mikocanares Associates, Capacity Building, Facilitation, Monitoring and Evaluation, National Government Agency, Results-based Management

Step Up Assists PCW

PCWStep Up Consulting Services assisted the Philippine Commission on Women in refining the results chain of one of the components of a project it implements with the support of AECID.  This activity was done in a training workshop held in Manila last 19-21 November.

The training workshop was attended by representatives from 6 provinces, namely, Aklan, Albay, Iloilo, Mindoro, Saranggani, and Surigo del Norte as well as by representatives from the Project Management Office and the Philippine Commission on Women.

The objectives of the training-workshop were to make participants understand the  basic concepts and principles of RBM as a tool in project development and management; practice the use of the RBM tools using the three-year project target for LGUs; arrive at clear indicators for the 3 year-targets and provide an overview of project development and management including its planning methodologies and tools.

The participatory, inter-active, and activity-based learning sessions proved productive with the adult learners.  The participants were able to efficiently assimilate new concepts better because of this approach.  Likewise, the RBM workshops helped crystalize ideas of participants and made more explicit their theories of change in so far as the project is concerned.

The diversity of outputs is impressive in terms of sectors and themes.  Saranggani concentrated on indigenous communities and indigenous women, Aklan on VAW victims, Albay on disaster-prone communities.  Surigao del Norte and Mindoro focused on women entrepreneurs while Iloilo tried to cover several marginalized women groups.

Step Up will continue to assist PCW in this project.

mikocanares Business Planning, Non-Government Organizations

Step Up Assists Vincentian Missionaries Social Development Foundation

Payatas dumpsite, courtesy of Sean Miller’s blog at seanmillerblogs.com

Step Up signs recently a consulting contract with the Vincentian Missionaries Social Development Foundation, Inc. (VMSDFI).  The non-government organization is based in Quezon City and has tasked Step Up to formulate a business plan for a community enterprise that it helped establish in Payatas.

The Journal of Environment and Urbanization (1998) described VMSDFI as “a church-based organization which has been working in the urban slum community of Payatas, Quezon City, since 1991, in pursuit of community development goals for the lowest 20 per cent of the urban poor population.”  Its office is located at 221 Tandang Sora Avenue, NIA Road, Quezon City.

In the initial fieldwork, it was observed that while technical skills and assets are available at the level of the people’s organization assisted by VMSDFI, management skills that would make a community enterprise sustainable is wanting.  Step Up envisions to refocus VMSDFI’s efforts in assisting the organization through the preparation of a business plan suited to the context of both the beneficiary group and the assisting organization. The beneficiary group, in this case, manufactures different products made from waste and other materials.

Lead consultant for this engagement is Mr. Alvin Luis Acuzar assisted by research associate Anthony Tanio.

mikocanares Capacity Building, Facilitation

Step Up Consulting Trains Jagna Community Development Facilitators

ImageStep Up Consulting Services assisted the Municipality of Jagna by training 20 municipal government employees as facilitators. The training, entitled Facilitating for Development, intends to equip  facilitators with the necessary skills in facilitating participatory community development sessions.

Facilitating development in communities is a crucial process that entails maximum preparation on the part of facilitators.  As distinguished from training, facilitation involves not an instructive approach in bringing about learning from individuals but a bottoms-up approach in drawing conclusions based on participant’s knowledge, feelings and experiences.  Facilitation, as a process entails a lot of listening, not only to verbal but also the non-verbal cues happening at group processes and requires appreciation and not judgment of participant’s responses. The training covered these theoretical grounding.

Participants expressed appreciation to Step Up Consulting Services team for the efforts in making the training enjoyable, productive, and enriching.  The firm handled content as well as administrative arrangements for the total three-day training.