Between the 20th and the 22nd of October, the cycle of workshops on “DISASTER MANAGEMENT. PROJECT AND PROGRAM MANAGEMENT FOR EMERGENCIES” for Master HOPE – in Humanitarian Operations in Emergencies, Managing Projects, People Administration & Logistic in the Field, June 2017 Edition, was held in Rome, at the Polo Didattico, and it was led by Silva Ferretti, Independent Consultant, Humanitarian and Development Professional.
The first day was dedicated to an initial approach to “Project and Program Management”, through a set of exercises on concepts – such as project cycle, adaptive management
, disaster risk management, stakeholders’ analysis, etc – and a personal critical reflection on the fellow’s own competences. A second moment was dedicated to a first contact with Project Cycle Management, focusing on the Logframe and the Theory of Change, of the advantages and weaknesses of each and how they interact. By the end of the day, divided into groups, representing different kinds of organizations, the fellows had to assess the situation of the Nepal earthquake and address the activities (what to do), the approaches processes (how to work) and the stakeholders (with whom).
On the second day, the fellows worked on the development of their own organization’s projects, based on the Nepalese situation. A first moment was dedicated to talking with a donor who gave the fellows an assessment of the needs in the project cycle. The rest of the day was dedicated to identifying different actors within a humanitarian operation, and an in-depth work on the Logframe and Theory of Change, focusing on concepts such as ‘accountability’ and ‘participation’.
On Sunday, after a first moment of Question & Answers with the lecturer, the session was dedicated to assumptions and risk analysis. In the second part of the day, the fellows focused on trying to bring together the main ideas of the different organizations, to create a consortium, in which they had to emphasise the concept of resilience, central to their project – as the power to face disaster/threats.
The objective achieved in this series of workshops was to understand what project and program management involve for humanitarian programs, as well as the capacity to compare different approaches to project/program management, through a practical use of concepts and tools in simulations and exercises.
By Susana Ferreira, Master HOPE Coordinator and Career Development Officer
