Enhancing Programme Impact through Propel

Project Background

Driven by the pressing need to transform how organisations learn and adapt, we initiated a partnership with Terre des Hommes Burundi (TdH) last year, with a focus on pioneering a purposeful approach to learning. Confronted with significant obstacles in capturing and leveraging critical knowledge, TdH found not only a software solution in Propel but a catalyst for change. The collaboration further marked a leap towards innovative knowledge management and programme enhancement. 

The common denominator between TdH and Propel was also a shared commitment to drive meaningful, sustainable development. 

This document shares the remarkable journey and achievements and demonstrates how Propel has supported TdH Burundi in enhancing strategic knowledge capture, management, and application to catalyse organisational impact and improvement. Through detailing the transformative impact of Propel on operational efficiency, learning outcomes, and project effectiveness, we seek to inspire similar strategic innovation within the broader TdH confederation. At its core, this narrative celebrates Propel's fundamental role in cultivating a culture of continuous learning and adaptive management, setting a new standard for excellence across diverse programmatic contexts. 

Piloting Propel with TdH

The journey of Propel within Terre des Hommes (TdH) Burundi began in March 2023 with the "Programme de lutte contre la torture et les mauvais traitements", an initiative which aimed to combat torture and maltreatment. The mandate had ambitious learning agendas in order to optimise impact through and throughout the programme’s final year of operations.

Propel supported this through centralising the capture and analysis of invaluable insights. Following an eight-month piloting phase, the solution’s benefits were further leveraged in the "Réponse intégrée pour favoriser la protection et la résilience des rapatriés au Burundi." Propel provided a centralised platform for facilitating knowledge documentation and sharing of insights, best practices, and operational learnings. This approach enabled structured learning capture across projects, ensuring systematic storage and accessibility of crucial information, laying the foundation for various user cases. 

Detailed Use Cases of Propel

Use cases underscore Propel's role in enriching project outcomes, encouraging team collaboration, and fostering a culture of organisational learning. 

Each case showcases the tool's application to foster learning through capturing, organising, and applying information to refine processes, support informed decision-making, and increase programme efficiency.

Use Case: Sustainably integrating learning

The first step to improving learning practices in a project is to make them explicit and intentional. The space, capacity and resources have to be made available to support learning efforts and tools. In this regard, the starting point for TdH Burundi was to think about how to sustainably integrate Propel within their project. To do so, TdH Burundi innovatively incorporated the licensing cost of Propel into several funding proposals. This strategic move, driven by the team's direct experience with Propel's added value demonstrated commitment to structured learning. It highlighted the projects’ dedication to utilising cost-effective, innovative tools for programme improvement. 

The strategy to include Propel in funding proposals suggests a scalable model for adoption of active learning across the TdH network. It showcases the depth of TdH's commitment to continuous improvement current and potential donors and emphasises how the NGO uses innovative tools to enhance its programme outcomes. This approach could significantly attract additional resources to TdH as it highlights the organisation's strategic foresight in integrating technology in ways that support team efficiencies. 

Use Case: Capitalising on Past Project Knowledge with Propel 

One key challenge that projects face is that they do not have a central space to build project memory and build on past experience, whether that is in the field or at a regional or headquarters level. 

Projects are often implemented but lessons do not get documented – and mistakes are repeated while success drivers are lost. 

TdH Burundi's application of Propel in the programme "Programme de lutte contre la torture et les mauvais traitements" marked a major step in capturing and leveraging key learnings. These insights were subsequently strategically applied to both funding proposals and the learning agenda of follow-on projects, such as "Réponse intégrée pour favoriser la protection et la résilience des rapatriés au Burundi". What is clear is how positively the organisation’s cycle of capturing and applying past knowledge informs TdH Burundi's evolution towards being a learning organisation. 

The Knowledge Map functionality of Propel played a critical role in this process. It allowed the team to digest and visualise learnings in a centralised space, enabling efficient tracking based on chosen themes and topics. The tool therefore facilitated the strategic use of past project learnings, streamlined project design and eliminated many redundant efforts.

As a result, it can be concluded that capitalising on past project knowledge through Propel has demonstrated significant scalability potential across the TdH network. By creating a rich repository of insights, TdH offices globally can inform programme design and implementation, enhancing outcomes and operational efficiency. 

Use Case: Operational Learning Integration 

The integration of operational learnings into TdH Burundi's strategic decision-making processes via Propel marked a significant shift towards enhanced operational efficiency and a knowledge-rich environment. 

