Third sector OR and developing countries: some possibilities

Third sector OR and developing countries:some possibilities Andrew Dobson [AndrewEDobson@aol.com]

Presentation to cover • 3rd sector organisations working with or in developing countries: an overview • Who, where, what? • Where might OR help? • 2 examples • Bwindi Community Hospital • Rwanda Men’s Resource Centre

3rd sector & developing countries: The variety

3rd sector & developing countries: How many 3rd sector organisations?

3rd sector & developing countries: The variety

3rd sector & developing countries: Where might OR help?

3rd sector & developing countries: 2 questions 1) Where within this complex picture might OR work have most impact? 2) If there are/were OR people working in different parts of the ‘picture’, could there be scope for collaboration to significantly improve the impacts?

Bwindi Community Hospital:Basic facts

Bwindi Community Hospital:Different types of challenge 4) Of external ‘environment’: 1) Of designing ‘outputs’ (products, services, etc) to meet purpose: 2) Of inputs: 3) Of internal operations:

Bwindi Community Hospital:Different types of challenge 4) Of external ‘environment’: • 1) Of designing ‘outputs’ (products, services, etc) to meet purpose: • Local health problems are severe • Some require joining up with other providers to tackle effectively 2) Of inputs: 3) Of internal operations:

Bwindi Community Hospital:Different types of challenge 4) Of external ‘environment’: • 1) Of designing ‘outputs’ (products, services, etc) to meet purpose: • Local health problems are severe • Some require joining up with other providers to tackle effectively • 2) Of inputs: • Both finance & staff are hard to get • A long away off self-sustainability 3) Of internal operations:

Bwindi Community Hospital:Different types of challenge 4) Of external ‘environment’: • 1) Of designing ‘outputs’ (products, services, etc) to meet purpose: • Local health problems are severe • Some require joining up with other providers to tackle effectively • 2) Of inputs: • Both finance & staff are hard to get • A long away off self-sustainability • 3) Of internal operations: • Complex operation to manage efficiently

Bwindi Community Hospital:Different types of challenge • 4) Of external ‘environment’: • Uneasy relationships with gov’t health services & traditional medical practitioners • Demands of large donors & grant-makers • Geographical remoteness • 1) Of designing ‘outputs’ (products, services, etc) to meet purpose: • Local health problems are severe • Some require joining up with other providers to tackle effectively • 2) Of inputs: • Both finance & staff are hard to get • A long away off self-sustainability • 3) Of internal operations: • Complex operation to manage efficiently

Bwindi Community Hospital: My involvement as an ‘OR intervention’

Bwindi Community Hospital: Future possibilities for OR? • A variety of future possibilities could flow from improved MI and increased organisational capacity to manage value for money • More substantial internal reviews of systems & priorities, eg: work flows within hospital, managing capacity, balance between preventative & curative work? • Involvement of organisation in broader OR studies with other organisations, eg of health care approaches of the sort that others may describe in this session? • With technological developments, there should be increasing scope for work from a distance [For more on the organisation, see: www.bwindihospital.com]

Rwanda Men’s Resource Centre:Basic facts

Rwanda Men’s Resource Centre:Different types of challenge • 1) Of designing ‘outputs’ to meet purpose: • Trying to tackle difficult problems, eg high levels of gender-based violence, and bringing about change in cultural norms not a quick job • Approaches tried elsewhere still need local adaptation • Country where people are not necessarily very open & particular sensitivity is needed in relation to violence • 4) Of external ‘environment’: • Small organisation operating in a field with many different players with different interests • 2) Of inputs: • Some parts of the work seem much harder to get funds for than others • So, problem of being driven by donors’ interests • 3) Of internal operations: • Relatively complex projects to manage, and even harder to assess whether they are working • Director has difficulty of finding time for strategic work

Rwanda Men’s Resource Centre:My involvement as an ‘OR intervention’

Rwanda Men’s Resource Centre:Future possibilities for OR? • A variety of possibilities could flow from improved monitoring & evaluation, eg use of outputs to support operational management, programme planning, and funding bids • Other modelling support to programme planning, eg in theory, epidemiology-type modelling of how cultural change might spread, for planning and business cases? • Possibly helping join up thinking across the broader international ‘network’? [For more on the organisation, see: www.rwamrec.org]

3rd sector & developing countries: 2 questions 1) Where within this complex picture might OR work have most impact? 2) If there are/were OR people working in different parts of the ‘picture’, could there be scope for collaboration to significantly improve the impacts?

Third sector OR and developing countries: some possibilities