Praxis Note 2. How Can Capacity Be Built Through Cross-Cultural Management?

This Praxis Note focuses on the way NGO capacity may be built effectively and appropriately with the help of cross-cultural management approaches. Drawing on the concept of cultural crossvergence, it discusses how the process of hybridisation might be managed to develop organisations that are highly adaptive to their environments.

In order to build NGO capacity in an international development context successfully it is imperative to look at issues through a cross-cultural lens. This must not be an add-on or an afterthought. It must be integrated into a capacity building approach. The project Management and Change in Africa: A Cross-cultural Perspective, funded by Danida and the Paris Chamber of Commerce, although focusing primarily on the commercial and public sectors, was the first of its kind to address issues of managing in a ‘developing’ region in a critical way and from a cross-cultural viewpoint. This project has important implications beyond Africa for the ‘third sector’ and for development NGOs in particular.

This Praxis Note is part of a series of four Notes outlining the approach.