The team initially focused on programmatic learnings. The introduction of Propel simultaneously facilitated a deeper exploration into operational dynamics, particularly on topics related to partnership approaches, consortia-level operations, and the optimisation of country office systems and processes. 

While the initial project tested with Propel included a few questions focusing on operational learnings, the subsequent programme (Réponse intégrée pour favoriser la protection et la résilience des rapatriés au Burundi) delivered the strategic shift. 

Capitalising on the knowledge developed from the first implementation, the team then dedicated a significant portion of the learning agenda to operational questions. This evolution was evident eight months into the pilot phase, with staff displaying increased knowledge and ownership of the tool. The focus expanded beyond programmatic questions to embrace inquiries deeply rooted in operational strategies and methodologies. 

The systematic approach to capturing and applying operational learnings presents a scalable model for TdH programmes – both within Burundi and globally. By fostering a culture of knowledge sharing and operational excellence, Propel can facilitate the replication of successful strategies, ensuring that learnings from one context inform and enhance practices in others. This potential for scalability underscores the value of Propel as a tool for achieving operational excellence and optimal programme impact across the TdH confederation. 

User Case: Aligning with the Global Theory of Change through Propel 

A key advancement enabled through the partnership has been TdH Burundi's effort to align identified topics, not only within their own framework, but also within the pillars of TdH's Global Theory of Change, particularly on issues such as migration. 

This alignment ensured that learnings and best practices could be shared beyond the country office, which in turn contributed to the broader TdH confederation's knowledge base. 

TdH Burundi's engagement with Propel has significantly improved over time, notably through the use of the tool's topic/theme functionality during project creation. This feature allows for the categorisation of each learning question under specific themes, enabling the organisation to visualise and track learnings organisation-wide. 

By tagging learning questions with topics that resonate with the Global Theory of Change, TdH Burundi now ably facilitates the search, filter, and reuse of past learnings efficiently. The system has streamlined reporting as well as promoted global consistency and strategic coherence across TdH's international projects. It further ensures that local learnings contribute to the organisation's mission-critical objectives on a global scale.

The approach of aligning project themes with the global Theory of Change using Propel's functionalities showcases additional scalability potential. Other TdH country offices can adopt this strategy to ensure that their projects and learnings are globally coherent and contribute to a unified organisational approach to address issues such as migration. Such alignment would further foster a culture of learning, sharing, and strategic collaboration across the TdH confederation. 

Use Case: Shared Ownership and Co-creation through Propel 

The implementation of the programme "Réponse intégrée pour favoriser la protection et la résilience des rapatriés au Burundi" by the Burundi country office exemplifies the power of shared ownership and co-creation in developing learning agendas. 

During the inception phase, a Propel-facilitated workshop enabled the creation, discussion, and validation of learning questions for the three-year programme. This established a centralised platform for all team members to access and visualise the project's learning agenda. This approach fostered a sense of collective ownership among team members and partners, ensuring the learning agenda was comprehensive, relevant, and aligned with stakeholder expectations. 

The utilisation of Propel for co-creating learning agendas during the workshop underscored the importance of collaborative sessions in aligning learning objectives with project needs. This partnership culture of collective inquiry and problem-solving has contributed to streamlining the learning process and ensured that the insights gained are directly applicable to enhancing programme outcomes.

Use Case: Using Propel for Enhanced Programme Evaluation 

Evaluation of programmes often require a significant amount of capacity and resources. While evaluations are crucial to take stock of what was achieved, they are often not well connected to inform future programming. Hence, the time and resources invested might not serve the organisation in the end. The "Programme de lutte contre la torture et les mauvais traitements" has entered its external evaluation phase, leveraging Propel's capabilities to support this process. 

The strategic use of Propel has enabled the team to compile and present a robust set of data and learnings from the programme. This has included detailed insights into what worked, what did not work, and potential areas for improvement. By sharing this curated information with the external evaluator, the team consistently aims to facilitate a more informed and thorough evaluation process. 

The ability to easily export and share programme learnings through Propel has proven invaluable in enhancing the evaluation process. It allows for a more nuanced understanding of the programme's impact, challenges, and successes, contributing to more effective final reporting and recommendations for future interventions. 

Testimonies

« Propel est intégré par la délégation TdH du Burundi comme un processus numérique d’apprentissage et de capitalisation continu, sur ses projets. Piloté depuis près d’un an, Propel a été, ressenti au début, comme une tâche supplémentaire et difficile à intégrer pour les équipes, de part son aspect numérique et nouveau dans nos projets humanitaires. Quand on m’a confié de le piloter pour la délégation, c’est surtout une masse de défis que j’ai entrevus. 

