To be sustainable, development initiatives depend fundamentally on solutions being locally appropriate and strongly owned by those affected.  For at least these reasons of effectiveness and sustainability therefore, we regard meaningful participation of key stakeholders as essential, to the extent possible.  Properly managed, meaningful participation also creates important invisible products of trust, understanding, synergy and pre-coordination.  These unseen benefits are crucial to conflict transformation and important to effective implementation.

In addressing complex issues it is all too easy to lose the way.  In order for people to stay effectively engaged, we set out to establish and maintain a clear, transparent and shared focus to the work, with periodic checks on progress, means-to-ends and how each piece of work is contributing to achieving the desired outcomes.

Formulate, Act, Monitor, Reflect, Learn, Reformulate (repeat cycle)…  This approach we find most effective for creativity and where developmental initiatives are breaking new ground - as so often they are - or where there is pressure to take action before all the circumstances can be known.  It requires the development of an effective monitoring framework and the establishment of a “gain not blame” culture so as to create a “safe learning environment”.

In any tasks we undertake, we believe in transferring relevant knowledge and skills as much as possible with and between those with whom we work.  Thus we build capacity and transfer ownership so that the task can be continued or repeated with a progressively reducing need for our own direct involvement.

Communication and learning lie at the heart of our work.  Through fully participative, inclusive and deliberative approaches that build mutual learning and shared understanding, we avoid one person’s solution becoming the next person’s problem.

Those who commission us, whose perspective is key, are kept central to the team effort. In this sense we see our client’s commitment and involvement as fundamental to success.