Magda Rossmann | July 2014

Complaints and feedback mechanisms at HelpAge A case of Help Desk Committees in Turkana, Kenya

Focus Group Discussion with community members in Kalemnyang, Turkana.

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Only got 5 minutes? The purpose of this learning document is to show utility and value of complaints and feedback mechanisms through a case study of Help Desk Committees in Turkana, Kenya. It offers key lessons that should be considered when setting up complaints channels in HelpAge programmes.

Here’s a 2-page summary of the main points

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Feedback mechanisms and accountability

At HelpAge, our commitment to responding to feedback is articulated in the Accountability and Quality Framework.

The purpose of feedback mechanisms is not limited to listening but also involves using the information we receive to improve our programmes, and ultimately to see improvements in the lives of older people.

Background

Cultural and context appropriateness of feedback mechanisms is found to be connected to the overall effectiveness of this mechanism.

Rationale

In Turkana, Help Desks served a double purpose: 1) as a corrective mechanism and means of achieving greater programme effectiveness; 2) and as a broader community structure that aims to empower older people to hold HelpAge (and other duty bearers) to account

Process

Most of the community members felt free to complain or give feedback through Help Desk Committee and were well informed about the process, i.e. what happens after they submit a complaint or feedback. People were more likely to use the mechanism after they’ve learnt it led to improvements.

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Challenges

Some of the most common challenges were posed by the inaccessibility of the areas and long travel distances that they entail.

Resources required

Adequate planning and budgeting is essential for the complaints mechanism to be effective.

Facilitating factors

Community-based feedback mechanisms often perform a wider, more comprehensive accountability function, encouraging participation and ownership of the project while serving as a quality-control measure.

Results observed

Complaints and feedback have led to both immediate modifications and improvements made to the programme, as well as longer term changes.

Lessons learnt

“Very valuable mechanism to have! Any programme at the design stage need to include grievance mechanism. It should be in every proposal! It will show value for money, as it limits mistakes, corruption, etc. and increases accountability.”

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Feedback mechanisms and accountability

The right to say and the duty to respond paradigm1 places an obligation on humanitarian and development agencies to listen to people we work with, and most importantly to people that our programmes affect most. In recent years, international agencies have developed a range of approaches aimed at actively listening to their ‘beneficiaries’. Whether the motivation was accountability, ensuring the effectiveness of programmes, or merely responding to donor pressures, feedback and complaints mechanisms are becoming a permanent feature in development and humanitarian programmes.

At HelpAge, our commitment to listening and responding to feedback is articulated in the Accountability and Quality Framework. Whereas our Vision and Mission set out ‘what we do’, the accountability framework describes ‘how we do’ our work. We believe that being accountable to our stakeholders is both an end in itself and means to achieving better quality programmes and stronger governance structures. Accountability allows us to be a learning and responsive organisation, able to support older women and men more effectively.

The purpose of feedback mechanisms is not limited to active listening but also involves responding to and using the information we receive to improve our programmes, and ultimately to see improvements in the lives of older people. Increasing the levels of participation and feedback can empower people to hold agencies and donors accountable for their decisions. Furthermore, feedback from those directly affected by a project can help identify priorities, provide powerful real-time data and analysis of risks, and encourage people’s own solutions to problems.2 Feedback mechanisms should be at the heart of HelpAge programmes, rather than merely an add-on. Integrating them into programme cycle will create incentives to listen and to respond to older people, promoting learning, improving project management and results, and helping to identify priorities and information on what is working in real time.

Why this study?

The aim of this document is to share best practice and challenges in setting up and using feedback mechanisms based on the learning from a case study of Help Desk Committees (HDCs) in Turkana, Kenya. The DEC-funded3 programme set up to respond to 2011 draught was one of the first HelpAge programmes that piloted feedback mechanisms.

Although HelpAge’s work is based on a principle of participation through the involvement of OPAs and ADA campaigners, complaints and feedback mechanisms are still a relatively new feature of our programmes.

1 H. Banos Smith, The right to say and the duty to respond, HAP: 2009. 2 A. Jacobs, Creating the missing feedback loop, 2010. 3 Disasters Emergency Committee: http://www.dec.org.uk/

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This short case study focusses on Help Desk Committees’ role of a feedback mechanism, their effectiveness and potential value they added to both HelpAge and to their communities.

In the document, you will find a discussion on best practice and challenges of HDCs, the value added of their inter-generational nature and the role older people can play in receiving and responding to feedback. The study also set out to explore what the preferred ways of giving feedback by older men and women are. As such, it did not look at, nor analysed in depth the specific feedback or grievances that programme stakeholders might have submitted.

Each section will present key lessons that can be adapted

and applied when introducing feedback mechanisms in other HelpAge programmes.

Methodology

The two-week study took place in March 2014 during the phase-out stage of the DEC-funded project and consisted of a desk review, staff interviews, and Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) with both communities and HDC members.

