What is Capacity Building?

UNDP (1991) describes Capacity Building as "the creation of an enabling environment with appropriate policy and legal frameworks, institutional development, including community participation (of women in particular), human resources development and strengthening of managerial systems"

Capacity Building is about creating a "learning" organisation and its much more that just training. Training is only one of several possible interventions and perhaps the easiest part. Capacity Building includes the following (Wikipedia) human resources development, organizational development and institutional and legal framework development.

The changing environment forces organisations to constantly identify and meet new challenges. Each has their typical challenges to cope with. Dynamic components among others are economic, technology, politics, social, etc - all these determine what kind of services and activities are expected from private and public sector organisations. The changes fast enough as the expert says becoming a quantum leap especially in technology.

Capacity Building bridging present conditions with what is expected by the organisations by driving organisation's capacity to do what it takes to achieve the expected objective. Capacity Building is similar to Capacity Development (that was a term launched after WW2) are having same idea,  is a process that simultaneously takes place at three different leves:

1. 
   
2. individual level
   
3. organisational level, and
   
4. the systemic/social level
   

Each level is linked to another either directly or indirectly. Thus, the success of certain level changes to meet the challenge requires changes from other level as necessary. The question is where do the organisation start to make the changes is essential question and not all organisations knows the answer. Capacity Building approach helps the organisation to identify not only where to start but also the rest of 5W1H question for the organisations to achieve expected objective by necessary changes at each level.

Until next time - Be wise, Be successful!