Good aid has five characteristics. Let’s talk about those:
1) Starts and ends with the needs of those affected by poverty, disaster, and conflict (a.k.a. “the poor”, “aid recipients”, “program participants”, “beneficiaries”…). Some might want to articulate this point as aid needs to be demand driven, rather than supply driven. How we think about aid – how we rationalize it, how emotionally and intellectually honest we are about why we do it, and why we do it the way we do it – matters. But if we’re to do it right, if we’re to plan and implement good aid, our starting point needs to be those whom we seek to serve. If that starting point is anything else (for example, the needs of a particular donor, surplus of something…) then a recipe for bad aid has already been started.
2) Follows good process. To put it very simply, you start with what the need is, define the most logical good solution, implement that solution, and evaluate your program or project against what you defined as the need. Some call this Project Cycle Management (PCM) (See also) Of course in actual practice there is a lot that goes into each of those steps. Knowing what the need is requires commitment and follow-through on assessments.
Defining the most logical good solution can require an amazing amount of organizational honesty and discipline – especially when an organization has defined it’s focus, capacity or “niche” very specifically. One of the most common mistakes which leads to bad aid is when an oranization, project or individual defines the solution in terms of what they have to offer, rather than in terms of what the most logical solution is. (I call this the “solutions in search of problems” approach.)
Evaluation, like assessment, is very often glossed over. Amateurs typically focus on implementation (and of course good implementation is critical), but implementation outside of the context of overall good process is meaningless.
3) Is evidence-based: Digging a little deeper into the assessment, planning, and evaluation steps of PCM, it is absolutely critical that assessments be done properly (see Texas In Africa’s outstanding series on how social scientists think – assessments are more than just asking a few villagers what they want). If you don’t understand clearly both the issue (problem) that you’re trying to address, you can’t design a workable response, and at the end you can’t know if you’ve been successful.
Yet in my experience, this is the single most common downfall of small startup NGOs/projects and amateurs: skimping on assessments and evaluations, or simply not doing them at all. This is partially because those things require specialized skills, resources and organizational bandwidth. Sometimes where an organization or project defines it’s “product” very specifically (volunteer teams, 1,000,000 T-shirts, shoes, etc.), there is little point in doing either assessments, planning, or evaluation because the implementors already know what they’re going to do.
Good aid will be disciplined enough to go through the process of collecting and analyzing evidence, and then basing action on need, not on the surplus of a particular resource.
4) Tool-box approach: Expanding the above point with respect to action/programming, good aid will approach available resources as “tools” inside a “tool-box.” Which is to say that good aid will select the right tool for the job. Bad aid, by contrast, typically uses backward logic by selecting the tool (action, program…) in advance of having evidence.
Where an organization or project has only a few tools in it’s box, it can take real organizational discipline to say “no” to programming. Again, this is a very common mistake of small startups and amateurs: the desperate desire to act (or the real, survival need for resources) drive many to try to operate outside of their actual capacity or expertise – sort of like using a screwdriver to pound nails.
5) Learns lessons-learned: While humanitarian aid and development are not as old as other fields (accounting or urban-planning), there is already a substantial body of experience and lessons-learned. Good aid does not repeat the mistakes of the past. While this sounds simple, in my experience this also can require an amazing level of organizational discipline (organizational discipline is a common theme…), particularly (again) where an organization is founded on the premise of a specific kind of activity, particularly where that activity contravenes known best-practices. The existence still of foreign-run “orphanages” across the Third World are but one outstanding example in real-life.
Learning the lessons-learned also requires that an individual, project or startup NGO be aware of the history, be looped into the overall aid conversation, be current with industry thinking. This, also, requires organizational bandwidth and (wait for it…) discipline. It requires that people prioritize thinking and learning along with doing. It requires that organizations dedicate resources towards participating in learning events (sometimes feel like HRI-style “life-saving meetings”). It requires participation in coordination specifically, and generally being part of the larger community of practice overall. While few people would argue against learning the lessons learned in principle, in actual practice the realities of tight budgets, scarce resources, and staff already working 18-hour days frequently mean that the lessons learned do not get learned. And the result is frequently that while as an industry we know what to do and how to do it, many individual entities within the industry don’t.
Note: But what about “Local”? I know that some of you are already itching to fill my comments thread with hate-mail because I didn’t include something about “local knowledge” or “local NGOs” as one of the five characteristics of good aid. There are two main reasons why I did not:
- “Local” is a cross-cutting issue: In my direct experience in almost two decades of practice, getting the above five things right invariably means involving local… people, organizations, partnerships, knowledge, etc. When the above five things are done properly (really done properly), “local” happens organically.
