Organisational Development Review of the programme supported by Norwegian Red Cross and Swedish Red Cross 2006 – 2011

Background:
Due to the Israeli occupation and its ramifications the social and humanitarian needs of the population have augmented. To address this situation, PRCS has expanded its programs and services. To ensure that PRCS is achieving its mission, its organizational capacity has become crucial in order to manage efficiently its expanded operations. Specific to Palestine – because of the many restrictions on the freedom of movement imposed on the population - is the need for a decentralized response and therefore strengthening of PRCS’ local branches including human and material resources.

The Organizational Development program has since sought to build PRCS’ capacities, namely branches, leadership, finance, IT, and planning systems. Recently the PRCS, supported by Norwegian Red Cross, has embarked on an internal restructuring process, the ultimate goal of which is to provide those in need with better services. A number of policies and internal guidelines, were developed and adopted herein finance and administrative procedures and regulations on staff recruitment and branches' management. PRCS strategic plan 2005-2010 was reviewed and strategic directions for 2009-2011 have focused on the need for social mobilization and increasing local communities’ capacities with a particular attention to translating policies into action.

Purpose/objective:
This review aimed to assess to what extent the Norwegian Red Cross’ (RC) support PRCS organizational development processes has been conducive to increasing the capacity to assist vulnerable groups in Palestine.

Moreover, it sought to identify what has worked well, what can be improved and provide baseline data for discussions around future support and direction of the OD program.

Methodology:
This report reflects a combination of methods including desk literature, stakeholder interviews and focus groups discussions with PRCS staff and partner organizations. The combination of methods provided the assessment team with a good understanding of the situation.

Meanwhile, the evaluation also has some short-comings. First, strategic plans, logical frameworks (including indicators) and plans of action covering the period from 2009 were revised over the program implementation period. Hence, to some extent, objectives and indicators were changed and that timeframes were inconsistent and overlapping. Second, verification/cross-checking of findings have only been possible to a limited extent. The review team visited one branch only, Jerusalem, partly due to the limited period available for the review. PRCS Gaza and PRCS Lebanon were not visited. Several essential documents were not available in advance of the visit to the National Society. The reports provided to the review team were also limited.

Key findings:
-   PRCS has over many years developed the organisation to further enhance the ability to respond efficiently to the needs of the Palestinian population. Although the difficulty of verifying concrete results, the review team has the clear impression that milestones are reached and that the ongoing development processes will bring PRCS further on the road to fulfil the OD Strategy programme goal.

-   In unstable contexts, such as Palestine, achieving measurable results of OD change processes often takes more time than expected as responding to the day-to-day situation requires the full attention. It is obvious that PRCS and the Norwegian RC were far too ambitious in 2006. The expected results identified were unrealistic to achieve within the set timeframe even if professional competence to support the process had been put in place. However, the fact that necessary system development actions identified at that time are still not implemented in 2011 is not acceptable. For future possible cooperation the review team will emphasize the need for PRCS to strengthen the commitment in order to ensure implementation according to realistic plans.

-   In 2010 Ernst & Young was contracted for conducting a system audit targeting the Finance and the Administration Departments. The system audit report is not shared with the Norwegian RC, as PRCS regards the results as being internal. According to the information given to the review team, based on the audit results PRCS was in the process of developing and/or revising administration and finance procedures, manuals and guidelines, as well as revising the job descriptions for the two departments. The work was expected to be finalized by the end of November 2011.

-   The review team was provided no examples of systematic monitoring even though a revision and evaluation of current monitoring system was included in the logical framework for 2009. It seems that top management representatives have conducted monitoring visits to the branches, but findings and follow-up recommendations are not recorded, and not reported on to the supporting partners. What can be read from these reports is that organisational development processes involve those concerned. PRCS will benefit from this participatory approach when revised and new procedures are in place.

-   Although training has been conducted in the Project Management Cycle, there is a need for further improvements of planning, monitoring and reporting. Firstly, a result based approach will give the tool for documenting achievements and allow PRCS to take action if expected results are not reached. Secondly, the current reporting does not meet the expectations of the Norwegian RC, as well as the back-donors.

-   It was difficult to get a clear understanding of how independent from the HQ the branches and sub-branches operate in fields in terms of decision making authority and volunteer management. However, it is a clear impression that PRCS is developing into a more decentralized organisation by strengthening the role of the branches. The implementation of the revised bylaws and the revision of the PRCS Strategy will give a window for taking this process further.

-   In the report observations and specific recommendations are raised both to the specific performance related to implementation of the Norwegian and Swedish RC supported organisational development programme as well as issues related to the entire organization. Regarding the latter, the review team will specifically mention that PRCS has given special priority to gender by establishing the Gender Committee with the mandate to develop a gender strategy.

Recommendations:

-   Ensure an integrated OD approach including including: Involving all concerned parts of the organisation in the strategy development; ensure that cross-cutting OD initiatives are coherent and harmonised; consider the human resources needed at HQ level for carrying the OD processes forward in terms of planning, training, follow-up, monitoring and reporting.

-   In preparation for the PRCS strategy 2013-17: Ensure revision of all plans and logical frameworks from the previous period in order to get a realistic picture of achievements; assess the organisational capacity within the framework of Federation Strategy 2020 and the Characteristics of a Well-Functioning National Society.

-   Finance and admin, system audit: Immediate implementation of procedures, manuals and guidelines; ensure sufficient training of branch and HQ staffrepresentatives; monitoring until improvements are achieved.

-   Implementation of branch by-laws supported by workshops bringing branches together for discussions and experience exchange.

-   Gender: Link the planned gender strategy to the development of the overall PRCS Strategy; ensure that the gender strategy comprise both mainstreaming and targeted intervention according to identified needs; ensure that attention to gender balance profile is contemplated at all levels of the organization.

-   PMER: Continue training of relevant HQ and branch staff in planning (including logical framework), monitoring and reporting using the Federation approach