Jayne Cravens:
Capacity-Building Work with and in Developing Countries
& with Various Constituencies in "the West"
Much of
my professional work
has been focused on building the capacities of others. Through
onsite and online workshops, mentoring, training materials and
written guidelines, I have tried to help people in a diversity of
regions and countries and from a range of backgrounds to develop a
variety of skills to help them do their work and serve their
constituencies more effectively.
My capacity-building activities are focused on communications,
community/volunteer involvement, partner/donor relationships and
management basics for nonprofit organizations, non-governmental
organizations/civil society, and government-based programs.
My goal in any training, mentoring or other capacity-building
activity is to give participants tools that they can use
immediately and that give them a base on which to further build
and improve long after our interactions are over.
Below is a list of capacity-building activities in which I have
engaged, however, please note I am capable of engaging in
capacity-building activities regarding any of my core professional competencies:
- Drafting a revised country strategy for the United Nations
per drastic, sudden changes in circumstances in the country. (Ukraine)
- Rapidly editing and rewriting funding proposals,
presentations, press releases, web pages, meeting reports and
field reports. (Afghanistan
& Ukraine)
- Drafting a marketing plan for a UNDP project focused on
getting people to care about and take action regarding climate
change. (Ukraine)
- Drafted a strategy to leverage most of the UN
days in some way via social media and, in some cases,
traditional means (onsite events, press tours, etc.). (Ukraine)
- Mapping all of the online activities of all UN agencies and
programs in one country, live-tweeting an international event as
an example to local staff, strategizing
regarding how future online events might be more interactive,
creating strategies and delivering workshops to help staff to
leverage social media more effectively, including how agencies
could use social media to promote respect, tolerance and perhaps
even reconciliation in areas of Ukraine currently in conflict. (Afghanistan
& Ukraine)
- Advising federal ministry staff on media and online outreach
strategies (Afghanistan)
- Training federal ministry staff on how to gather and
present written information for government, donor and UN
reports, proposals and presentations (Afghanistan)
- Training federal ministry staff on how to monitor news wires
and the web (Afghanistan
and Ukraine)
- Training federal ministry staff on how to take photos
in a culturally-sensitive manner and to meet various needs,
e.g. to show female participation (Afghanistan)
- Training federal ministry staff in how to be pro-active and
reactive in distributing information and photos to various
offices (Afghanistan)
- Creating and delivering a presentation for
Afghan women on public speaking (Afghanistan)
- Training federal ministry staff in posting information to
appropriate online fora, such as developmentgateway.org
(Afghanistan)
- Advising on how to prevent folklore,
rumors and urban myths from interfering with development and
aid/relief efforts
- Creating and presenting all-day intensive onsite workshops
and engaging in one-on-one consulting re: business
planning, monetizing services, and donor/client relations,
as well as strategic planning and demonstrating program
credibility and transparency, for education advising centers
throughout Eastern and Western Europe (some are local NGOs, some
are based in local government offices, some are based in local
university offices) affiliated with EducationUSA, a
global network supported by the U.S. Department of State (Budapest,
Hungary and Belgrade, Serbia)
- Advising a volunteer center regarding its online interface
for potential volunteers (Cairo, Egypt)
- Training local UN agency staff working in mid-Eastern
countries and regions (Lebanon, Jordan, Occupied Palestinian
Territories, Egypt) in the basics regarding involving online volunteers
(Cairo, Egypt)
- Authoring, frequently updating and distributing "Basic Fund-Raising for Small
NGOs in the Developing World" (online, with requesting
NGOs based primarily in Africa and Asia)
- Creating a web page offering advice for hotels, hostels
& campgrounds in transitional & developing countries
- Mentoring an Afghan entrepreneur on
how to create a small cleaning business, by researching
and writing a detailed Afghan-specific guide that walked the
entrepreneur through each cleaning business development step
(including how to ensure the safety of female employees) and by
recruiting the owner and manager of a successful cleaning
business in the USA to edit the guide and answer the
entrepreneur's specific questions.
- Researching and promoting the elements necessary to ensure
success in using "Theater as a Tool
for Development", with examples from Africa, Asia, Europe
and the USA.
- Advising aspiring women
bloggers, as well as female students of a variety of ages,
from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kenya, Nigeria, Afghanistan,
and various locations in "the West."
