Trainer for Conflict Sensitivity and Do No Harm Trainings for LCRP partners in Lebanon

Our Organisation

forumZFD (forum Civil Peace Service) provides training and project support in Germany and abroad. With its members, it advocates the renunciation of violence-based policies, reinforcement of civilian resources in the state and society and democratic participation of all social, ethnic and religious groups.
forumZFD currently has more than 80 employees working in 14 locations in Germany, the Middle East, the Western Balkans, and South-East Asia. forumZFD has been working in Lebanon since 2009.
The Lebanon-team consists of 18 staff members working in the programme areas of Community Mobilising, Dealing with the Past and Capacity Development.
In the field of Capacity Development forumZFD supports conflict transformation and peacebuilding projects and enhances the capability of NGOs to work in a conflict sensitive manner through training and mentoring. The portfolio of trainings forumZFD developed and implemented with partner organisations includes a broad variety of conflict transformation tools and methods such as Reflecting on Peace Practice (RPP), Conflict Analysis, Mediation and 'Do no Harm', just to name a few. 

Context and Background

The massive influx of refugees fleeing Syria since 2011, has made Lebanon the country with the highest number of refugees per capita. This has taken a heavy toll on refugees, host communities and donors alike. There is increased strain on basic service provision, such as education, health, water, sanitation, and waste collection, as well as growing competition for sources of income, leading to tensions and frustration among and between communities. It has also led to an increased number of humanitarian organisations operating in Lebanon. Further tension has revolved around aid provision provided by the organisations, where host communities feel neglected in the face of support perceived to be earmarked for refugees. This already tense situation is further exacerbated by the increasing political instability and drastically deteriorating economic situation in the country further accelerated by the devastating impact of the Corona pandemic leading to catastrophic living situations for a great part of the country’s residents. 

Critically, the prevalence of host community fatigue increasingly risks turning violent. Over 2017-2021, there was a 11% increase in the likelihood that Lebanese and Syrians would turn to violence if their interests are threatened. Taken in sum, there remains a significant risk that the further deterioration of relations between host communities and refugees could result in the further reduction of the protection space for refugees and localized instances of violence.

Within the framework of the Lebanon Crisis Response Plan (LCRP), UNDP and UNHCR, together with key ministries in the Government of Lebanon – in particular the Ministry of Interior and Municipalities (MOIM), the Minister of Social Affairs (MoSA) – lead the Social Stability sector. The sector’s objective is to alleviate communal tensions between refugee and host communities through participatory processes that address sources of tensions.

Outcome 3 in the Social Stability logframe identifies the need for the Social Stability sector to work with other sectors in the response to ensure that partners are operating in a conflict sensitive manner with adherence to the do no harm principle.  

As such, in 2020 a round of training was conducted, 149 participants across 62 partners were trained on conflict sensitivity and do no harm including four mentoring session to partners, with many participants calling for further trainings to be conducted in 2021.

The Task

With this in mind, forumZFD, in partnership with the Social Stability Sector , is seeking to contract a trainer on conflict sensitivity and Do No Harm to deliver a series of trainings and mentoring workshops in 2021. Given the current restrictions on mobility and the need to adhere to social distancing measures to protect trainer and trainees, the training(s) shall be conducted online. A re-evaluation of the safety situation shall take place throughout the course of the project to assess if face-to-face trainings could be possible at a later stage.

The objectives of this consultancy are as follows:

1. LCRP partners to undertake a 2-day exposure  workshop that serves as an introduction to conflict sensitivity and Do No Harm training in each of the four regions in Lebanon to increase awareness of conflict sensitivity and the basic tools required to ensure the application of the principles in their work.
2. Of the trained organizations in the exposure workshops, organisations shall apply of which four shall be selected  in order to receive an  application workshop (three half-days to ensure the attendance of senior staff) and other follow up mentoring activities that differ from the exposure trainings in that they will be more contextualized by taking examples from the work of the participating organisations./applying the methods on actual project work of the participating organization.
3. For the four organizations who have participated in last year’s application workshop rounds, a follow-up and evaluation process to measure success in embedding conflict sensitivity in their work shall be conducted.

