This is what 3,000 local partners of International NGOs think…

Natalia photoAfter almost four years, 62 participating international NGOs and over 3,000 responses from local partners to our Development Partnerships Survey, Keystone is proud to present a short report (it’s only 8 pages long!) on what we are learning so far.

The headlines are:

  1. Financial support is well administrated by INGOs, but often conditions are too restrictive from the point of view of partners.
  2. INGOs offer a lot of non-financial support to their partners, in a wide array of areas ranging from capacity building in monitoring and evaluation to insight and advice about the sector of work. While partners consistently ask for more non-financial support, they tend to find little value in the support currently provided by the INGOs.
  3. Monitoring and evaluation carried for and with the INGO is seen as very helpful by partners. It is still however, a one-way street of reporting from the partner to the INGO without a real feedback loop.
  4. INGOs are perceived as knowledgeable and understanding in their relationships with local partners. Yet, relationships remain marked by a lack of accountability from the INGOS to the partners.
  5. Overall, partners consider that the INGOs add value and contribute significantly to their work, but feel that they should play a less protagonistic role in the field.

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Our data shows that the Development Partnerships Survey is a great way for INGOs to listen to their local partners. Both surveyed partners and commissioning INGOs express high satisfaction levels with it. The Development Partnerships Survey is a vehicle for local partners to provide feedback to INGOs about their relationship with them. It uses an anonymous, standardised questionnaire to collect partners’ perceptions and uses the power of benchmarking in order to provide INGOs with rigorous and actionable data.

Contact us to learn more about it.

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