There are good reasons to talk about “capacity development” or “capacity building”. Most of the time, that’s not the way I think about my work. Some of that is just a reaction because it seems like jargon to me. I don’t like jargon, though I’m as guilty of using it as everyone else is.
There are ways that thinking in terms of capacity development (or building, or strengthening… which we will get back to!) makes it harder to get to the heart of the performance problems that you’re trying to fix. That’s what this article is about.
Reason One – Makes it less clear what you’re doing – to yourself and others
Most of the time, when humanitarian organisations talk about capacity development, they are running training. When you don’t come right out and say that, it gets in the way of your thinking and planning. This is not such a critical problem in the humanitarian world, because we use “capacity building” and “training” as precise synonyms 95+% of the time. If you learned English through working in the sector, you might be surprised to learn that there’s a word “training” that means the same thing as “capacity building”!
Language puritans annoy me. I’m not suggesting this is bad simply because it’s a different or new use of the words. The problem is that it disguises what you will actually do in your planning (and in your mind). Clarity is good! You need different resources if you’re running training courses than if you’re doing an open-ended programme of coaching and accompaniment. Don’t fool yourself that you’re doing something different. Say what you mean.
Reason Two – Devalues training
Training without other changes rarely solve performance problems. I do not believe that training fixes all the problems people hope it will – even though it would be a lot better for my income if it did. Or even if I was just someone who believed that!
But training is important. Training is needed. The first time you’re asked to complete a logframe, you need to be trained how to do it. That training might look different in different situations. But you can’t do the task without some training. If we don’t train people then there are going to be a lot of people who can’t do their jobs, and the systems won’t work.
The humanitarian sector tends to undertrain people on the actual skills that they need to do their jobs (running focus groups, creating budgets, negotiating with suppliers). And it often overtrains them on theories, frameworks or new initiatives.
Running training on Accountability to Affected People as a general concept won’t get you a lot of results. But if people are trained on how to respond well to complaints they receive through Feedback and Complaints Mechanisms, things can get better.
When it is the right answer, training should be enough. It doesn’t need to be dressed up as something grander. Helping people do their jobs right, whether they are Country Directors or finance clerks is noble. You don’t need to pretend it’s something else for it to be worthwhile.
Reason Three – Makes you think about vague “capacities”
There are a lot of important elements captured in the word “capacity”. Sometimes when we’re talking about capacity, we just mean having enough money! Sometimes we mean the numbers of staff. Often we mean skills.
It’s great to think holistically. When I do a performance analysis, I take that big picture. But it’s not straightforward to keep all these elements clear in your mind, or plan for them.
When you’re going to be designing training anyway (and a lot of the time, that’s what we mean by capacity development), you need to be very specific. You don’t want to present a list of good things to do in a WASH project. You want to tackle specific skills like where to install lighting for a given design of toilets and washing facilities. When you think about capacity, it can guide you away from the concrete questions of what people actually need to do on their job – and what they struggle doing. You want to think about concrete skills, tasks and actions. Then, you can focus on practicing them and getting better at them.
Reason Four – Makes you think about abstract potential, not current skill
This is closely related to reason three. The word capacity sounds a lot like people’s potential to do a job or task. Lots of people have great capacity for work. But that doesn’t mean that they can do the task well. I have the capacity to do pivot tables in Excel – but if you give me a data set, I’ll have to relearn how to do it.
It’s not insulting to provide training to people who could do a task, but can’t right now. It’s helpful! You want to focus on what people’s current level of skill or performance is – and how that’s different from what you need or expect it to be.
Reason Five – It doesn’t live up to its billing, so don’t say it!
The language you use should communicate what you need it to. Languages are not static. But they need to function too – you need to communicate. One big part of that is using the right words.
When it comes to capacity development, it’s very unusual to actually be revising tools, systems and procedures. You’re running training.
To be fair, sometimes you are buying computers or generators for local partners, and that does help their capacity. But I’d still prefer to find a clearer way to talk about it. I understand if you’re trying to make things sound good for your donors – but don’t lie to yourself and everyone else.
There’s a related contradiction, too. On one hand most training that’s run as part of “capacity development” programmes is presentations based on what an expert wants to say. It’s almost never looking at what the group can do and then helping them build from there. It’s top-down and supply driven.
And at the same time, “capacity development” is a very humble phrase. That’s one of its strengths. And it can push some trainers to be overly humble! As a trainer, you do have to focus on others, where they need and what you can do to support that. And to make any of that work, you have to value your own ability to get them there.
It’s OK to believe that it’s not just a process of self-discovery – you have a lot to add that will help them get further, quicker.
Reason Six – Creates pointless debates about the right (English) words to use
This reason is the least substantial, which is one reason why it’s last! But I’ve seen it create annoyance and dissatisfaction with “capacity development” programmes – and with the people who run them.
What started as an attempt to find more gentle or respectful language to describe training (and performance improvement more generally) got pulled into discussions about whether “capacity building” is insulting and whether “capacity strengthening” is more respectful than “capacity development”. Possibly there’s some new nuance to this debate that I’m not aware of. In any case, it doesn’t help and it’s not worth spending time on it. Here’s why.
More than 10 years ago, I was driving back to Beirut with a Danish friend and we were talking about a meeting she’d been in where this debate had broken out. And she had to step in and tell the people to just write down one because as soon as you translate it, the debate vanishes.
In many, many languages you’ll translate each of them the same way. These are minor nuances or implications that only affect native or very high-level English users and are meaningless to the majority of people that work in the humanitarian sector. And in fact, what you do is create confusion.
In this article I’ve been using “capacity development” as I hear (this is how out of touch I am!) that this is the phrase that’s in the ascendance. But throughout my career I’ve generally talked about “capacity building” when I needed to.
And when I mean training, I try to say training. It’s a discussion that doesn’t add anything, and one that you don’t need to be in. Thinking in terms of capacity development is not helping, if this is the discussion you get into!
Use the phrase capacity development when it helps you communicate, certainly. Absolutely use it if it’s going to get your project money that you need! But be clear on what you mean, and beware of the ways it can guide you away from the concrete skills you normally need to focus on for people to do their jobs better.