- “Local” is not a magik bullet: The above five apply equally to “local.” And in my experience, local NGOs are just as prone as INGOs, local staff just as likely as expats, to get the above wrong. (see also: here) The concepts of needs-based logic, good process, evidence-based action, picking the right tool for the job, and learning from past experience are as important (and as easy to get wrong) for local NGOs as for INGOs.
The Red Cross has something called the Better Programming Initiative (BPI)…born out of the Do No Harm but taking it a bit further. Looks and connectors and dividers primarily within a community. Fits well within the ‘assessment’ category—actually UNDERSTAND what is going on…ie’ analyze. And write it down so that people know where you are coming from (not just the affected population but colleagues, donors, etc).
And, World Vision (I know…I’m amazed too), but they have this FANTASTIC tool on APPLICATION of lessons learned….and doing it as a team, at the start, during and end of responses…I can’t recall what it’s called now, but I bet you can google it…and get this: they are happy to share the tool…and it’s a good one.
Phasing is a huge pet peeve of mine by the way….I’m going to (with the oh so copious time I have I on my hands) look into designing an indicator based system…we need to take into account CONCURRENT needs and respond to those…not to our artificial timelines…(it’s relief…look, now it’s recovery!).
Thanks for this….enjoyed.
Nice work, I’ll be sharing this one around. Interestingly, I think what you identify here are pretty much the same factors that make any community development project effective, whether international or domestic. Now I’m back to working mostly here in NZ I realise that pretty much the same range of issues arise here… And pretty much the same principles and practices are needed to avoid them. I’ve been known as the ‘process’ nag in most of the organisations I’ve ever worked in, and I now wear the title with pride!
@Zehra – Sure enough, many of the large NGOs as well as some smaller ones, develop their own, organization-specific paradigms and tools. DNH, LCP, CS, Hearth, BPI… As I see it, nearly all of these fall either into the assessment/evaluation part of PCM (‘knowing what’s going on’ is putting it very well), and more broadly into what I’d call “tool box.”
Thanks for reading!
@Marianne – I’ve certainly done my share of whinging about ‘process’ on this blog, but to clarify, that was all directed towards internal NGO bureaucratic processes.
But in terms of good development process, being the “process nag” is a compliment indeed. Good aid and good development never happen by accident.
And I think you’re absolutely correct: exactly the same issues apply, whether one is trying to work internationally, cross-culturally, or in one’s one neighborhood at home.
J
Excellent list – almost surprised there is not more controversy in the comments.
A couple of things I’d add to the list:
1. Effectively navigates local issues – here I mean not only local partners, but also taking account of, and working through (or around) local culture, politics and power relations. Having evidence-based programmes that don’t take into account, how to get people with power let you do what you want to do or better even support it is an essential element of getting things done.
2. Sustainability – buzz word I know, but what I mean here is having some form of thinking about an exit plan – what happens when the external resources disappear, will it be either no longer needed, or will it be picked up by government communities or local NGOs and does the project pave the way for this to happen.
I’d agree with Ian’s additions.
Of the original list, however, I detect a slight contradiction. That is to say we need items 2-5 because we never really get (1) absolutely right. Let me explain some more …
Most poor peoples’ horizons are not broad enough to fully understand what would most benefit them (especially when looking longer term). So we have to help them through that decision making process, but in doing so it is next to impossible to separate out our own motives and goals, and we end up guiding them to choose whatever it is we can offer. (Many poor people have also realised this is the best way to get a project, even if it belongs firmly in the bad aid bin.) Thus our need for good process etc. to help us disentangle what is needed from our preconceptions and prejudices.
However, we should also not forget the benefit of experimentation. A subject for a forthcoming post of my own …
Thank you.
Timely…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/nov/16/haiti-aid-ngo
damn good analysis. period.
I agree with @Ian’s addition, especially the whole issue around an exit plan, it should be part of any strategy form day one. Almost have clear goals and marks that indicate the program is reaching its goal and it’s time to start thinking about wrapping up. too often the implementors have no desire to reach this point.
the second comment is just a highlight of something you said in your original list (which goes back to overhead costs, and how someone needs to talk with donors about this). Training and workshops are almost looked down as a waste of time and money.
Thanks a lot, I learned a lot from these posts. What would you consider a complete, self-critical, useful monitoring and evaluation form to apply once projects are implemented? Thanks again.