A total of five community FGDs took place in five selected locations (Kapua, Kalemnyang, Konoo, Napusimoru, Napetet). The focus groups consisted of equal number of men and women, the majority of whom were older people. Each discussion, which consisted of 15-20 persons, was conducted over a period of one to two hours. Interviews were also conducted with Help Desk Committee members. Each HDC consisted of two older women and two older men, although in two locations (Kapua and Napusimoru) Help Desks were inter-generational. The findings were analysed against eight domains: background, rationale, process, resources, facilitating factors, challenges, results and lessons learnt.4

This report does not claim to provide a comprehensive overview of complaints mechanisms in practice. More in-depth study requires larger sample, stronger analysis of the mechanism and greater triangulation of findings.

4 For a detailed methodology paper see Annex 1

Focus Group Discussion in Napusimoru

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Hunger Safety Net Programme (HSNP) is a programme designed to address the recurring cases of extreme poverty, hunger and vulnerability in Northern Kenya region, through unconditional long term cash transfers. The programme is run in partnership with other international organisations and the Kenyan Government, and is funded by DFID. HelpAge is responsible for Social Protection and Rights element that aims to work with communities and programme implementers to protect the rights of cash transfer recipients and other programme participants. HelpAge also manages the work of Rights Committees who are a community-based mechanism responsible for handling complaints and feedback. The programme, now in its second phase is also being implemented in Turkana. For more information have a look at the HSNP website: www.hsnp.or.ke

Limitations

A number of limitations presented themselves during the study which might have affected the findings:

Active participation of women in the discussions was at times challenging and required the facilitator to consciously seek women’s feedback throughout the FGD;

Help Desk members were present during some of the FGDs which might have affected feedback given by the communities;

Initially communities thought the purpose of the study was to check if HDCs did a good job which could have affected their feedback. Having a Turkana based programme coordinator explain the learning objective of the study helped create an open discussion;

Most of the FGDs were conducted in Turkana and translated into Swahili and then English which could have resulted in some degree of loss of original meaning.

Turkana feedback mechanisms – Help Desk Committees (HDC)

Background

Turkana, one of the poorest counties situated in northwestern Kenya is largely underdeveloped and vulnerable to long and recurrent periods of severe drought. The Turkana people are nomadic pastoralists who can lose their livelihoods and be pushed into poverty even during short dry spells.

At the end of 2011 serious drought was affecting the livelihoods and food security of 3.75 million Kenyans5. About 1.4 million people were classified as being in the Emergency Area of Kenya, residing predominantly in north and northeastern pastoral areas including Turkana. Older people, women, and children in the emergency areas were considered most vulnerable6.

HelpAge has responded by providing cash transfers and livelihoods support in 9 locations that were not included in the first phase of the HSNP 5 OCHA Kenya Humanitarian Update, 13th September 2011 6 KENYA Enhanced Food Security Monitoring, 7th September 2011

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programme (see box). To ensure that the project is of highest quality and to meet our accountability commitments, HelpAge introduced a community-based complaints mechanism.

Feedback in the Turkana context

Help Desk Committees (HDC) were chosen as the most appropriate complaints mechanism. The consultations with communities revealed that people were aware of a similar structure functioning as part of the HSNP and asked HelpAge to introduce it in the project.

One of the challenges of getting and responding to feedback was the nomadic nature of the Turkana communities which required a complaints mechanism to be mobile and ‘always present among the people’. To facilitate this and to build trust in a mechanism in the context where ‘complaining’ is not considered culturally appropriate, the Help Desk members were elected by their communities (and not appointed) and giving feedback was framed not as ‘complaining’ but as people’s right to quality support. This process has also helped to shift the ownership of the mechanism from HelpAge to the community.

“In Turkana ‘complaining’ is not always accepted – there is a perception that people shouldn’t complain about the support they are given. That’s why we have framed the role of Help Desk Committees around rights and entitlements.” Ibrahim Njuguna, Regional Emergencies Manager

One of the requirements for a Help Desk member was to be independent from the local administrative structures7, but village elders and assistant chief were also consulted in each location and involved in resolving wider community grievances.

“If it was a community issue, there would always be a meeting. It was not just referred to the Help Desk - sometimes they would also involve the council of elders.” Community FGD, Konoo

7 Turkana Help Desk Committee Guidelines

Women during FGD in Konoo

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International NGOs tend to distrust existing local community mechanisms which may lead to creating parallel structures and overlooking local leadership, processes, capacities, resourcefulness and culture. The weakness in this strategy is that ignoring or bypassing the local institutions – which can eventually be expected to assume responsibility for service provision – can erode both their capacity and legitimacy.8

“Gatekeepers in community can be a challenge to a new structure as they want to preserve a status quo. It’s important to involve all stakeholders to be able to explain that Help Desk Committees are not a threat: stakeholder and existing community structures mapping is crucial, so that Help Desks are not see as a ‘killer’ to other structures.” Peter Ekunyuk, Turkana Programme Coordinator

In Turkana, some of the HDC members were eventually incorporated into existing administrative bodies. At the same time, the feedback mechanism and wider accountability structures challenge existing power relations and have to be independent to allow the participation of the more marginalised members of the community. In the case of Turkana, which is culturally conservative, women do not usually take part in decision making processes. HelpAge

negotiated with village elders to include women as Help Desk members in order to facilitate their feedback.