Task 1: Review training content and develop training plan (4 days)

It is vital that the trainings conducted in 2021 mirror the trainings conducted previously in order to ensure consistency of content throughout the LCRP response. To that end, the first task of the consultancy will be for the trainer to conduct a full review of the trainer course material, the format of the trainings, and review the feedback forms provided by partners to the previous round of the training.

This review will feed into a training content plan where the trainer’s own tools and experience in conflict sensitivity and do no harm will be the incorporated to the training plan. The plan will then be submitted to the Social Stability sector and forumZFD for review.

Task 2: Deliver four exposure (introduction?) training workshops for LCRP partners (8 full days)

 Conduct the following trainings:

• 2-day training: Zahle (Bekaa & Baalbeck-Hermel)
• 2-day training: Beirut (Beirut & Mount Lebanon)
• 2-day training: Tripoli (North & Akkar)
• 2-day training: Tyre (South & Nabatiye)

Task 3: Deliver four 3-day application workshops and mentoring to selected organisations (16 days)

Following the training workshops, 4 organisations will be selected for a 3-day application workshop (approx. 9h to 14h) with the objective of engraining the processes of conflict sensitivity and principles of do no harm into the operations of those organisations. The application workshops will involve approximately 20 of middle and senior management from these organisations, including Programme Managers and Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) staff.

Following those application workshops, 1-day of further mentoring (either remotely or in person) will be conducted with key focal points in those organisations to assist in the implementation of the application workshop outcomes. This mentoring could be divided into 2 to 3 sessions according to need of the organization and not take place on one and the same day.

3 days of training plus (the sum of) 1 day of mentoring per organisation = 4 days

4 organisations = 16 days

Task 4: Implement a follow-up and evaluation process for participants of 2020 application workshop round (3 days)

In order to determine the longer-term impact of the application workshop, trainer will design and distribute a questionnaire for the Conflict Sensitivity focal points of the four organisations who underwent the application workshop in 2020. A previously developed questionnaire will be made available to benefit from already existing processes. After analyzing the contents of the questionnaire, the trainer will hold a discussion round with each of the organisations to follow-up on their level of progress and discuss successes, challenges and ways-forward to further embed Conflict Sensitivity in the respective organisation. Findings and recommendations from this process will be presented within the final report.    

Task 5: Deliver a report back to forumZFD & UNDP on process (3 days)

Write a report outlining the training methodology and feedback of the participants on the overall effectiveness of the consultancy including lessons learnt and recommendations for future training sessions.

Total consultancy days: 34

Time Frame for the Process

The timeframe for the tasks is as follows:

• Task 1: First 2 weeks of May 2021
• Task 2: Over 2 weeks May/June 2021
• Task 3: Over three to four weeks in July 2021 plus 1 day of mentoring per organization in the 2 months following the trainings.
• Task 4: Over one week in August 2020
• Task 5: After conclusion of the mentoring sessions

Conditions and payments

Conditions and payments and respective timings are provided below

1. First payment, upon acceptance of the training workplan: 40%
2. Second payment, upon completion of the eight training workshops: 30%

Final payment, upon completion of the application workshops & mentoring sessions and submission of final report: 30%

Evaluation Criteria

It is required that the trainer will meet the following criteria:

• Over 3 years of experience training workshops with diverse participants on conflict sensitivity and do no harm.
• Experience working in an organisation that promotes conflict sensitivity & do no harm, or a peacebuilding organisation (or similar) that demonstrates an explicit adherence to those principles
• Experience working in Lebanon, preferably with an organisation involved in the LCRP at a strategic level.
• Fluent English language, proficiency in Arabic would be an advantage.

Skills

• Strong communicator
• Excellent interpersonal skills
• Sound technical grounding in conflict sensitivity and do no harm
• Adaptability to diverse stakeholders
• Proactive
• Culturally sensitive and aware of Lebanese context
• Experience in delivering training online would be an asset