How donor requirements shape project outputs and outcomes : a small NGO’s experience

Abstract

In the field of development assistance and humanitarian aid work, donor requirements can often stifle the effectiveness and efficiency of a project or program. This can be especially true for organizations of smaller size that do not have the capacity to handle high administrative requirements, international procurement procedures, or complex non-standard technical designs. The result of these donor requirements can be an overburdened implementing organization that struggles to meet the agreed upon project outcomes while maintaining their own flexibility to navigate the local contextual environment. This paper examines how specific donor requirements affect the project’s outputs and outcomes. In order to do this, I will examine projects completed by Solbakken (SBK) from 2014 – 2018, identify the donor requirements for each project and determine if they affected the project outputs and outcomes. During the organization’s five years of operation, fifteen projects were implemented that were funded by five different donor organizations. Each donor organization had different requirements that created challenges and demanded different levels of attention and capacity. Donor requirements that divert resources is not a unique occurrence, but normally discussed in relation to government agencies or large international non-governmental organizations (INGO)s, not small local nongovernmental organizations (NGO)s. This paper attempts to show how these donor requirements affect projects in practical and observable ways.