- Creating online materials to build the capacities of
organizations working in and for the developing world to involve
and support volunteers using the Internet (online, via onlinevolunteering.org
- Training UN staff regarding volunteer management and online communications
(Germany)
- Advising international and national organizations based in
the USA regarding using their web to better promote their
involvement of volunteers, to better support current volunteers,
and to better recruit new volunteers (online).
- Advising on volunteer-involvement relating to Information
Communication Technology for Development (ICT4D) and online
volunteering for the Southern
Africa Capacity Initiative (SACI), a UNDP/UNV effort to
address the challenges of HIV/AIDS in nine countries
- Advising regarding volunteer management and online community
development for various UNV and UNDP-affiliated projects in the
developing world, such as development of a volunteer center in
Sri Lanka
- Researching and preparing pioneering articles on working with volunteers
via Instant Messaging, and volunteers using PDAs
and other handheld network technology
- Creating a module
regarding effectively involving volunteers for UNESCO's
Multimedia Training Kit
- Working directly with organizations throughout the world in
setting up and expanding online volunteering programs (onsite in
the USA, Germany, Switzerland and Egypt; online throughout the
world)
- Training in communications activities, such as how to create
a community newsletter, and how to approach local media
in-person, by phone and by fax, for the American Indian
community of the Southern San Francisco Bay Area
- Training nonprofits regarding web site accessibility and
working with remote volunteers, through Knowbility
- Advising a Youth Resource Center of Guria, Georgia (formerly
part of the Soviet Union) regarding promoting volunteerism to
youth
Countries I've visited or lived in:
Afghanistan,
Albania, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina,
Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, Egypt, France, Germany,
Great Britain (England and Scotland), Hungary, India, Ireland,
Italy, Jordan, Luxembourg, Macedonia (the former Yugoslav Republic
of Macedonia), Mexico, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland,
Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain (Catalunya and Castilla),
Sweden, Switzerland, USA, United Arab Emirates, Vatican City
Also see: Civil Society Capacity Building:
Why?
My favorite kind of professional work is building the capacities
of civil society organizations, especially in transitional and
developing countries, to communicate, to change minds and to
engage a variety of people and communities, through
communications, dialogue and volunteering. But the term civil
society isn't used in USA as commonly as it is elsewhere,
and many don’t understand exactly what I mean when I talk about
my favorite type of work. This new resource explores exactly
what is meant by the phrase civil society capacity building.
Back to my development resources main page
Discuss
this
web
page, or comment on it, here.
Quick Links
my home page
my consulting services
& my workshops &
presentations
my credentials & expertise
Affirmation that this web site is
created & managed by a human.
My book: The Last Virtual
Volunteering
Guidebook
contact me or see my schedule
Free Resources: Community Outreach, With & Without
Tech
Free Resources:
Engaging & Supporting
Volunteers
Free Resources: Technology Tips for Non-Techies
Free Resources: Nonprofit, NGO & other
mission-based management resources
Free Resources: Web Development, Maintenance,
Marketing for non-Web designers
Free Resources: Corporate philanthropy / social
responsibility programs
Free Resources: For people & groups that want
to volunteer
linking to or from my web site
The Coyote Helps Foundation
me on social media
(follow
me, like me, put me in a circle, subscribe to my newsletter)
how to support my work
To know when I have developed a new
resource related to the above subjects, found a great
resource by someone else, published
a
new
blog, uploaded a new
video,
or to when & where I'm training or presenting, use any
of the following social media apps to follow me on any of
these social media platforms:
Disclaimer: No guarantee of accuracy or suitability is made
by
the poster/distributor of the materials on this web site.
This material is provided as is, with no expressed or implied
warranty or liability.
See my web site's privacy
policy.
Permission is granted to copy, present and/or distribute a limited
amount of material from my web site without charge if
the information is kept intact and without alteration, and is
credited to:
Otherwise, please contact me
for permission to reprint, present or distribute these
materials
(for instance, in a class or book or online event for which
you
intend to charge).
The art work and material on
this site was created and is copyrighted 1996-2026
by Jayne Cravens, all rights reserved
(unless noted otherwise, or the art comes from a link to
another web site).