The consortium of LightBox Limited (LightBox), Busara Center for Behavioral Economics (Busara), and the Advocacy Accelerator (the Accelerator) works together to help form communities of stakeholders and communities of practice who will learn from one another in a mutual, locally owned and sustainable process. The consortium will enable this through storytelling and communication, research and use of evidence in advocacy and development of the linking and learning platform to allow efficient knowledge sharing and linking of partners while at the same time being highly responsive as a resource that supports peer-to-peer learning and addresses the areas of improvement support that will have been identified through the stakeholder mapping.

Cross learning between grantee partners for knowledge and skills transfer 

This project worked together to help form communities of stakeholders and communities of practice who will learn from one another in a mutual, locally owned and sustainable process. This was to be achieved through storytelling and communication, research and use of evidence in advocacy and development of the linking and learning platform to allow efficient knowledge sharing and linking of partners. At the same time, the platform will be highly responsive as a resource that supports peer-to-peer learning and addresses the areas of improvement support that will have been identified through the stakeholder mapping. As the initial facilitators of Linking and Learning in Kenya and Tanzania, one of the main results was the development of the Voice platform that was used to facilitate inter-country linking and learning. This platform brought together grantees from all thematic groups across Kenya and Tanzania to engage on topics of interest by linking and learning on the platform. 

Advocacy Accelerator  initiated  the  development  of  the  platform  using  insights  from research  results  conducted  by  Busara.  This  round  of  data  collection  was motivated  by the  need  to  understand  the  different  needs  and  platform  design features that would appeal to the various grantee partners groups. Once the first prototype of the  Voice platform was developed, there was an immediate need to test the various platform   features   with   its   users.   To   achieve   this, Advocacy Accelerator established an advisory group comprising a sub-set of grantees from some of the thematic groups from both Kenya and Tanzania. 

“I’m grateful that I am part of the Kenya Voice grantee network as it gave me an opportunity to apply and be sponsored for the Monitoring & Evaluation Advocacy Training that focused on Designing Theory of Change for Advocacy and Capacity Building Programmes” –Felix Lekurchalan, Project Officer, Network Empowering Samburu Transformation (NEST). 

The  linking  and  learning  facilitators  also  created  WhatsApp  groups  for  Kenya and Tanzania. While Advocacy Accelerator worked to update the Voice platform following  the  feedback from  the  Advisory  group  and  platform  review  prototype session,  there  was  an  increasing need  to  have  a  medium  of  communication (following  low  communication  at  the  2019 Indaba)  and  linking  and  learning  for the multiple grantee clusters in Kenya and Tanzania. WhatsApp emerged as the most  viable  option  since  it  is  easy  to  use,  secure  and  most grantees  were already  using  the  platform.  Over time, the WhatsApp groups have been embraced as a key communication tool to share project information, updates on new content on the platform as well as discussions on social issues. 

One of the key takeaways from this facilitative process was understanding the grantees perception and preferences. We came to realise that grantees prefer linking and learning sessions that are thematically organised around their focus areas. While the learning sessions previously conducted attracted participation from grantees in all thematic groups, the grantees feel that the knowledge exchange can be highly leveraged when the organisation of the learning sessions is based on their thematic groups. This will enable them to adequately address their learning needs, enhance peer linking and increase their ability to conduct more target group led advocacy. 

The culmination of this work was the Paza Festival bringing together grantees from both Kenya and Tanzania under the theme, “A Socially Acceptable World”, to have the public engage with the themes. The festival was organised by LBx Africa.  

The project faced start up challenges due to issues with systematic technique of on-boarding grantee partners clusters, challenges with running the link and learn activities for gender and sexual minorities in Tanzania and of course the global disruption by COVID 19.