Management Response

: Multi-Country Office for the Pacific (Fiji)
: 2016 - 2016 , Multi-Country Office for the Pacific (Fiji) (MCO)
: END OF PROJECT EVALUATION OF THE EC STRONGIM MERE: PROMOTING WOMEN’S POLITICAL PARTICIPATION AND REPRESENTATION IN THE SOLOMON ISLANDS (2014 – 2016)
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: Multi-Country Office for the Pacific (Fiji)
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The evaluation report for the Strongim Mere Project was completed in 2016 and did not satisfy the Fiji Multi-Country Office. Working together with the Regional Evaluation Specialist at the time (2016), the Fiji MCO provided extensive feedback to the evaluation team, indicating that the report did not meet UN Women quality standards and asking the evaluation team to make significant changes. The Fiji MCO offered the evaluation team to proceed to a no-cost extension of their contract to allow them to do this. The evaluation team however refused to make any substantive revision to the report and refused the contract extension. Subsequently, the project manager moved on from UN Women and the office was left with a poor quality report that we cannot use with confidence. Nevertheless, we have provided a management response indicating how the recommendations fed into programming efforts. The Strongim Mere project was one of the first longer terms focused project ran by UN Women in the Pacific on Women's Political Empowerment and Leadership. As such, it gave way to a number of lessons learned that we used in subsequent programming in the same space. In particular, the Strongim Mere project confirmed that programming around women's political participation needed to be for an extended period going over a full electoral cycle and accompany women candidates whether successful or not; it also confirmed that training packages needed to be calibrated to the specific needs of women candidates in each situation, and that social norms change interventions were key to changing the hearts and minds of the broader population on women's leadership. The project was not continued in Solomon Islands, where UN Women instead focused in partnership with the government on promoting alternative modes of leadership for women rather than being focused solely on elections. The project did however serve as model for programming on WEPL in Samoa.
: Approved
Recommendation: 1. Future programmes adopt an action-learning approach to programme design that encourages programme iterations where needed, but ensures that are they documented and used to enhance programme learning
Management Response: All projects developed by UN Women in the Pacific include a learning component allowing the project to be adapted in consultation with the project board where and when necessary.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Relevance
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Ensure that all projects developed by the Fiji MCO include a learning component allowing the project to be adapted in consultation with the project board where and when necessary. project managers 2016/12 Completed
Recommendation: 2. Care is taken to ensure that programme outcomes and indicators are realistic, relevant and measurable
Management Response: The new projects in the field of women's leadership and political participation were developed using a result based programming model
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Relevance
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Ensure that new projects in the field of women's leadership and political participation are developed using a result based programming model project managers 2019/02 Completed This was applied to the 2 new Women in Leadership projects in Samoa as well as to the 2 new peacebuilding projects in the Solomon ISlands
Recommendation: 3. That UN Women continue to use South-South exchanges to promote knowledge sharing and exchange on improving women’s political participation
Management Response: Agreed and UN Women did continue with South South exchanges including a regional conference held in September 2016 to compile lessons learned from programming in this space which included a wide range of stakeholders and all development partners.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Relevance
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Organize regional learning conference on WEPL programming in the Pacific Deputy Representative 2016/12 Completed The Conference was organized in the Fall of 2016
Recommendation: 4. That UN Women continue to use radio dramas and dialogues as an advocacy tool to promote dialogue about women’s political participation in Solomon Islands;
Management Response: UN Women did not continue with a similar program on WEPL in Solomon Islands but did adapt the radio drama for a parallel project in Samoa.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Relevance
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Include a social norms component in future programming on WEPL Program managers 2016/12 Completed The radio drama was included as part of the new Women's leadership in Samoa project
Recommendation: 5. In future programming, communications products are initially produced in the common language of the intended audience (e.g. Solomons Pijin) and then translated into English (instead of vice versa);
Management Response: While it is essential to have material for beneficiaries in their own languages the sequence of production and translation will depend on the programmatic context. For instance in some cases, it may be that global products and documents are used as a basis and then translated from English whereas in other cases, products may be developed directly in local language.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Partially Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Relevance
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Ensure that programmatic documents destined for beneficiaries are available in local language project managers 2016/12 Completed All the UN Women projects in the Pacific include material drafted or translated in the local languages. In Samoa, the radio drama was rewritten entirely by a Samoan novelist and dramaturge to ensure it was not simply a translation but drafted with a Samoan angle.
Recommendation: 6. The Transformational Leadership training manual be revised and updated, taking into account feedback from trainers and participants and incorporating locally relevant examples.
