Organisational Review of SOS Children’s Villages Norway

Executive Summary

This review of SOS Children's Villages Norway, commissioned by the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad), examines the organisation's performance as a development actor, with a focus on:

• Cost-effectiveness in the use of funds
• Coherence with Norwegian development policy priorities
• Relevance for partners
• Ability to achieve its own objectives

According to the Terms of Reference, the review shall assess SOS Norway's technical, financial and administrative capacity - in cooperation with local partners in the South - to carry out the agreed programmes and achieve planned objectives.

In assessing SOS Norway's performance it must be taken into account that it is a member of the international umbrella organisation SOS Kinderdorf International (KDI). It works closely with SOS-KDI in order to achieve global strategic objectives. The overall objective for the period 2009-2016 is to enable one million children to grow up in a caring family. This review focuses on the Family Strengthening approach, i.e. the preventive outreach activities of the organisation, and not on the Villages as such.

A review of SOS Children's Villages Norway was carried out at the end of 2003 (COWI 2004). Findings and conclusions from the COWI report have to some extent been used as a basis for assessment in this review.

The team has collected information through qualitative interviews with members of different SOS offices and other stakeholders, and an analysis of relevant documents. The team also went on a field visit to Zambia in order to meet one of SOS Norway's partner associations, and to look at a Family Strengthening Programme.

The overall conclusion of the review is positive. Promising developments identified in the COWI report have continued, particularly in terms of creating a more integrated approach to the organisation's traditional and new areas of intervention. However, there is still much to be done in certain areas, and many challenges to overcome. Below three main conclusions are presented, building on the key words Transition, Relevance and Capacity. Some main findings to illustrate these are also included. The conclusions and findings relate to the international organisation as a whole, with a focus on challenges in the years to come, while the recommendations concentrate on SOS Norway.

Transition: SOS Children's Villages is going through a transition phase. The team finds that the organisation is "on the right track" to become what it aims at. However, it must consolidate its new role in order to successfully implement its ambitious strategies.

• SOS Children's Villages is in a transition in terms of scaling up its work on prevention of child abandonment, changing its character from being primarily a welfare organisation to working more with development issues, and is increasingly applying a strategic and programmatic approach to its work.
• SOS Norway has played a central role in this transition process. It has a strong voice in the KDI system, and is perceived as a constructive "driving force."
• While SOS Children's Villages' arguments for taking an increasingly holistic approach to the prevention of child abandonment are valid, it runs the risk of loosing its niche position as an organisation. A challenge is also to ensure sufficient quality of interventions in new thematic areas in order to achieve positive and sustainable impact on the target group

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Relevance: SOS Children's Villages' objectives and work related to improving lives of orphans and vulnerable children are relevant for communities in which it operates. SOS Norway can do more to provide relevant added value to SOS partners at country level.

• SOS Children's Villages is becoming a more open organisation internally and externally. As a result of this, it is also gaining more relevance, both for the countries and communities in which its programmes are implemented, and as a partner for public donors like Norad.
• The target group, orphans and children at risk of losing their families, is what primarily defines the organisation's identity, purpose, and core competence. SOS Children's Villages clearly reaches a large number of these children with its interventions worldwide. However, it has a potential to play a more important role in advocating for the rights of these children at country level.
• SOS Norway has increased its ability to provide added value to the Norad funded programmes by recruiting more technical staff. There seems, however, to be a potential for defining this added value more clearly in dialogue with KDI and local SOS partners in order to ensure relevance, and to avoid duplication.

Capacity: SOS Children's Villages as a whole has a considerable capacity administratively and in terms of financial and human resources. The ability to reach its ambitious objectives will depend on the strategic allocation of these resources.

• SOS Children's Villages has a considerable funding base, and professional administrative management. There are global minimum financial standards in place which are regularly monitored. The prevention of corruption and fraud remains a challenge, and is increasingly being addressed in the organisation.
• In order to operationalise and implement the ambitious new strategy, numerous policies, tools and guidelines are developed. A challenge for the "SOS family" will be to create local ownership and build the necessary competence at country level in order to put these into use.
• Among the main challenges in terms of cost-effectiveness are: Balancing quality and quantity, prioritising according to goals, and rationalising human resources both at implementation level, in SOS KDI and between SOS Norway and KDI.