FOR THE ORGANIZATIONAL CAPACITY SELF-ASSESSMENT OF
CIVIL SOCIETY ORGANIZATIONS

The “Reproductive Health Programme in Turkey” (RHP) has developed a capacity building strategy to provide guidance to grant awardees for assessing and improving their institutional capacities.

Within the scope of this strategy, it was planned to develop a capacity assessment tool that would help CSOs identify their strengths and weaknesses and build capacity based on their priorities.

The tool to assess the CSO capacity will incorporate wide participation; the objective is not only to have an understanding about the capacity of the organization but also to provide a learning tool in order to develop an organizational perception and a basis in order to improve capacity.

The tool will identify activities for the low performance areas of the organization as well as specific areas that need intervention.

In this context, the following were undertaken under RHP in order to contribute to the capacity building strategies of CSOs:

• Examples of global tools for the organizational assessment of CSOs were examined and it was decided to adapt and use the Organizational Capacity Assessment Tool (OCAT) developed by PACT.

• The “Financial Resources” section of the tool was reviewed by a chartered financial consultant for compliance with the Turkish legislation. Furthermore, a member of the United Nations Non-Governmental Organizations Committee, two CSO managers and the Technical Assistance Team of the Civil Society Development Project reviewed the tool and it was further adapted based on the recommendations.

• The institutional capacity development tool was introduced to the awardees of the 1st Call for Proposals during the “Public-CSO Collaboration Workshop under the Grant Scheme” in Akyazı, Sakarya on 22-24 June 2005.

• The CSOs were asked to conduct their institutional capacity self-assessment by using the institutional capacity development tool and return the tool by 5 August 2005.

Planned Activities

• The “Institutional Capacity Development Tool Assessment Forms” will be analyzed. The results of the analyses will be compared with the database established by PACT based on results from other countries.

• Capacity building plans of CSOs will be reviewed according to the results of evaluations and analyses and a joint capacity building plan will be developed for grant awardees. This plan will mainly focus on identifying priority areas for building capacity within organizations at different levels and performance development needs of CSO personnel.

• The areas that the grant awardees joint capacity building and the activities they need to carry out for that purpose will be identified and training support will be provided for capacity areas which require strengthened capacity.

Click for the “Institutional Capacity Development Tool Assessment Form”

NOTE: The OCAT (Organizational Capacity Assessment Tool) developed by PACT has been adapted to CSOs in Turkey by the Ministry of Health MCH/FP General Directorate after obtaining relevant permissions. Therefore, the staff of the Ministry of Health MCH/FP General Directorate below should be contacted for permission to use the adapted tool.

Arzu Köseli
Sağlık Bakanlığı AÇSAP Genel Müdürlüğü
Tel : 0 312 435 76 63 / 159
e-mail : arzu.koseli@saglik.gov.tr

A.Serdar Esin
Sağlık Bakanlığı AÇSAP Genel Müdürlüğü
Tel : 0 312 435 76 63 / 158
e-mail : serdar.esin@saglik.gov.tr