Management Response: The Fiji MCO agrees that transformational leadership trainings need to be improved and tailored to the needs of the participants. This is valid not just for the TL training manual but for all training developed for women candidates.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Relevance
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Ensure that training material developed for women candidate are tailored to their specific needs project managers 2019/02 Completed UN WOmen has not led any new training for candidates since this evaluation report. UNder the Joint Programs with UNDP in Samoa this is indeed led by UNDP. As a project partner UN Women has however worked with UNDP to ensure the training materials were localized and relevant for a Samoan audience.
Recommendation: 7. Engaging men as champions of women’s political participation should be done so with a clear purpose, and involve separate and specifically designed programmes
Management Response: UN Women agrees entirely that engaging men and boys around projects supporting women's political participation should be done with a clear theory of change and clearly designed and measurable interventions and not just as a gimmick.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Effectiveness
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Ensure that were UN Women programming on WEPL includes men and boys ,there is a clear ToC governing the intervention project managers 2017/12 No Longer Applicable UN Women has not developed since this recommendation any programming focusing on men and boys for WEPL
Recommendation: 8. Identification of aspiring female candidates should be done in partnership with community leaders and organisations
Management Response: While it is essential that communities and local organizations be stakeholders in all programming in country, UN Women disputes that these organizations or local leaders should be choosing which women should or should not be candidates and benefit from project activities. It is essential that project focus on giving all women a chance to come forward in this respect, whether or not they have the support from their community leaders (who most often are men). It is much more essential however to ensure that project activities aimed at promoting WEPL focus on helping women candidates to connect with their local communities and organizations.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Partially Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Effectiveness
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Ensure that local communities are involved in the design of projects on WEPL project managers 2017/12 Completed The two SAmoa Joint Projects on WEPL and the two Solomon Islands JP on Peacebuilding all have closely involved local communities and organziations in their design and implementation
Recommendation: 9. UN Women continue to work with political parties to ensure that they provide meaningful support to female candidates.
Management Response: UN Women agrees that working with political parties is one of the important channels to work on WEPL in Solomon Islands. This work is however led at the moment by UNDP and any UN Women project in the field would ensure complimentary rather than automatically taking on the work with political parties itself.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Partially Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Effectiveness
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Coordinate with UNDP and their work with political parties in Solomon Islands in any new programming on WEPL in Solomon Islands project managers 2017/12 Completed The two new Joint Projects with UNDP on peacebuilding in Solomon Islands ensure that the work done by UNDP with political parties is closely aligned with the JPs
Recommendation: 10. Where capacity exists, goods and services should be procured locally. To enable this, a wider range of local organisations and businesses should be registered as vendors on the UN system.
Management Response: UN Women agrees with this finding and systematically favors and prioritizes finding and working with local service providers. Registration as UN vendors does however require strict conditions which are not up for UN Women to waive. In addition, UN Women has a duty to ensure value for money at a Pacific level.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Efficiency
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Continue to engage local service providers as a matter of priority project managers 2017/12 Completed The Fiji MCO continues to engage local service providers where they meet the requirements to be registered as local vendors in atlas and where they apply to procurement exercises
Recommendation: 11. UN Women should consider working more intensively with a smaller number of individuals and/or in few locations where change is most possible;
Management Response: UN Women agrees that in certain circumstances programming may benefit from being focused and initiated in some locations to test interventions that may then later be scaled up.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Impact
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
If advisable based on the context consider starting WEPL programming in Solomon Islands at a smaller scale which could later on be scaled up project managers 2017/12 Completed The two new JP on peacebuilding in Solomon Islands, focused on 3 provinces only as a way to ensure more catalytic and focused change.
Recommendation: 12. If candidate training programmes are used, female candidates who are unsuccessful in their campaigns should be provided support post-election, including de-briefing and if necessary, support to re-enter the workforce.
Management Response: UN Women entirely agrees with this finding which it has shared widely as one of the most important lessons learned from programming in the WPEL field.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Impact
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Ensure that new projects on WEPL include a component aimed at supporting candidates who have not succeeded in being elected project managers 2017/12 Completed The two new JP on WEPL in Samoa include activities focusing on women candidates after the elections
Recommendation: 13. In future programming, all implementing partners should be engaged in a formal MOU or partnership agreement from the outset of the project, which clearly sets out the roles and responsibilities of each organisation.
Management Response: UN Women agrees and in fact, programmatic partners are always connected to projects through LoAs or PCAs.
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Description:
Management Response Category: Accepted
Thematic Area: Leadership and political participation (SPs before 2018)
Operating Principles: National ownership
Organizational Priorities: Operational activities
UNEG Criteria: Sustainability
Key Actions
Responsible Deadline Status Comments
Continue contracting programmatic partners through LoAs and PCAs project managers 2017/12 Completed THe Fiji MCO ensures that all its partners are contracted through the proper UN modality