Saturday, January 24, 2009
Monday, January 19, 2009
Short Report on MSC in East Timor - August 2008
I facilitated two workshops in Dili, East Timor (Timor L'Este) in August 2008 at the request of Trocaire and CAFOD as a combined initiative. Each workshop was split into 3 parts; the first day focused on studying and practicing the Most Significant Change (MSC) method followed by a 10 day period for using and practice among each participating agency's members and then a final day to assess what problems or benefits had been encountered in using the process.
A summary of guidelines on how to conduct a simple MSC process, was written in Tetum and provide to each workshop participant along with a sample story collecting form. Websites relatingto MSC were also given and the participants introduced to internet discussion groups where problems and experience encountered in using MSC could be shared.
The design of the workshop was seen as equating to an 'on the job' training where participants would conducted a real MSC study. The intervening space of 10 days enabling an agency to focus on delivering a story collecting process. The final workshop dealt with analysis of these stories, selecting one most significant one, then drafting a report based on the experience.
We had approximately 30 participants with at least 80% attendance in the follow up workshops. Given the disparate nature of the those attending it was not possible to make the 2 week exercise a real MSC study. The 30 participants came from approximately 18 agencies which made this impossible to implement. Instead the methodology was redesigned to use the 2nd day workshop as an opportunity to re-visit the methodology and to see what problems had been encountered by those participants who'd been able to use it in the intervening period.
Conducting a successful MSC entails considerable staff time allocation, and for the host agency to fully commit itself to participating in the selection and analysis process. It also provides an important means of community participation in programme impact assessment. In addition it can potentially give an agency heightened feed back on wider issues being faced by the community.
Some lessons learnt.
A number of those attending the workshops verbally expressed their interest in the MSC methodology and showed enthusiasm in seeing how it might be adapted to use in their work. Of particular interest was the participative model whereby the local community takes a key part in selecting and analysing stories of change.
The workshops were conducted in English with a Tetum consecutive translation. There were clear signs that the concepts were not fully understood by all the participants. In the 2nd workshop it was also not clear that the guidelines written in Tetum, had been fully understood and communicated effectively.
A number of participants had conducted some story collecting during the intervening period between workshops. These showed limited but some critical understanding of the methodology. Their efforts had mostly been conducted amongst staff (as we had done in the exercise used in the 1st day workshop) however the question used in gathering their stories focused on the impact of work in the communities. A key aspect of the methodology had therefore been misunderstood; that the question is designed to understand change through the community's story and not through the staff member's story.
An MSC can be legitimately conducted amongst an agency's staff but only to measure the impact of work within the agency itself, i.e. its impact on its own staff. Hence in the first workshop the question used for our experimental MSC was 'What was the most significant change you experienced in your work during the least month?
One agency presented a story collected from a local facilitator which had been chosen from one of three facilitator's stories. The story form, given out to workshop participants, had also been adapted for use by the facilitators. This particular participant said he didn't really understand the process at the end of the first workshop and was not clear how it might be applied but had gained interest after reading the documents provided. Although the MSC he presented fell short of a real MSC, because the question had not defined a period for the story teller to address and was not addressed to members of the community from which impact was being assessed, it nevertheless gave rise to a useful discussion where these deficiencies were explored and then better understood.
Some Recommendations:
There was genuine interest expressed in seeing how MSC could be adapted to be used in Timor L'Este as one tool of impact assessment. However a lot of support and ongoing assistance will be needed to enable local partners to implement successfully their own MSC studies.
We should explore opportunities for Timorese staff to attend MSC trainings being conducted by Rick Davies and Veronica Magar in India (a 4 day training being conducted in India November 2008). With a locally trained resource person in Dili a much better understanding of the MSC methodology can be expected and this would represent a needed commitment to building local capacity.
Hosting a regular (possibly half yearly) discussion group with invite agencies asked to share and discuss their MSC studies would also help to build interest and skill. This would not only build competencies in using the method but could be an interesting way of sharing the agency's work, and build links between partner groups, both in-country and beyond.
