Capacity building

In Romania we helped develop the capacity of the Water Training Centre to assist municipalities and companies in preparing environmental projects and securing fundingSpreading ownership and understanding to foster sustainable planning and development processes while establishing consensus and managing expectations – that’s at the heart of Mott MacDonald’s approach to capacity building and institutional strengthening.

We believe the key is empowering people through building trust, sharing ideas and providing opportunities to develop themselves under a guiding hand. We’ve been applying these principles in working alongside central and local government across eastern Europe, Asia and Africa to support sustainable improvements to service delivery, project preparation and professional development.

A major advantage we offer at Mott MacDonald is that through our various specialist teams we not only embrace the social, institut-ional and infrastructural dimensions of development, we do it with a deep insight into local and regional issues and aspirations that’s born of practical experience, close working relationships, comm-unity participation and stakeholder engagement. As a result, we support customer organisations in achieving solutions that are inclusive, sustainable and appropriate.

We have a long history of strengthening institutions though project implementation units, training programmes and a wide range of capacity development programmes. Because we firmly believe in promoting management systems that foster and facilitate ownership and responsibility where it belongs, we focus energies into building on existing capabilities and strengths, promoting dialogue and constructive exchange of views and consulting with a wide variety of stakeholders, from community user groups to NGOs.

Increasing government decentralisation in many countries means enabling municipalities to develop their own infrastructure improvement capability. We’re experienced in helping them enhance understanding of the project cycle, project preparation process and requirements of the funding institutions so they can secure the necessary finance. Here we have a particularly strong track record in the environment and water sectors where as part of helping increase the quality and number of project proposals prepared for consideration by funding agencies we’ve provided specialist support in areas such as master planning, quality assurance and control, environmental impact assessment and economic analysis. We’ve also assisted in establishing principles of cost-efficiency and corporate planning along with new approaches to sustainable financial management, customer service and environmentally friendly operational practices.

Workshops and consultation sessions are a key tool in our approach, together with training and study tours to help institutions modernise work practices and ensure effective implementation of the improvement programmes they’re working on. We’re also experienced in using workshops to bring together parties with differences, to help them discuss the difficulties and take joint ownership for developing ways forward.

We’re skilled in using modern participatory techniques, often working with local partners to create a core of professionals from the institution as trainers, incorporating their skills into the course design process and thus ensuring a sustainable, continuously improving programme of knowledge transfer. We also assist in setting up systems to determine human resource development needs and establish the financial and administrative capacity to implement projects.

Combining our strong belief in the power of partnership with the wealth of expertise we have readily available, we collaborate with local partners in capacity building, develop and share our knowledge in different sectors and support the professional development of national and internal advisors and policy makers.