Ensuite le voyage a commencé avec Andrés, heureusement il est tenance et patient, cela a bien aidé. J’ai commencé à me rendre compte de la flexibilité de Propel. Tu peux apprendre par étapes, tu n’es pas obligé de tout assimiler au même moment. Propel pouvait donc s’adapter à mon organisation de travail et à mon rythme d’apprentissage. Je pouvais aussi interagir avec Propel qui te guide tout au long, il devenait intéressant et cette capacité lui confère une dimension de légèreté importante. Propel te challenge sur ce que tu souhaiterais garder de ton projet, tu es par conséquent, obligé de réfléchir sur un autre aspect du projet que sur son opérationnalisation. Je pouvais oublier la routine et travailler différemment avec le projet. Propel capture ce que tu as appris et te permet de le communiquer simplement, le résumer et en déduire ce qui est le plus important pour toi. 

De ce parcours, aujourd’hui à mi-chemin, qui n’a pas été individuel, qui a bénéficié de l’accompagnement bienveillant des cadres et de l’implication et appropriation des équipes à différents niveaux, Tdh Burundi est plus à l’aise et outillée pour notre deuxième projet avec Propel. 

Comme 5 mots clés sur Propel, ce serait : simplification, innovant, motivation, envie d’apprendre et engagement. » 

Translation:

Propel has been integrated by the TdH Burundi delegation as a digital process for continuous learning and capitalisation across its projects. Having been piloted for nearly a year, Propel was initially perceived as an additional task that was difficult for teams to integrate, due to its digital nature and its novelty within our humanitarian projects. When I was entrusted with leading its implementation for the delegation, what I mainly saw at first were challenges.

Then the journey began with Andrés. Fortunately, he is persistent and patient, which helped a great deal. I started to realise how flexible Propel is. You can learn step by step; you are not required to absorb everything at once. Propel could therefore adapt to my work organisation and my learning pace. I could also interact with Propel, which guides you throughout the process. It became engaging, and this ability gives it an important sense of lightness. Propel challenges you on what you would like to retain from your project, which means you are compelled to reflect on aspects of the project beyond its operational implementation. I could step away from routine and work with the project differently. Propel captures what you have learned and allows you to communicate it simply, summarise it, and draw out what is most important to you.

From this journey, now at the halfway point, which was not an individual process and benefited from the supportive guidance of management as well as the involvement and ownership of teams at different levels, TdH Burundi is more at ease and better equipped for our second project with Propel.

If I had to describe Propel in five key words, they would be: simplification, innovation, motivation, desire to learn, and engagement.

Mylène NTAMATUNGIRO 

Learnings

Before concluding, it is important to acknowledge several challenges encountered during the implementation of Propel at Terre des Hommes Burundi. The expansion of the team necessitated periodic refresher training to ensure that all members could effectively use Propel. 

Additionally, there was a need to adapt the guidelines into French to cater to the linguistic preferences of the team, which enhanced usability and comprehension.In the initial months, embedding Propel into daily workflows proved complex, partly due to the tool being available solely in English. This language barrier presented difficulties for some staff members. Notably, the introduction of AI summarisation in French in December 2023 delivered a significant dimension of support, making Propel more accessible and user-friendly. 

These challenges have underscored the importance of viewing learning as an investment which extends beyond the immediate implementation of activities. They have also highlighted the necessity to prioritise the adaptation of tools to fit the diverse needs of programmes, country offices, and the organisational structure as a whole. Despite these hurdles, our commitment to integrating and maximising the benefits of Propel remains steadfast as we continue to refine our approach to learning and programme enhancement – and impactful and relevant in the universe of Terre des Hommes.

Conclusion

Terre des Hommes Burundi's strategic deployment of Propel has shown a pivotal shift towards a more innovative, structured approach to knowledge management, learning, and programme improvement. The user case highlights a clear trajectory of enhanced operational efficiency, collaborative learning, and strategic decision-making facilitated by Propel. 

Through these varied applications, Propel has supported individual project successes and laid the groundwork for replicating these benefits across the broader TdH network. The scalability of these practices—ranging from funding proposal integration to global Theory of Change alignment—illustrates the potential of the platform to become an integral part of TdH's operations at country, regional, and global levels. 

As a hub for capturing, documenting, using, and disseminating both programmatic and operational learnings, Propel is testament to TdH Burundi's commitment to continuous improvement and organisational effectiveness. The journey of the partnership to date has been one that demonstrates the transformative power of organisational learning in achieving operational excellence and programme impact – setting a benchmark for other TdH entities to follow.