“Women are often not given opportunities to raise issues – it’s not accepted culturally. HelpAge talked to elders and wider community that it is important for women to also voice concerns. This is why Help Desk members have both women and men, older and younger”. Peter Ekunyuk, Turkana Programme Coordinator

In some villages, women became leaders of Help Desk Committees which was seen as a big achievement given the traditional context.

Cultural and context appropriateness of feedback mechanisms is found to be connected to the overall effectiveness of the mechanism (especially from communities’ point of view). However relying on the already existing local

8 A. Wood, The community context and complaints handling by NGOs, World Vision, 2011: p.14.

Peter Ekunyuk (right) with Help Desk members, Napusimoru

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Help Desk Committee Guidelines: HelpAge is committed to ensuring its stakeholders have an opportunity to provide feedback and complain about its staff and operations. (…) A help desk allows beneficiaries and other community members the opportunity to give their feedback and make complaints in a non-threatening environment. This will help HelpAge to solve issues early and inform programme redesign which will contribute to more effective programmes. It is also an opportunity for information sharing between HelpAge and the community.

structures might not be enough, as sometimes traditional feedback mechanisms might exclude certain vulnerable groups from accessing them.9

Key lessons:

Communities should be consulted on the preferred ways of giving and receiving complaints and feedback before the mechanism is introduced

It is crucial to do context and stakeholder analysis and try to support and build on existing accountability mechanisms rather than creating parallel ones

Participation of marginalised community members (women, disabled people, etc.) needs to be facilitated. In some contexts this might require setting up of an additional complaints channel (e.g. a phone line) as they might shy away from sharing their feedback within community

Rationale: Why were the Help Desk Committees set up?

Help Desk Committees were set up primarily as an accountability mechanism, to ensure that our stakeholders have an opportunity to provide feedback and complaints about the quality of the HelpAge programme. Help Desks served a double purpose: 1) as a corrective mechanism and means of achieving greater programme effectiveness; 2) and as a broader community structure that aims to empower older people to hold HelpAge (and other duty bearers) to account.

“If you’re poor you’re marginalised. Older people aren’t usually given a chance to raise concerns. Help Desks were set up to rectify it, to give voice to the voiceless, to form a ‘bridge’ between the community and our organisation.” Peter Ekunyuk, Turkana Programme Coordinator

All of the stakeholders saw an advantage in establishing Help Desks that went beyond merely handling complaints (or being only a ‘correcting’ mechanism). Help Desk members themselves viewed helping communities as the main motivation for their participation – the fact that they were elected by their peers not only ensured trust between them when dealing with grievances, but also gave them a

9 I. Jean, F. Bonino, We are committed to listen to you: World Visoin’s experience with humanitarian feedback mechanisms in Darfur, ALNAP/CDA Case Study, London: ODI/ALNAP, 2013.

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sense of purpose. They felt appreciated, respected and regarded by the community as honest.

“We were chosen because communities have confidence in us.” Help Desk member, Kapua

“We are respected among the community that’s why we were elected by them. We offered our services as we know we’re serving our people.” Help Desk member, Napusimoru

Help Desks were perceived to serve a wider accountability purpose of increasing participation, ownership of the project, information sharing and of ‘assisting communities’.

“This place is landlocked, network coverage isn’t good – Help Desk was like a ‘phone’ that connects us to the HelpAge office.” Community FGD, Konoo

In reality, feedback and complaints mechanisms do not exist separately from other accountability structures - they are often integrated and complement each other. Transparency and sharing information about the purpose and scope of the mechanism proved to be particularly important. Given the cultural context in which ‘complaining’ is not always perceived as appropriate, it was essential to provide training on accountability to Help Desk members and to raise awareness on their role among the community. “First time that Help Desks were introduced into communities, people didn’t know how to complain and what to complain about – this knowledge only came with time.” Help Desk member, Kapua

Some community members were hesitant to use Help Desks at the beginning as they weren’t sure about the process or if their complaints would be valid. As pointed out in one of the focus group discussions, this knowledge came with time indicating a need for continuous, rather than a one-off information sharing activity with the communities. Another factor that encouraged people to use Help Desks was the fact that concerns they’ve raised were being addressed on time.

