Meeting CEE Trust goals

• The Trust in the CR:

• Impacts and Achievements
  • Overall impacts
  • Meeting CEE Trust goals
• Program Map
• Program Components
  • Creating Favorable Environment for NGOs
  • Creating Favorable Environment for Advocacy and Public Policy
  • Institutional Support for NGOs
  • Knowledge Fund
  • Consultants’ Guild
  • Strenghtening Regional Foundations
  • Model Community and Regional Projects
  • Ensuring Access to the EU funding
  • Increasing Support from the Private Sector
  • Increasing Support from Individuals
• Program In Spotlight
  • CEET in facts and figures
  • CEET in the eyes of grantees
  • CEET in stories
  • CEET in pics
• Annotated Summary of Grants( pdf 153 kB)

Meeting CEE Trust goals

• Enabling Environment
• NGO capacity
• Sustainability

NGO Capacity

The CEE Trust Objective: Strengthening the nonprofit sector through institutional capacity building

Background

In the first decade after the fall of communism, Czech NGOs were operating in what is known as a "project culture" environment. Most projects were donor-driven and donor-inspired. NGOs lived from one grant to another. Far too often, they implemented projects just because there was funding, rather than projects of their own choice that would better fit their mission. Far too often, they started up new programs only to help cover their running costs. The situation did not motivatee strategic thinking about their own organizational development and long-term sustainability. When the major international donors withdrew from the region, the funding picture dramatically changed., The organizational and financial instability of individual NGOs hasbecome a major threat for the survival of many civil society initiatives that were successfully introduced in the 1990's. Many NGOs badly felt the pressing need for organizational change, but did not do anything about it because they were too deeply immersed in their search for securing grants to ensure their day-to-day living. The CEE Trust program has provided them with both the incentive and opportunity to face these challenges.

At the same time, the Czech NGO sector infrastructure and networks were under-developed compared to the neighboring CEE countries. Czech NGOs did not have a history of successful joint action projects similar to, for example, the Slovak NGO campaign prior to the parliamentary elections in 1998. Most umbrella organizations were relatively weak; the services provided to NGOs were insufficient in terms of accessibility, range and quality, and specialized think tanks and consultants were lacking.

Program response:

In order to foster the NGO capacity, the CEE Trust program worked with individual NGOs, the NGO sector at large, as well as individual consultants. The capacity of individual NGOs was addressed through institutional development programs serving various types of organizations. They offered a combination of planning grants, technical assistance and financial support. The programming adressing the overall capacity of the Czech NGO sector consisted of two interlinked phases: a research phase mapping the "blank spots" in the NGO sector and the state of civil society in the Czech Republic; and the grantmaking phase, whichaimed to fill in the identified gaps. The expertise-building through investing into individuals consisted primarily of operating activities supporting networking and experience-sharing, providing access to education, publications and case studies. In general, the program intentionally provided a platform for NGO consultants and other experts so that they could take the lead and shape the program activities on their own.

The program activities produced significant achievements:

• CEET programming highlighted the importance and beneficial impacts of institutional capacity building (i.e. systematic and planned organizational development: professionalization in contrast to the previous "project culture"). Thanks to the program,
  • over 130 key Czech NGOs and regional foundations developed structured, concise visions of their future development. Grants supported 26 institutional plans.
  • 140 NGOs examined and analyzed (through SWOT analysis) their developmental needs
  • 52 of them received a technical assistance grant for expert advice.
  • 40 NGOs developed detailed organizational development plans with the aim of diversifying their fundraising portfolio, and thus achieving higher financial stability. 11 of these fundraising plans were financially supported through grants. The others received technical support in the form of training and consultancy.

  In an independent evaluation, this program received the most positive feedback and the highest recognition from participants

• The stimulated discussions, especially the Czech part of the international Civil Society Index Project (Civicus), substantially contributed to mapping the current state of NGO and civil society development in the Czech Republic. The gathered findings and data can serve as a reliable basis for further analyses, research and project development. Researchers, public administrators, journalists, and the NGO community in general appreciated the well-grounded final report "An Assessment of Czech Civil Society in 2004: After Fifteen Years of Development" (1,88 MB, pdf), representing the first data of this type, which has made it possible to compare the Czech Republic to other countries.
• The NGO sector at large has made a huge step forward thanks to research activities that revealed its potentials and weaknesses. Some of those were already addressed through the 14 diverse projects that contributed to building partnerships with other sectors and the public, building NGO networks and coalitions, and providing NGOs with various kinds of know-how.
• The CEET program laid the ground work for better expertise-building, experience-sharing and networking among NGO experts, on both national and international levels.
  • The Consultants' Guild, closely linked to its Slovak counterpart TaK, was formally established as a legal entity that will further develop the capacity of NGO consultants beyond the CEE Trust.
  • The newly established think tank NETT (The Independent Think Tank for NGO Sector and Civil Society Issues) came into existence as a formation of four independent NGO consultants to work collaboratively on cross-sectional issues.
  • The program developed expertise of, and created links among, consultants both nationally and internationally.

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