Ground Truth Solutions provides the humanitarian sector with tools to systematically listen, learn and respond to the views of affected people. It also captures the often-overlooked perspective of field workers and local partners, eliciting their views as a counterpoint to the views of those caught up in humanitarian crises.
The premise is that the best way to design humanitarian programmes and gauge their impact is to include the perspective of affected people at all stages of implementation. The aim is to make their perceptions the touchstone and driver of organisational efficiency and effectiveness. To this end, Ground Truth Solutions offers humanitarian teams practical tools that help them discover whether the services they provide are appropriate and relevant, if affected populations trust them, and whether they feel enabled to stand on their own feet. The surveys of field staff and local partners provide additional insight.
The result is that:
- Affected people are placed at centre stage and empowered to express their views
- Agencies receive real-time, actionable information about what affected people think – as well as how their staff and local partners see things
- Donors receive a new measure of humanitarian performance, promoting better programmes and more accountability to affected people as well as a measure of progress towards localisation
The Core Humanitarian Standard on Quality and Accountability (CHS) is central to Ground Truth Solutions’ focus on quality and accountability. Through the Listen, Learn, Act Project—a collaborative effort with DanChurchAid and Save the Children Denmark funded by ECHO—Ground Truth Solutions has contributed to developing a comprehensive set of tools to enable humanitarian agencies to verify respect for the commitments set out in the CHS and, equally important, to gain insight on how to adjust programming to attain these commitments.