“They resolved our issues so it encouraged us to complain.” Community FGD, Kalemnyang

Women during FGD in Kapua

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Key lessons:

Make sure all stakeholders understand and appreciate purpose and value of the feedback mechanisms

It is important to establish feedback mechanism at the very beginning of the programme (inception phase)

Information sharing on accountability and purpose of the feedback mechanism should be a continuous process rather than one-off activity

Process: How are complaints received and responded to?

After conducting stakeholder consultations and agreeing on the most appropriate channel for raising concerns, the next step is to define the scope of the chosen feedback mechanism and to agree on the process for handling complaints.

In Turkana, Help Desks were originally introduced to deal with HelpAge-related grievances, but were later adapted to also respond to wider community concerns. In effect, Help Desks had two functions – as a complaints mechanism dealing with operational issues, and as a community grievance structure. Both functions proved important and in practice can be integrated together.

“There are two types of complaints: individual and communal. For individual complaints Help Desk member takes person’s details and when issue is resolved provides feedback directly to complainant. For communal complaints a community meeting is called and then feedback is provided.” Romano Ekitela, Turkana Field Officer

The mechanism was also used as an information sharing tool on current community needs and concerns (e.g. upcoming draught, security concerns in the area, etc.).

“Help Desk was there to receive our complaints and take them to the organisation, e.g. if there’s a drought we raise it with Help Desk members and they report it to HelpAge.” Community FGD, Konoo

Most of the community members felt free to complain or give feedback through Help Desk Committee and were well informed about the process, i.e. what happens after they submit a complaint or feedback.

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Below is a (simplified) graphic representation of complaints and feedback handling process in Turkana:

Community members that wish to provide feedback or to complain can contact their Help Desk who either resolve the issue (if community grievance) or pass it to HelpAge (directly or through field officers). HelpAge processes the complaint and provides an outcome directly to a person that submitted it or gives response through the Help Desk. If an issue is not within HelpAge’s scope, it is referred to the relevant local authority or other NGOs.

Apart from Help Desk Committees, there are alternative, complementary channels for raising complaints and giving feedback (directly with field officers,

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Help Desk Committee Guidelines: The complainant must be contacted at the next distribution at the latest to inform the person of the outcome of the process or action based on the feedback. If a decision has not been reached, the complainant should be provided with a progress report with an indication of a likely date of conclusion

coming to HelpAge office or raising issues during community meetings, etc.). Both community and Help Desk members have also asked for mobile phones to supplement their work and to enable immediate contact with HelpAge. Such additional direct channels for providing feedback might be particularly useful for the more marginalised members of the community who may shy away from approaching the Help Desk.

“Some people are shy about exposing their disability, scared they will be laughed at. Some that are HIV positive are also shy to come out.” Help Desk member, Kapua

The associated stigma with being HIV positive or disabled would often prevent people from using community-based feedback mechanism. They would fear the Help Desk Committees might not understand their complaint or thought it would be regarded as unimportant. A suggestion made by the communities was to include people with disabilities or people who are HIV positive as Help Desk members.

On the other hand, Help Desk Committees were proactive in reaching out to people who cannot access the mechanism. Being part of their communities, Help Desk members knew where vulnerable people could be found. This was especially important given the pastoralist context of the Turkana region. People with impaired mobility could also send a peer or a relative to complain on their behalf.

If the community had a complaint about a Help Desk member, they would prefer referring it to the village chief or directing the complaint to another Help Desk member rather than bypassing them to contact HelpAge. The most common reason given during the FGDs was ‘not wanting to escalate’ community grievances. This example highlights the importance of working with already existing structures.

Closing the Feedback Loop

Feedback mechanism is considered effective if, at minimum, it supports the collection, acknowledgement, analysis and response to the complaint received, thus forming a closed feedback loop. Where the feedback loop is left open, the mechanism is not fully effective.10

In other words, while it is important to implement appropriate complaints mechanisms for different stakeholders, they are only meaningful if an adequate response

10 F. Bonino, I. Jean, P. Knox Clarke, Closing the loop – Practitioner guidance on effective feedback mechanisms in humanitarian contexts, ALNAP-CDA Guidance, London: ALNAP/ODI, 2014, p.4.

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is provided and the feedback received through those mechanisms is used for organisational learning and improvement (effectively ‘closing the loop’).

There are two important dimensions to closing the feedback loop: 1) listening and responding to our stakeholders – this contributes to building respect and

trust in our relationship with the community; 2) ensuring that complaints and feedback are appropriately recorded and analysed which allows them to be used for organisational learning and improvement.

Additionally, in Turkana the programme coordinator was ultimately responsible for handling complaints (taking appropriate actions or referrals) which ensured that the feedback received was continuously used to make changes to the project.

The Focus Group Discussions also revealed that people were likely to use the mechanism

after they’ve learnt it led to improvements.

