Civil Society Capability strengthening
Since its inception FCS has been a core- organization for strengthening civil society in Tanzania with over 5000 Civil society organizations (CSOs) already supported, particularly the grassroots CSOs. Depending on social dynamics and the availability of resources, capacity strengthening efforts have varied broadly. In the early years, FCS used to support the registration and institutionalization of CSOs, later strengthening of netting and networking of CSOs including regional, district and thematic networks. From 2016-to 2020, FCS focused more on three dimensions – civil society’s capacity to do, to be and to relate. In doing so FCS wants to see that people, organizations and society as a whole strengthen and maintain capacity over time, in order to achieve development results.
In the 2022-2026 strategic period, FCS has embedded partner capability strengthening within grants. In this new capacity strengthening approach, partners who will be recruited by FCS to be provided with grants are given more responsibilities in managing the capacity development process of their organizations. This is different from the previous strategy whereby FCS had a specific department managing capacity development for CSOs. Therefore, partners who will be recruited by FCS to be provided with grants will be allowed to allocate up to 10 per cent of their approved budgets for their institutional strengthening efforts. The aim is to enhance ownership of the capacity strengthening process by the partners, in addition, to ensuring sustainability and efficiency of the programme.
FCS has designed its programme to ensure that the supported organizations are constantly capacitated to deliver to the expected results and document them accordingly to ensure that evidence of the successes achieved is shared. Our capacity-building programme seeks to achieve its outcome through the three interrelated and interconnected pathways.
- Capacity TO BE which relates to institutional strengthening: improving organizational internal performance through strategies, plans, rules and regulations, legal frameworks, partnerships, leadership, organizational politics and power structures, as well as strengthening organizational systems, processes, roles and responsibilities, sustainability, marketing and communication strategies, change management and resilience capabilities
- Capacity TO DO which entails the capacity to implement FCS funded programme/project: entailing technical capacities in managing FCS thematic projects based on specific thematic areas e.g. social inclusion, peacebuilding, livelihood PETS/SAM as well as functional capacities related to overall planning, budgeting, financial analysis, monitoring and evaluations, strategy formulation and communications, local resource mobilization, mobilizing support. Cluster leads will be responsible for managing the technical capacities of their members. they will be required to use a wide range of methodologies such as skills training sessions, mentorship and coaching trajectories, exchange visits and study tours, reflections sessions and learning as well as peer learning sessions.
- Capacity TO RELATE which entails capacity at enabling environment level: including building partnerships with development actors namely: -local communities, other CSOs, government, as well as the private sector. In addition to the capacity to manage policy and legislative environment, social-cultural aspects in a coherent and mutually reinforcing fashion.