Where the equipment is available using video and digital images in an MSC way can become on ongoing resource for all stakeholders in small community development projects. It builds a pictorial history of the project and provides excellent training material. One village can see how another has understood the changes a particular project or programme has achieved. Providing a small a incentive, such as a digital recorder or camera, for agencies and local community organisation to participate can both stimulate interest and provided a long term resource.
A summary of guidelines on how to conduct a simple MSC process, was written in Tetum and provide to each workshop participant along with a sample story collecting form. Websites relatingto MSC were also given and the participants introduced to internet discussion groups where problems and experience encountered in using MSC could be shared.
The design of the workshop was seen as equating to an 'on the job' training where participants would conducted a real MSC study. The intervening space of 10 days enabling an agency to focus on delivering a story collecting process. The final workshop dealt with analysis of these stories, selecting one most significant one, then drafting a report based on the experience.
We had approximately 30 participants with at least 80% attendance in the follow up workshops. Given the disparate nature of the those attending it was not possible to make the 2 week exercise a real MSC study. The 30 participants came from approximately 18 agencies which made this impossible to implement. Instead the methodology was redesigned to use the 2nd day workshop as an opportunity to re-visit the methodology and to see what problems had been encountered by those participants who'd been able to use it in the intervening period.
Conducting a successful MSC entails considerable staff time allocation, and for the host agency to fully commit itself to participating in the selection and analysis process. It also provides an important means of community participation in programme impact assessment. In addition it can potentially give an agency heightened feed back on wider issues being faced by the community.
Some lessons learnt.
A number of those attending the workshops verbally expressed their interest in the MSC methodology and showed enthusiasm in seeing how it might be adapted to use in their work. Of particular interest was the participative model whereby the local community takes a key part in selecting and analysing stories of change.
The workshops were conducted in English with a Tetum consecutive translation. There were clear signs that the concepts were not fully understood by all the participants. In the 2nd workshop it was also not clear that the guidelines written in Tetum, had been fully understood and communicated effectively.
A number of participants had conducted some story collecting during the intervening period between workshops. These showed limited but some critical understanding of the methodology. Their efforts had mostly been conducted amongst staff (as we had done in the exercise used in the 1st day workshop) however the question used in gathering their stories focused on the impact of work in the communities. A key aspect of the methodology had therefore been misunderstood; that the question is designed to understand change through the community's story and not through the staff member's story.
An MSC can be legitimately conducted amongst an agency's staff but only to measure the impact of work within the agency itself, i.e. its impact on its own staff. Hence in the first workshop the question used for our experimental MSC was 'What was the most significant change you experienced in your work during the least month?
One agency presented a story collected from a local facilitator which had been chosen from one of three facilitator's stories. The story form, given out to workshop participants, had also been adapted for use by the facilitators. This particular participant said he didn't really understand the process at the end of the first workshop and was not clear how it might be applied but had gained interest after reading the documents provided. Although the MSC he presented fell short of a real MSC, because the question had not defined a period for the story teller to address and was not addressed to members of the community from which impact was being assessed, it nevertheless gave rise to a useful discussion where these deficiencies were explored and then better understood.
Some Recommendations:
There was genuine interest expressed in seeing how MSC could be adapted to be used in Timor L'Este as one tool of impact assessment. However a lot of support and ongoing assistance will be needed to enable local partners to implement successfully their own MSC studies.
We should explore opportunities for Timorese staff to attend MSC trainings being conducted by Rick Davies and Veronica Magar in India (a 4 day training being conducted in India November 2008). With a locally trained resource person in Dili a much better understanding of the MSC methodology can be expected and this would represent a needed commitment to building local capacity.
Hosting a regular (possibly half yearly) discussion group with invite agencies asked to share and discuss their MSC studies would also help to build interest and skill. This would not only build competencies in using the method but could be an interesting way of sharing the agency's work, and build links between partner groups, both in-country and beyond.
Where the equipment is available using video and digital images in an MSC way can become on ongoing resource for all stakeholders in small community development projects. It builds a pictorial history of the project and provides excellent training material. One village can see how another has understood the changes a particular project or programme has achieved. Providing a small a incentive, such as a digital recorder or camera, for agencies and local community organisation to participate can both stimulate interest and provided a long term resource.
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