Key lessons:

Ensure the process for handling complaints is transparent, with roles and responsibilities clearly understood by all stakeholders

Make sure there are alternative, complementary channels for giving feedback available to more marginalised community members

Close the feedback loop – provide a response to those who have complained and use submitted feedback to improve your work

Resources required: How much does it cost?

Designing, implementing and maintaining feedback mechanisms requires an investment of both financial and human resources. The costs will vary depending on the project and a type of mechanism used but it is important that all feedback-related activities are budgeted for adequately.

Usually, there are two types of costs: direct, associated with the complaints mechanism itself (such as training, transport costs, etc.) and indirect, related to the operations of feedback (collection and analysis of feedback, providing response, potential changes to the original project design, etc.).

Source: ALNAP CDA, Closing the loop guidance.

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In Turkana most of the direct costs were associated with capacity building of the Help Desk Committees and community awareness raising activities. HelpAge produced Help Desk guidelines and the members received training on accountability and complaints handling. Due to large areas covered by the project and the semi-nomadic lifestyle of Turkana people, both transport and communication costs were also significant.

During the focus group discussions all Help Desk members highlighted the importance of receiving identification badges or clothes so that they can be recognised by other community members. Another reason was that being able to identify themselves as a Help Desk member gave them ‘a voice’ when talking to e.g. local leaders.

Help Desk members work on a voluntary basis and the need for incentives was discussed in each location visited during this study. In Turkana, transport and communication costs that HDCs incurred would be reimbursed. They were also provided with refreshments during meetings with HelpAge.

“Especially here where the land is dry and people need to work to feed their family as they can’t feed them from the land, they need to be reimbursed for the opportunity cost of participating in meetings.” Peter Ekunyuk, Turkana Programme Coordinator

There is an ethical aspect that must be considered when discussing the incentives for community-based structures. In some cases, like in Turkana or in urban areas, opportunity costs for poor older people participating in HelpAge project might be very high and should be adequately reimbursed. On the other hand, payments to the community groups tend not to promote sustainability and might compromise independence of the participants. Hence, the decision on the type of incentives provided should always be context specific and adequately planned and budgeted for. It is worth noting that monetary incentives are not the only option. For example, in Turkana Help Desk members mentioned training and other capacity building activities as an incentive to participate in the project.

Complaint regarding a lack of mobility devices

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Indirect costs (both human and financial) of maintaining complaints mechanism usually relate to HelpAge staff and partners. In Turkana, HelpAge staff participated in the accountability training and used the learning from the HSNP project on how to manage and respond to feedback. Additional staff time might be required to collect, acknowledge and respond to feedback. In some circumstances, data analysis skills might be needed to be able to aggregate and analyse received feedback. Technical support from accountability officer to either input into design of mechanisms or build capacity of staff and partners in accountability issues must also be budgeted for.

Communities and Help Desk members in Turkana have all underlined the importance of face-to-face contact with HelpAge. Apart from HDCs being a channel to contact Lodwar office, field officers were also present in villages to be able to respond to issues and escalate them when needed.

It is also important to consider how flexible project design is to apply potential changes that result from complaints and feedback as these might have budgetary implications. Discussing such possibility with a donor prior to setting up complaints mechanism is recommended.

“We need plans and budgets for accountability to be able to follow up and respond where needed; to be able to visit people and talk to them; to check with them if we are focussing on the right issues. We cannot be reactive to emergencies, we have to be proactive in our response.” Peter Ekunyuk, Turkana Programme Coordinator

Adequate planning and budgeting is essential for the complaints mechanism to be effective.

Key lessons:

Ensure all complaints mechanism related activities are adequately budgeted for (including collection of feedback and its analysis)

Plan and cost capacity building for Help Desk members (if applicable) and programme implementers, and invest in citizen awareness-raising

Plan and budget for any technical support you might require Consider best type of incentives for community-based structures and

discuss their ethical implications

Facilitating factors: What enabled the mechanism to work effectively?

Number of factors enabled the mechanism to work effectively and contributed to the good practice in handling complaints.

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Focus Group Discussions in Turkana revealed that people especially appreciated Help Desks being part of their communities. The proximity and familiarity of the mechanism made giving feedback easier – Help Desk members were trusted and respected, and communities felt they understand them and their concerns. Having Help Desk members elected by the community seem to have strengthened the confidence in feedback mechanisms and encouraged people to complain.

“We were able to use Help Desk because we know them, we understand who they are. They also know the environment and know where people are based (e.g. disabled person by the river).” Community FGD, Konoo

On the other hand, good relationship between HelpAge and Help Desk Committees was also highlighted as crucial for the channel to work smoothly. Discussions emphasised the importance of regular face-to-face contact and trust-building between HelpAge, HDCs and communities.

