This ensures progress and lessons are continually fed back into implementation to improve our approach and practices, in line with the Core Humanitarian Standards (CHS) on Quality & Accountability.
Our projects are firstly monitored by the teams in charge of their implementation. For that purpose, we use tools that allow us to plan in advance, continuously assess progress, identify blocking points early, and quickly escalate information to the in-country top management.
Our field-based Technical Coordinators also ensure that high quality standards and principles are respected, and contribute to the development of further guidance to be shared across countries of intervention.
Our Appraisal, Monitoring and Evaluation team is dedicated to improving the relevance, quality and accountability of our projects. It is independent from the teams directly involved in project implementation, and reports directly to the in-country top management, to effectively inform corrective decisions and actions.
This is done by sharing trustworthy information and concrete recommendations drawn from surveys conducted among populations we serve, observation of the implementation of our activities, documentation of lessons learnt and best practices, and feedback received from the communities and other stakeholders.
Every effort is also made to ensure our interventions are conducted with the highest standards of integrity and respect for the beliefs, manners and customs of the social and cultural environment. Respect for the confidentiality, privacy, security and well-being of the people we serve is of utmost concern.
For the sake of ensuring a robust humanitarian response, ACTED actively captures lessons learned and disseminates best practices with other agencies conducting similar work. ACTED also relies on established coordination structures to share information and facilitate a collaborative environment that promotes timely communication amongst relevant actors.
There may be occasions when we do not meet the expectations of all beneficiaries, or when we fail to live up to our commitments. When this occurs, beneficiaries have the right to complain and make suggestions.
We believe that having a well-designed and well managed mechanism for handling beneficiary complaints can improve the quality of our work, enhance the trust and confidence of our beneficiaries, identify areas of our work which need to be improved, and ensure that ACTED learns from the feedback provided through this process.
ACTED is striving to meet the highest quality in its programming, and seeks to work with affected communities in the best way possible, openly and responsibly, building trust and respect. To improve our work, we are interested in what people we serve have to say, whether in the form of a comment, a compliment or a complaint.
Our Complaints and Response Mechanism is guided by the principles of respect, confidentiality and neutrality. All complaints are taken seriously and swiftly followed-up, with a response being provided to all as quickly as possible.
As many communication means as relevant are made available to ensure the mechanism is easily accessible, taking into account the specificities of the local context and culture, as well as project resources and beneficiaries’ vulnerabilities.
