Expression of Interest at Creative Associates International

Creative Associates International provides outstanding, on-the-ground development services and forges partnerships to deliver sustainable solutions to global challenges. Its experts focus on building inclusive educational systems, transitioning communities from conflict to peace, developing sustainable economic growth, engaging youth, promoting transparent elections and more. Creative is recognized for its ability to quickly adapt and excel in conflict and post-conflict environments.

• Generally, in Nigeria, Community-Based Organizations (CBOs) and Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) play a critical role in addressing important issues in communities, like food insecurity, poverty, conflict prevention, education, inter-religious dialogue, and CVE. A mapping of CSOs carried in the Northeast in 2017 revealed the proliferation of young and emerging community-based groups, associations, and organizations involved in some great work in the region. These organizations are acknowledged by the government and communities as important partners when designing effective strategies to counter the threat of conflict and violent extremism, and efforts to build social cohesion.
• However, Northeast Connection recognizes that often due to underfunding, many local organizations lack the strong operational and management systems required to effectively manage and implement activities and programs according to the standards and satisfaction of many donors. Most of these organizations are in need of technical and operational capabilities to function properly and serve as viable vehicles for increasing community resilience and delivering essential support to more underserved and vulnerable hinterland communities.
• Therefore, NE Connection is implementing a comprehensive capacity building activity that seeks to institutionalize learning. Unlike the traditional approach of organizing periodic capacity building training events, this carefully crafted capacity development effort focuses on providing targeted organizational development assistance and tailored coaching and training to CSOs in the NE with an emphasis on creating more organizational sustainability.
• This activity directly contributes to NE Connection’s key program outcome of affecting Change in Institutional Capacities of CSOs, which means creating positive shifts in the structures and capacities of CSOs to ultimately strengthen their ability to design, implement and monitor locally led conflict mitigation and resilience building.

• Phase 1 (approximately 1 month): Establish Activity Foundations. During this phase, a team of dedicated organizational development (OD) consultants will work with each selected CSO to conduct participatory self-assessments using USAID’s Organizational Capacity Assessments (OCAs) tool. After the assessments are completed, the consultants will work with each CSO to develop a capacity building action plan that will be used to identify and prioritize areas of systems improvement, training needs, and support to develop management capacity areas such as governance/leadership structures and financial, organizational, and project management, etc.
• Phase 2 (approximately 3 months): Implement Capacity Building Action Plans. During this phase, each CSO will become a part of a CSO cohort in their state and be assigned an Anchor organization, which is a well-qualified mentoring organization that is based or experienced in the BAY states and seeks to play an enduring role in strengthening local communities in the NE region. CSOs will receive one-on-one support from their Anchor organization to implement their capacity building action plan, ensuring the right training, coaching and mentoring is provided to address key the capacity gaps identified during the OCAs. At this stage Anchor organizations will work closely with OD consultants to provide tailored support and technical oversight to CSOs in three (3) ways:
  • Improve organizational development, including operational systems and financial management
  • Improve grant proposal development knowledge and abilities
  • Improve technical capacity and activity development.
• Phase 3 (approximately 6 months): Intensive Mentoring, Coaching, and Activity Implementation. By this stage, organizations are expected to apply to grants and/or implement activities (a minimum of one) having fully completed phase 1 and 2. The organizations may apply to NE Connection’s Annual Program Statement (APS) for a chance to receive a small grant through the open and competitive process. However, to fulfill requirements under this phase they may alternatively apply to grants from other donors or implement community or privately funded activities. Throughout this phase, Anchor organizations will provide intensive and dedicated coaching and mentoring to support concept/grant proposal development, project management and implementation, project performance monitoring, and reporting. This will help CSOs apply what they have learned. This is also a shared learning and networking stage during which Anchor organizations will organize exchanges between CSOs or support networking forums to facilitate learning and exchange of knowledge. By the end of this phase, an OCA survey will be conducted with each organization to gauge improvement and change from phase one.Each organization that successfully completes all three phases will be awarded with a graduation certificate.

N/B: This capacity building activity heavily emphasizes learning by doing. As such, CSOs that are selected to participate are encouraged to continue working on their active projects and to seek new opportunities throughout the phases. Each phase will be conducted in such a way that will enable CSOs to continue their daily work and planning, while receiving coaching and training support that they can apply in real time.

• Community Based Organizations (CBOs)
• Civil Society Organizations (CSOs)
• Community, Youth, or Women Associations
• Faith-based organizations (FBOs).

• Must be based in one the BAY states
• Must have or be in the process of legal registration with any of the following: local, state, or federal government of Nigeria
• Must have one of the following: a vision, a mission, or core values that aligns with community works around any of the following areas, including peacebuilding/conflict mitigation, women empowerment, youth engagement or entrepreneurship, countering violence extremism (CVE), reintegration, social cohesion, community development, civil society advocacy, community resilience, or related thematic areas.
• Must have at least a basic staffing structure of a minimum of five (05) number of staff (no more than 30% should be part-time or volunteers).
• Must have a functional bank account
• Must have previous experience implementing grants, community projects or other activities

• Must be based in one of the BAY states.
• Must have legal registration with local, state, or federal government of Nigeria entities, such as corporate affairs commission (CAC) or EFCC/SCUMUL certification to operate
• Must have a functional bank account and some financial management systems or processes
• Must have a vision, mission, OR values statements that aligns with community work around any of the following areas, including peace-building/conflict mitigation, women empowerment, youth engagement or entrepreneurship, countering violence extremism (CVE), reintegration, social cohesion, community development, civil society advocacy, community resilience, or related thematic areas.
• Must have a staffing structure with a minimum of eight (8) staff (no more than 30% should be part-time or volunteers).
• Must have previous experience implementing donor-funded grants, projects, or other activities.

• Participate in the entire spectrum of the Capacity Building program to be eligible to apply to the annual program statement (APS) grant mechanism
• Provide enough time for staff to attend trainings and other capacity building events, including Executive Directors/Team Leads that will be well engaged
• Sign a declaration of commitment and nominate two (02) focal staff who will remain points of contact throughout the spectrum of this capacity building intervention
• Positively collaborate with other CSOs during the Capacity Building process, remain supportive and share from organizational experience and learning.
• Actively look for opportunities to support or coordinate with community members and leaders especially during the mentoring, activity development, and implementation stage

• A Cover Letter expressing clearance to apply for a slot in either the Tier 1 or Tier 2 cohort of this intervention – on letter-headed and signed by the Executive Director / CEO. (One page max)
• Complete the organizational Expression of Interest biodata form with relevant and updated details as required. All fields should be filled out per the instructions. Include any other proof documents as needed to certify the organization meets the minimum qualifications for eligibility.
• An essay of not more than 1000 words (or three pages max) that answers succinctly the following questions:
  • Why they want to participate in this opportunity
  • What they will bring to share with other peer organizations
  • What they hope to gain from the process
  • How they intend to apply learning after the support.
• Completed Past Performance or Reference Sheets
• Organization “declaration of commitment” to participate throughout the three phases of the NE Connection Capacity Building Program. This should be written on letterhead and signed by ED/CEO (One page max).