Although cultural and context appropriateness of the mechanism seem to contribute to its overall effectiveness, more marginalised community members might face barriers when trying to access it. It is therefore recommended to have parallel (more formalised) channels available for those who traditionally do not have access to community based structures. Such formal mechanisms (e.g. hotline, sms, suggestion box, etc.) might also be more appropriate for sensitive complaints. In some areas people mentioned that it’s unlikely they would approach a Help Desk with a sensitive complaint for fear of being victimised. They weren’t sure if Help Desks are a confidential mechanism.

In Turkana, mobile phones were mentioned as a good supplement to Help Desks’ work – however they were primarily used by Help Desk members, rather than communities to contact HelpAge. In future, it might be worth exploring using mobile phones as a direct channel for communities to contact HelpAge. In Turkana, people were open to using different media to give feedback as long as they did not substitute face-to-face interactions.

Another factor that facilitated work of the Help Desk Committees was training that members received on accountability and HIV/AIDS.

Men during FGD in Konoo

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“Members received training on accountability but also on HIV and AIDS after they suggested that older women who are birth attendants could also raise awareness on HIV/AIDS.” Ibrahim Njuguna, Regional Emergencies Manager

Help Desk members also fulfilled an advisory role, sharing the new skills and knowledge with their communities. As such, feedback mechanisms had a wider accountability function which often translated into an increased sense of ownership of the project.

“Help Desk was very important – when they received training they came back to communities, shared information about the project, they gave advice. It was valuable because it was always among people. Community would take their advice on e.g. taking care of livelihoods – that would really assist people.” Community FGD, Napusimoru

Some community members also highlighted the empowerment aspect of trainings and capacity building activities.

“If you’re trained it’s as if you grow taller.” Community FGD, Konoo

Developing new skills, in addition to livelihoods support, was considered particularly important as it seemed to have built a sense of autonomy among the communities.

Overall, the findings from Turkana suggest that community-based feedback mechanisms often perform a wider, more comprehensive accountability function, encouraging participation and ownership of the project while serving as a quality-control measure.

Clarity on what the roles and responsibilities of Help Desk members are contributed to the smooth running of the mechanism in the face of constrained resources. Giving autonomy to Help Desk Committees to deal with community concerns without forwarding them to HelpAge minimised the backlog of complaints and contributed to the sustainability of the HDCs. Indeed, most of them continue to act as a community grievance mechanism, being incorporated into local administrative structures or through the HSNP II Rights Committees. However, guidelines and training on principles of accountability are crucial to minimise ‘elite capture’ and ensure HDCs are representative.

In order to ‘close the feedback loop’ and respond to complaints received, it is important where the mechanism lies in the organisational structure. In the case of Turkana, programme staff were responsible for handling complaints with the Programme Coordinator ultimately accountable for more strategic outcomes. Placing the mechanism within the responsibility of staff with decision making

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power ensured that responses were followed up and changes could be implemented promptly.

Key lessons:

Ensure feedback mechanisms are culturally and context appropriate (and do not underestimate the value of direct contact and relationship building)

Set up complementary (more formalised) channels available for those who traditionally face barriers of access to community based structures

Ensure that staff with decision making power are also accountable for responding to and acting on feedback received

Challenges: What issues had to be overcome to ensure the good practice?

Number of challenges had to be overcome for the mechanism to work effectively.

Some of the most common challenges were posed by the inaccessibility of the areas and long travel distances that they entail. The remoteness and difficulties in access were often accentuated by the semi-nomadic nature of Turkana people and by the instances of insecurity. Lack of mobile phones and poor network coverage were also mentioned as a challenge, especially when the HelpAge staff weren’t personally available to talk to Help Desks or to communities. These factors and the delays in receiving response to submitted complaints highlighted the need for more frequent presence of HelpAge staff in the communities.

“It takes long for HelpAge to respond and come to the community. It would be better to visit us weekly, not just once a month.” Community FGD, Kapua

Interestingly, face-to-face contact between HelpAge and the community was mentioned as a good practice, but if this contact was not regular or frequent enough it was perceived as a major obstacle. Adequate planning and resourcing of the mechanism might contribute to overcoming this challenge.

Additionally, unclear links between Help Desks and other agencies have prevented them from feeding back to communities on complaints not related to HelpAge.

Help Desks and communities identified a number of ways in which the mechanism can be improved.

More frequent trainings (not just one-off) for Help Desk members were suggested, which relates to the need for more continuous awareness raising and information sharing activities. The trainings were also an opportunity for Help

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Desk members to meet their peers from other locations, to share their experiences and to exchange ideas on how to improve the mechanism.

Awareness raising on accountability issues for the communities was identified by the HDCs as a possible improvement. There also seems to be a need for better information sharing on targeting criteria among the communities. Clear explanation of why HelpAge focusses on older people could lessen the amount of complaints received from non-beneficiaries who feel left out.

“In future, when registration is being done, consider all elements not just strict age of 60 and above. You could be 59 and disabled so in need of assistance.” Community FGD, Konoo

Key lessons:

Ensure that you plan and budget for transport, communication and time HelpAge staff need to spend in the community

More frequent trainings and continuous information sharing with the communities might increase the awareness of the mechanism and encourage feedback

Results observed: Did Help Desk Committees lead to any changes?

