan, a participant at the webinar, shared his concern on reporting cases, “Individuals sometimes do not feel safe to report any suspicious case. For this reason, organisations must establish a strong complaint response mechanisms and train staff to come forward through a standardised procedure and report incident witnessed internally or in communities. In addition, proper safeguarding standards should be set within organisations, available in local languages as well, to allow individuals to clearly understand the process and report without any fear or discomfort.”

  • What do we need to include into our recruitment process in terms of safeguarding?
  • What do we need to include into job descriptions in terms of safeguarding?

While addressing these questions, raised by Ester during the webinar, the participants highlighted the need to include equal representation of men and women in the recruitment team and ask questions related to safeguarding during the interviews. Some shared the need to sign an undertaking focused on Safeguarding and commit to maintenance of confidentiality and diversity in recruitment.

“It is important to be precise on who should provide a reference so that one can avoid references from line managers who are your best friends. This will allow organisations to gain useful information on the person they aim to recruit.  Elaborated questionnaires can be sent to references to address some specific questions that takes up more time but prove to be more helpful in recruiting the right person,” shared Ester.

Due to the increase in safeguarding issues, it has been recommended to conduct interviews with people who are providing reference checks. “This can be a good indicator to determine if the applicant being considered will be able to comply with the safeguarding policy and procedures set within the organisation.”

Speaking about inclusion of key points on safeguarding in job descriptions, participants shared, “It is important to remind people, even at the level of announcing new positions, that there is zero tolerance on SEAH. In addition, commitment to maintaining confidentiality can be added in the contracts. An individual can be given a role to act as the focal person on Safeguarding in the organisation, who will be responsible to orient staff, promote the policy and ensure proper implementation of the procedures and guidelines established.”

Another point raised was to add the commitment to maintain safeguarding norms, especially for staff with specialised responsibility or who work with vulnerable individuals. Moreover, the job description can guarantee that disciplinary action is included in the event of a breach.

Ester shared an anonymous action plan from an organisation, which contained activities to improve the organisational culture and put safeguarding at the centre of everything. “An action plan will attempt to provide a safe environment for the children, youth, and families with whom organisations engage with, as well as employees and partners.”

“Working with children and young adults may be quite gratifying. However, it also entails a significant amount of responsibility. One of the most crucial components of this responsibility is your duty to keep individuals under your care safe. Having a solid safeguarding policy in place is the ideal method to guarantee that personnel have the information and skills required to offer a service that safeguards all stakeholders involved in humanitarian work,” Ester concluded.

1. https://interagencystandingcommittee.org/

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