Institutional Strengthening

i-APS

We partner with communities, national and international development agencies to design and implement assistance and development projects. To strengthen projects, i-APS provides short and long-term expert technical advising services, personnel and staff augmentation, technology products, and field-tested systems and operations. Our services help clients and communities adapt in more agile ways to achieve locally-led development results. Our experts specialize in civil society and Technology and Research, project management, mentorship and training and are experts in a range of topics such as democracy and governance, technology, solution design and management, civil society strengthening, strategic communications, monitoring and evaluation, economic growth, and agribusiness and market systems.

Services in Institutional Strengthening

i-APS is able to augment our clients’ personnel needs by hiring and managing the performance of staff in some of the most hard-to-reach and non-permissive areas in the world. We utilize our offices in Yemen, Syria, Turkey, Kosovo, Sudan, Colombia, Venezuela, Mali, Afghanistan, and Iraq to recruit, hire, train, coordinate, and monitor local staff for project activities. Our connections to local communities and business infrastructure allows us to rapidly deploy technical resources and implement project activities. Over the past 10 years we have regularly managed a full range of staffing services, including staffing databases, hiring, onboarding and training, operations, supervision and staff replacement.
i-APS uses a long-term localized approach for development and humanitarian assistance. We work with a team of qualified and trained nationals, supported by international technical experts experienced in USAID and UN affiliate programming. Our work is informed by USAID’s Local Systems Framework and other capacity building best practices.

i-APS is actively registered in 11 countries and works with over 125 local partners annually in complex and transitional settings, including Afghanistan, Sudan Syria, Venezuela, and Yemen.

Our local presence, technical infrastructure, and expertise allows us to… Conduct landscape analysis, capacity assessments, and local partner (LP) readiness capacity assessments. These assessments allow our clients to evaluate local partner capacities at a national level; identify new potential partners based on their specializations, geographic coverage, and perceived legitimacy with local residents; and assess their readiness to work with agencies like USAID or UN entities.

Manage Third-party monitoring -TPM of local partners and project activities. Our TPM services allow us to evaluate LP and project accountability, assess desired performance indicators, and provide recommendations for future improvements.

Conduct Non-US Organizations Pre-Award Surveys (NUPAS) and Due Diligence Assessments for clients like USAID and the UN. These services help donors assess LP capacities and risks, manage allotted awards, and develop specific award conditions.

Provide Risk Mitigation Support to National Partners. Our work helps national organizations develop internal systems, processes, and training programs to strengthen internal audit functions.

Support local partners with the NICRA application process in partnership with local accounting firms.

Support clients with assistance localization by helping them work with more local awardees, manage awards, and further incorporate local voice into clients programming. i-APS uses a “learning by doing” approach to enhance uptake and build complementary skills.
Our knowledge management work helps organizations translate lessons learned into core organizational behaviors and processes, resulting in improved decision-making and outcomes. Through our technology infrastructure and expertise, we can link organizational objectives to the right information systems and enhance workflow processes.

i-APS works together with our partners to improve their systems and identify areas for improvement. We aim to create online “brain centers” for country, regional and global programs to deposit critical information, such as context assessments and M&E reports. After, we help organizations translate knowledge into action and establish real-time communication and collaboration among stakeholders.
i-APS undertakes activities to present and promote our clients work, disseminate learning materials from our research, and engage communities in generating positive behavioral changes. We work with our clients to promote our findings among target communities and improve their outcomes, making sure our message is understandable and resonates with the community. Additionally, we engage and motivate beneficiaries to voice their concerns and opinions on program activities through establishing feedback loops and complaints mechanisms. This helps our clients improve project design, delivery, and beneficiary satisfaction.