Caritas India as a learning organization, continues to learn and provides techno-managerial support to Regional Fora and Diocesan Partners in the fields of development, humanitarian response, and Disaster Risk Reduction. Development and humanitarian work take place in increasingly complex environments with growing numbers of people in need. Resources are not sufficient to meet the needs and donors require measurable results, accountability, and indicators of efficiency and effectiveness of project interventions.

A variety of uncertainties are challenging development interventions daily. The necessity and demand for increased effectiveness and efficiency are greater than ever. The outcomes of development interventions are not pre-determined; they are uncertain. It has become increasingly difficult for development organizations to define the optimum pathway toward the desired development results.

With the aim of building local leadership, Caritas India has been implementing the Capacity Assessment and Enhancement Programme is designing improvement plans based on the partner’s need. In this regard, Caritas India conducted a 4-day training session on Management Standards and System Strengthening for 11 partners from Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, and Delhi from 6th to 9th June at Ranchi, Jharkhand. Under Knowledge Repository for Action and Learning, Caritas India conducted this programme supported by Caritas Australia. The training focussed on Caritas Internationalis Management Standards that included Laws and Ethical Codes, Governance and Organisation, Programme and Finance Accountability and Stakeholder Involvement.

The participants came up with the expectation to learn how to work efficiently in the organization, understand different types of Management Systems, dynamics to strengthen partnership, effective leadership, details of relevant documents required in an organization, and gain knowledge in fulfilling legal compliances.

The training sessions broadly discussed the key elements of an organization, culture, significance of maintaining objectivity, overview of assessment including Standards, Articles and Good Practices, mandatory articles, documents and tools required for compliance, accountability framework, internal and external evaluation, and developing improvement plans. It was a learning process that helped partners collectively discuss and learn how to enhance professional competence and serve as a link between donor partners and the wider community to strengthen fraternal cooperation and learn various steps in the assessment process.

“It is very important that an organization has a risk analysis system, properly updated documents, and policies in place to raise the standard of an organization,” said Fr. Bipin Pani, Jharkhand Forum Director. Fr. Abin, Director of Deepti Foundation appreciated that effort and said, “It was a great opportunity of learning and comprehensively organizing documents in the organization.”

Fr. Benedict said that he was able to understand the organizational systems in detail and how they function. He also thanked the Caritas India team for conducting the immensely helpful training and said that there is a lot of scope for improvement in bettering the organizational systems and maintaining good documentation at the organization level.

The expected outcome of the training was to develop partners’ capacity to assess internal and external risks that may be preventing them from achieving organizational goals. This self-assessment calls for objectivity which needs to be done meticulously and periodically. Preparing an improvement plan based on the CIMS scoring and ensuring measures are in place to reduce these risks. This was well achieved with the support of Dr. John Arokiaraj (Thematic Lead in Caritas India and Caritas Internationalis Management Standards Assessor) who facilitated the entire session with practical examples and individual and group exercises that helped understand the concepts with clarity.

In addition to CIMS, Dr.John also took a session on Results Based Management explaining various terminologies, project components, and establishing a logical sequence to predefine realistic and achievable results based on appropriate analysis. Newly appointed Diocesan Directors found this session very useful particularly the involvement of stakeholders in project designing and incorporating monitoring and sustainability mechanisms.

As a follow-up of this training, each partner would be individually visited by the Caritas India team to support the self-assessment of the respective organizations and tailor improvement plans based on the individual needs and requirements.

The training session coordinated by Armstrong and Monisha was duly supported by Caritas India Ranchi Team headed by Nikhil Sanga and Erose Kujur. It was virtually inaugurated by Caritas India Administrator, Fr. Sushil Modi and context setting was shared by Ms. Babita Pinto while the vote of thanks was proposed by Fr. Bipin Pani, Director of Forum, SIGN and Erose Kujur.