1. What is likely to go wrong?
Failure Festival:
What is likely to go wrong?
December 9, 2013
Violet Murunga
AFIDEP 1
HIV Project Consultative Meeting Draft Presentation 1

2. Failure is part of programming
Donors are interested in learning about what did not work as much as what worked
Need a mechanisms for an objective assessment of the situation and discontinuing such activities or approaches (M&E)

3. Failure can happen because of challenges at various levels
Contextual factors e.g. beneficiary attitude and behavior; beneficiary institutional policies
Project team capacity at staff, institutional and partnership level

4. Policy makers may be too busy
High level policy makers are inundated with many commitments and competing interests
Institutional commitments
Competing interventions trying to support or engage them
They have to make choices – What’s in it for me (WIFM); competing interests
Because of time constraints, they often have very little time to avail themselves therefore the quality of information collected from them may be compromised
They have to make choices – What’s in it for me (WIFM)
Sometimes based on financial incentives e.g. per diem offered by other programme
They may loose interest when they realize you are not a source of funding

5. Time constraints and technical capacity
Staff are not full time on one project; working on various projects
Staff may fall behind with meeting targets because of poor time management and therefore project plans and deliverables falls behind schedule
Limitations with technical capacity compromises the quality of outputs or delays completion of outputs
Partner is not easy to work with and/or there are challenges in getting required deliverables

6. Mitigating the challenges
At beneficiary level (high level policy maker)
Flexibility – fit into their schedule or activities
Focus – identify information gaps that only they can address; leave out general information you can obtain from other sources;
this makes your contact brief but effective
Get them to delegate someone who can fill any pending gaps

7. Mitigating the challenges
At Project team level
Conduct capacity needs assessment for new project
Assign team with appropriate skills – management, coordination and technical
Bring in short-term consultants to support work – if feasible
Form partnerships with institutions that have complementary strengths; strive for openness and inclusiveness to promote participation and ownership by all partners

8. Open Discussion
What do you think is likely to go wrong in this project?
How could we mitigate the potential problems? Lessons?

9. Thank you!