The 3 days Caritas Internationalis Management Standards  (CI MS) assessors’ training workshop was held at Nairobi, Kenya from 19th to 21st June 2019. It was attended by 15 participants from 4 continents representing 5 Caritas Regions and  12 countries. Caritas Arica was the host organisation under the leadership of Mr.Albert Mashika, Caritas Africa Regional Co-ordinator and facilitated by Ms.Moira  Monacelli and Ms.Annamaria from Caritas Internationalis ICDS Department. Caritas India was represented by Dr.John Arokiaraj who has been inducted into the panel of CI MS assessors.

During the inaugural session, Mr.Albert underscored the significance of CI MS that aim at promoting the identity of Caritas and professionalism in the service of love. In her opening remarks, Ms.Moira emphasized the significance of this training and CI MS as a whole. She noted that the first 4 years have produced good results having assessed 60 Member Organisations (MOs).

The overall purpose of the training was to enhance the knowledge about the newly revised CI MS tool that will be able to effectively carry out an assessment process taking into account the context of the MOs being assessed. The other objectives being acquiring knowledge on CST and link with CI MS, understand the scope of work and attitude for assessors and understand how to implement the tools. The workshop was an opportunity for the participant assessors to get acquainted with the harmonised assessment tool through collective sharing, learning, exploring, reflecting and improving.

The underlying values of CI MS, CST, care for creation, stewardship, cross-cultural diversity, and encounter were discussed in the interactive sessions intending to improve MOs capacity and not to judge them.

For the assessors, the common unifying factor is the understanding that Caritas method of work is to animate and strengthen the Confederation through observing, learning and discerning. It becomes imperative to acquire knowledge on internal and external factors of influence, organizational structure and culture, Church leadership and Socio-political-economic-religious context.

Internal factors likely to influence the process are identified as an inadequate understanding of the CI MS, quality commitment to vision of CI MS, bureaucracy/protocol, different levels of development, unclear structures and roles of MOs, sugar coating, lack of engagement by board, language limitations. Insecurity, political and religious restrictions, emergencies and logistical challenges are found to be some of the external factors. CI MS analyses MOs at three levels; policy (board, committees, etc.); strategic (management); and technical/operational (projects, finance, etc.)

Having two Parables of the Sower and House on the rock as case studies, the participants discussed how they are inspired by the Scriptures and according to their knowledge and experiences how they link the Parables to their role and mandate as assessors and the key values linked to their role beyond these Parables. This exercise enabled to brainstorm on factors contributing to value addition while linking the assessment to Caritas founding values and mandate of assessor vis-a- vis challenges.

Strategy, structure, systems, style, staff and skills, all contributing to and deriving from shared values were discussed as key elements of an organization and there is a need for an assessor to understand them at the backdrop of organizational culture and adapting to the culture. The term culture under discussion included: power relations centred on an individual or leader, staff relations, gender relations, action-oriented behavior, how freedom is provided in decision making, employee commitments and clan culture in organizations.

In order to be effective, an assessor is expected to read about the Country context, get information on the Caritas history and be in contact with the regional/zonal coordinator, the country’s development trends and critically study the documents to see if they contextually represent the values of the Church. As assessor is the mirror for the organization, he/she must be aware and more objective not to be influenced.

Organizational Review Tool (ORT) is a simplified and harmonized tool (Synchronisation of existing tools of CAFOD, Caritas Australia, Cordaid, CRS, Trocaire)  that focuses on risk analysis, prioritization, sensitivity for contextualisation, evidence-based data and having all external assessments on-site for going beyond document evidences.

CI MS permanent tool for the confederation from 2019 comprises of  4 standards namely Laws and Ethical Codes, Governance and Organisation, Programme and Finance Accountability, Stakeholder Involvement, 8 articles namely Catholic Identity ,  Law of the Land, Ethics and Staff conduct , Constitution, Governance Structure,   Auditing and Safeguarding  and  74 statements or good practices. In the ORT, scoring guidelines are simplified and so also the accountability framework which is obligatory. The documents received for external assessment are Organisational Assessment Tool, Accountability Framework in PDF format and 4 management standards.

Involvement of  Caritas Regions is enhanced by entrusting them with responsibilities of identification of the most fragile MOs, identifying assessors, training of trainer for coordinators, follow up of the improvement plans, creation of IDCS regional groups. Accompaniment needs to be prioritised for MOs who ask for it with tailored measures and also giving special attention to the MOs not yet “on board”

Assessors gained clarity on the 4 types of data analysis viz, descriptive, diagnostic, predictive and prescriptive. This helps in capturing the complexity of the information for structuring them into data/results that will lead the MO to a decision-making process especially when developing the improvement plan. It obliges assessors to take into consideration the global picture (internal and external) and the context the MO is functioning. Going beyond the checking of the existence of the documents and helping MOs to realize the gaps in communicating, updating, revising, sensitizing and applying the documents, will help the MOs to be more effective and sustainable organizations.

It was concluded that  CI MS assessor is a person who is an expert in the organizational functioning and who is asked to advise on the performance of the assessed Caritas. The assessor is expected to have an in-depth understanding of the specific assessment area, specific skills, competencies, and experience in providing the assessment and also highlighting the potential consequences/social values of the interpretation and use of the results for the MO thus ensuring that assessment is appropriate, ethical and safe. With this background, the Code of Practice was discussed in detail to support professionally responsible and ethical assessment practice and to guide the CI MS assessors to fulfill their mandate. The code reinforces the performance outcomes of the assessment undertaken.