JOHANNESBURG, South-Africa, June 6, 2014/ – Accelerate Performance and Clear Impact today launched the maiden Results Based Accountability™ (RBA) Africa Summit 2014 (http://www.rba-africa.com) at an exclusive executive breakfast briefing. Aimed at leaders in governments and non-profit organisations (NPOs), the summit will be held at the Hyatt in Rosebank, Johannesburg from 8-10 October, boasting an impressive line-up of speakers including Mark Friedman, developer of RBA and author of Trying Hard is Not Good Enough.

For this three-day summit, delegates from government, NPOs and academia, will meet to tackle and co-create strategies on global socio-economic priorities where children and communities are concerned.

Adam Luecking, CEO at Clear Impact focused on the importance of data in RBA in his key note address, citing RBA is a simple yet and rigorous approach of using data to make decisions on the things we care about most, to bring precision to your passion.

“Everyone no matter where they sit, no matter what organisation they are in should be able to understand measurably what it is they are trying to help achieve at a community level, understand what it is they need day to day to have high performance within the organisation and individual work; and the third, measurably and what they need change within themselves and how they collaborate with others as it relates to making that measurable impact.”

RBA is founded on two key principles for achieving measurable results, namely:

  • Start with ends and work backwards to means; and
  • Data-driven, transparent decision making.

Luecking stressed that “Always and without exception, data is central to RBA. If you are not using data you are not using RBA.”

The use of data and rigour on how to use it enables decision makers within governments and NPOs to make transparent decisions and take better action. RBA gets them on this path by galvanising data that is meaningful to decision-making. Moreover, innovation is also introduced through RBA training to propel an entrepreneurial attitude in governments and NPOs. The absence of an entrepreneurial environment within governments NPOs means they are not performing at their full potential; whereby low productivity, high inefficiencies and ineffective use of financial resources then become common features in these organisations.

Luecking told the audience of executives and senior managers from governments, state-owned agencies and international non-profit organisations (NPOs) that “RBA methods are preventative and corrective, with the intentional focus on improving the wellbeing of children, families and communities. RBA training has successfully been delivered in over 40 US states and in countries including Australia, Canada, Colombia, Ireland, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Norway and the UK.  Data and its correct use have been key to this success. That is, by applying simple yet rigorous tools, language and approach, the use of correct data transcends to a change in policy; whereby RBA matches the organisation’s intentionality with suitable measures of the success.”

Nadi Albino, Chief of Education at Unicef South Africa agrees that the rigorous use of data and applying an outcome based accountability model such as RBA will assist their work in child-sensitive and children driven programmes.

She adds: “The challenge is we focus on the impact but don’t know how to do the right thing the right way. That’s a leadership issue as well. The other challenge is that how we interpret the data. The kind of indicators we chose and the data we collect do not help us answer the questions we seek to answer.

 Therefore leadership is crucial in terms of people understanding data issues, taking that data and addressing the right things. We have a lot of data but we pick and choose which one we want to use. There is lot of data but often leadership chose indicators that tell a good story. So leadership and data are 2 critical issues; and how we use them is very important in how driving accountability”.

Frank Aswani, Vice President of Strategic Relations at Africa Leadership Academy lauded the RBA principles and a greater need for accountability in NPOs.

“In the corporate sector accountability is a lot tighter. Running an entity has the same disciplinary demands whether you are running a non-profit or not. So question then becomes how do develop the same kind of discipline in the NPO space? The answer lies within the process recommended by RBA of working backwards from the ends to the means is exactly what happens in the corporates. We need to take pride. Not just measuring activity but also measuring impact,” Aswani said in his concluding remarks.

The RBA international network has grown organically globally over the last 20 years, with highly trained RBA practitioners.

“We are proud to welcome Accelerate Performance, who are also co-hosts of the RBA Africa Summit 2014, to the global RBA network. Led by Laureen Rwatirera, Accelerate Performance has been identified as the local expert in Africa within the RBA global network. The team here is well positioned in sub-Saharan Africa and holds the local context to help governments and NPOs in Africa, while also drawing on insight from the global network, with which it has direct access and the support of.” remarked Luecking.

Accelerate Performance is well resourced with team of over 20 facilitators that are accredited for scalability across South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Kenya, Namibia, Lesotho and Ghana.

Registration for the RBA Africa 2014 Summit is still open. For more information on the summit, visit http://www.rba-africa.com and follow @RBAAfricaSummit

 

Distributed by APO (African Press Organization) on behalf of Results Based Accountability™ (RBA).
Issued by Ngwee on behalf of Results-Based Accountability™ (RBA) Africa Summit 2014.
For media queries:
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About RBA Africa Summit 2014

Clear Impact (http://www.rba-africa.com), with offices in the United States and Australia, and Accelerate Performance, with offices in South Africa, will host Results-Based Accountability™ (RBA) Africa Summit 2014 in Johannesburg South Africa. The Summit will introduce cutting edge RBA concepts to conference delegates which will comprise of leaders from government and non-profit organisations as well as experts in training and implementation in Africa.

This summit will feature introductory training from Mark Friedman, the creator of RBA and author of the book Trying Hard is Not Good Enough.  There will also be live panels, break-out sessions led by leaders on the front lines, and facilitated learning sessions on how to use RBA for creating impact on what you care about most.