May 2024 Community Gathering with Stopping As Success
Michael, Grace, and the rest of the SAS+ team
This month we were joined by the fantastic Grace Boone and Michael Robinson from Stopping As Success: Locally Led Transitions in Development (SAS+) , which is a global consortium of organizations that were brought together by a common belief in local leadership. From 2017-2020, Stopping As Success developed case studies, tools, and partnerships to facilitate transitions to local leadership, and from 2021-2024, they (as SAS+) leveraged these tools to accompany a dozen of their partners in the hands-on process of transition. These accompaniments led to a refinement of the resources and tools that is presently in its final stages, as SAS+wraps up their publications and winds down operations to a close in April 2025..
On May 24, 2024, Michael and Grace joined a small and engaged group of CoP members to talk about their work and share some of their learnings. Read on to learn more about what we discussed!
The Importance of Incentives In Transitions
“International NGOs are not incentivized to transition.” Grace and Michael made this point at the beginning of the session and continued to return to it during the hour and a half gathering. An important aspect of their organization’s work has been to explore the push and pull factors that lead international non-governmental organizations and their local partners to embark on the transition path.
In their experience, transitions are usually initiated by the INGO in the midst o a politically-motivated funding shift. For example, USAID has se ta goal to transition 25% of their funded projects to local leadership by the end of 2025. As such, Stopping As Success (itself a USAID-funded project) has a keen focus on guiding INGOs towards the most responsible ways to empower their local teams to step up to the challenge of taking over local offices or spinning out initiatives into their own entities. As Michael stated, “Power is so essential to these conversations.” By which he means, who has it and how can SAS —- and other likeminded organizations —- prod them to release it to those who are closest to the problem? As we continue to see foundations grapple with the same questions, the conversation is a timely one with broad relevance throughout civic society.
Transitions Require Shared Language
Though many of their resources emphasize the importance of “responsible transitions”, Michael and Grace were quick to highlight the importance of making sure everyone was on the same page about what terms like “responsible” “transition” even mean, To that end they provide a transition plan template to help all parties come to the table. The planning effort helps all parties craft a bespoke and appropriate vision for what their own shift from INGO to local power will look like and how they can do their best to honor each other and themselves in the process. As Grace noted, “People have different definitions of transition .How do you contextualize this and get buy-in? And how can the transition process move beyond just a discreet project aim?”
In some cases, INGO-funded projects have developed enough of a presence on the ground to feel a sense of readiness to go it alone. They point to Talking Drum Studio as one such example. As a highly-visible producer of innovative radio and television programs in the former conflict zones of Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Nigeria, TDS had much more name-recognition than the INGO that it had emerged from (MIchael’s organization Search For Common Ground.) So when time came for it to transition to operating independently, they knew that their name held valuable cache’ that would enable them to pursue the sort of of funding and relationships that would help them land on their feet. However, In other cases, local teams may have less of a sense of what they will need to do or be in order to manager their own affairs. The prospect of life without the expertise and connections provided by the prominent and well-funded INGO, can elicit quite a bit of trepidation!
In the face of such concern, SAS stresses the importance not only of transition planning and visioning, but also capacity-strengthening. Capacity strengthening (also known as capacity building or capacity development) is a term used throughout the INGO world to describe the work of enabling people and groups to successfully handle their own affairs. In the case of transitions from international to local, capacity strengthening may mean learning how to manage budgets, developing fundraising skills, fostering new partnerships, or developing a staffing plan. However, what remains most important is for the local group to define its own vision of the potential new local organization and feel confident stepping into leadership.
“People have different definitions of transition. How do you contextualize this and get buy-in? And how can the transition process move beyond just a discreet project aim?”
Capacity-Strengthening Is Omnidirectional
SAS hastens to state that their vision of capacity strengthening is rooted in reimagining the INGO to local organization dynamic. As Michael emphasizes, “Capacity strengthening can be very ineffective as a one-way street.” As such, they prescribe a process of mutual capacity strengthening, in which all parties bring their unique abilities and knowledges to the table. While the INGO can help the local organizers navigate the wilds of the NGO world, the local groups always have much to share about how and where the work is down and what can be down better/more effectively. For example, as part of the staged transfer process from INGO Nuru International Nuru Kenya, the Kenyan team was able to provide feedback to the international organization about how the transition was going and what changes they’d like to see moving forward.
In addition, shifts in power and ownership can also benefit from local-to-local capacity building work. Such was the case when Talking Drum Studio Liberia reached out to BRIDGE, a Georgian organization that had spun out of INGO Oxfam. Peer to peer learning can be a critical — and critically non-hierarchical!— way for knowledge and skills to be share.
The Transition Space Still Needs Endings
As a community of practice focused on hospicing and endings, we (of course!) had to ask how Stopping As Success views successful closures. The sad news was that they unfortunately didn’t delve into cases where local groups chose to close down operations rather than continue operations as a stand-alone entity. The good news is that Michael and Grace are keen to keep joining our gatherings and exploring how they can apply what is being shared to a broader understanding of how to foster mutual success even when operations shut down.
Thanks again to Michael and Grace for joining us for another wonderful session! You can check out the calendar for upcoming CoP gatherings here.