Complaints and feedback have led to both immediate modifications and improvements made to the programme, as well as longer term changes.

Most common complaints would come from non-beneficiaries on being excluded from the project. These were usually followed up, but it might be worth considering awareness raising activities to the whole community on the vulnerabilities faced by older people, especially in humanitarian contexts. Intuitively, better information sharing (and knowledge of the programme) should yield more substantial and constructive feedback. On the other hand, a specific set of questions can be asked to solicit feedback on a particular aspect of a project.

In Turkana, Help Desk members improved targeting by using a ‘calendar of events’ to establish the age of older people who were initially excluded from the programme due to ID card errors. Feedback from communities has also led to a change in the amount and frequency of cash transfers – people preferred to receive larger amounts less frequently to be able to make investments.

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“With first transfer we bought food, but second transfer we invested, e.g. bought bicycles to go to Lodwar to buy cheaper things. There is still a continuous impact.” Community FGD, Kapua

In addition, communities felt that feedback mechanism was valuable as ‘it was always among people’, reaching out to those who were immobile or otherwise vulnerable. Presence of Help Desk Committees gave people assurance of a good quality programme.

“Presence of Help Desk gave us some assurance that things wouldn’t go wrong as there is somewhere we can channel our issues, unlike other projects that don’t have it, so you just sit at home and complain.” Community FGD, Napusimoru

HDCs continue being approached by communities which shows potential for a more sustainable mechanism that can function beyond specific programmes.

“The advantage is that it enabled HelpAge to understand concerns of people in this area.” Community FGD, Napetet

Some of the Help Desk members have already been incorporated into HSNP Rights Committees or local dispute resolution structures. This not only shows signs of sustainability but in longer term might contribute to a better sense of empowerment among communities and eventually to an increased accountability

of duty bearers.

The presence of HDCs seems to have contributed to the overall quality of the project and had positive influence on HelpAge’s reputation. Now communities ask to work with HelpAge as they claim that “when HelpAge says they will do something, they do it”. This resulted in HelpAge being included in a new accountability

programme working in a consortium led by the Transparency International which aims to coordinate complaints systems in Turkana.

Multiple roles that feedback mechanism often fulfils (from complaints handling to information sharing and capacity building) points to a need for a more holistic

FGD in Napusimoru

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approach to accountability. Accountability structures do not exist in vacuum and often are closely inter-linked. On the other hand, special attention needs to be paid when multiple functions of community groups may lead to conflicts of interest, e.g. when Help Desk members are also beneficiaries of the project. The roles and responsibilities of Help Desk members should be well defined and a code of conduct should be in place to guide their actions and behaviours. These have to be effectively communicated so that all stakeholders understand what they can expect from each other.

Key lessons:

Awareness raising activities on the vulnerabilities faced by older people might help reduce a number of complaints from non-beneficiaries

The roles and responsibilities of the complaints and feedback mechanism should be well defined and a code of conduct guiding their action should be in place

Lessons learnt

The study of the Help Desk Committees in Turkana have revealed good practice examples that contribute to the effectiveness of complaints and feedback mechanisms, and that can be adapted and applied to other HelpAge programmes. This section will discuss the main lessons learnt.

Older people as Help Desk members

Help Desk Committees were originally designed to be inter-generational to facilitate exchange of skills between older and younger people. In reality, some of the HDCs were formed mostly by older women and men. When asked about the value of having older people responsible for handling complaints and feedback, communities pointed out that they are perceived as trustworthy, less corrupted and acting for the interest of their communities without hidden agendas.

“They’re valuable and respected – we would listen to them as we trust them. They can resolve things without bias. They don’t have hidden agendas, they’re honest so we trust they will pass issues to HelpAge.” Community FGD, Napusimoru

Their knowledge of the area and its history was also seen as an advantage. Older people would know where the boundaries of sub-locations are and where to find people that were targeted through the programme. Communities also felt that older people understand their way of life, traditions and customs.

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“In Turkana, older people are a bit like a library or encyclopaedia – their traditional community knowledge needs to be transferred to younger people.” Peter Ekunyuk, Turkana Programme Coordinator

Where Help Desks were inter-generational, the biggest value added was seen to be in the complementarity of skills. Younger people were perceived to be more literate, educated and physically fit so they would help with documenting the complaints and mobilising people for meetings (which required long distance walking). On the other hand, older people would pass on their community knowledge and teach younger members e.g. how to use a ‘calendar of events’.

Formal vs informal mechanisms

The lack of regular communication with aid recipients and external pressures to demonstrate visible mechanisms for accountability are resulting in an overall trend of formalising feedback processes that may already exist but are deemed unsystematic and hence hard to track and access.11

One concern that has surfaced during some of the discussions is that more formal mechanisms and tools – such as suggestion boxes, sms, phone lines – can potentially displace more meaningful participation, engagement and accountability. People’s demands, feedback and complaints shared spontaneously on aid-related issues may fall outside the scope of a narrowly defined complaints mechanism and be lost or undervalued.12

All of the interviewed stakeholders, and especially the communities, underlined the importance of trust, relationship building and direct contact as crucial for ensuring accountability. The advantages of investing in relationship building and better quality participation seemed to have a ripple effect - serving as a corrective mechanism and ensuring quality of our programme, but also increasing people’s ownership, autonomy and consequently sustainability of the project. This had an empowering effect

11 I. Jean, F. Bonino, We are committed to listen to you: World Vision’s experience with humanitarian feedback mechanisms in Darfur, ALNAP/CDA Case Study, London: ODI/ALNAP, 2013. 12 Ibid, p.30

Women at FGD in Konoo

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especially for older people who often prefer to give feedback and claim their rights through supportive structures made up of their peers. For HelpAge it meant a more effective and responsive programme, targeting those most in need.

Together with the general preference for in-person interactions the value was also placed on the complementarity of different tools and channels put at people’s disposal (as long as they did not replace less formalised mechanisms). The additional formal complaints channels were especially important for more marginalised members of the community (such as women in case of Turkana or those who are HIV positive, or living with disabilities) who might face barriers when trying to access traditional feedback mechanisms. Availability of additional channels, that are safe and confidential, encourages people to submit more sensitive complaints without fear of retribution.

Feedback loops

Currently, most visible changes can be observed at programme level. Despite a commonly held view that feedback from aid recipients is valued as essential to improving accountability, the few continuous feedback loops tend to focus on project-level information, not agency-wide policies or strategies.13 At programme level, these often result in corrections or improvements being made to a project but might not be always documented (other than through anecdotal evidence) or analysed with learning applied to other projects.

What seems to be missing is the discussion on trends that aggregated feedback and complaints might potentially provide and how this learning that can be applied in another project, e.g. high number of complaints from non-beneficiaries might require more information sharing activities to be included when designing future projects. Additionally, for the data received through complaints channels to be useful across the organisation it needs to be verified and cross-checked. Other studies focusing on

13 Ibid, p.5

Help Desk Committee members, Napusimoru

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feedback mechanisms found an explicit link between the presence of procedures that support the verification of feedback data and its analysis, and the overall well-functioning of the system.14

Including complaints and feedback from our stakeholders at the core of existing M&E systems might help facilitate this process. Furthermore, feedback mechanisms should be a part of project evaluations, looking both at the effectiveness of the chosen structure as well as patterns in feedback and potential changes it brought about. Learning from such evaluations might be useful not only when setting up complaints channels but also when designing programmes that are more responsive to people’s needs and capacities.

“Very valuable mechanism to have! Any programme at the design stage need to include grievance mechanism. It should be in every proposal! It will show value for money, as it limits mistakes, corruption, etc. and increases accountability.” Peter Ekunyuk, Turkana Programme Coordinator

Although complaints and feedback mechanisms require a degree of investment, the benefits often outweigh the costs.

Concluding remarks

The purpose of this document was to show utility and value of complaints and feedback mechanisms through a case study of Help Desk Committees in Turkana.

Overall, the findings from Turkana suggest that the particular value of complaints and feedback mechanisms lies in their dual function: as a corrective mechanism for HelpAge and as a broader community structure. The Help Desk Committees often performed a more comprehensive accountability function, encouraging participation and ownership of the project while serving as a quality-control measure.

For HelpAge, they proved useful in improving real time information and making our programme more responsive to people’s needs. This in turn, improved our relationship with communities and increased the sustainability of the project as well as our reputation. For the communities, Help Desks were not only a channel through which they could voice their concerns but also served as a community structure promoting participation, information sharing and empowering older people to hold HelpAge and other duty bearers to account.

The case study has also identified a number of good practice examples and challenges associated with setting up and managing complaints channels.

14 Ibid, p.66

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The cultural and context appropriateness of the mechanism, as well as face-to-face contact and peer support provided by the community-based structures were highlighted as particularly important. Additionally, more formalised mechanisms such as sms or phoneline will allow for sensitive complaints and for more marginalised members of the community to submit their feedback in a confidential and safe way. In Turkana, people were open to using different media to give feedback as long as they did not substitute face-to-face interactions.

While it is important to implement appropriate complaints mechanisms for different stakeholders, they are only meaningful if an adequate response is provided and the feedback received through those mechanisms is used for organisational learning and improvement (effectively ‘closing the loop’).

Feedback mechanisms should be at the heart of HelpAge programmes rather than merely an add-on. Integrating them into programme cycle will promote learning, improving project management and results, and helping to identify priorities and information on what is working in real time.