3 things I learned from Shelter Cluster Coordination

I just completed my mission as Provincial Shelter sub-Cluster Hub-Coordinator this December 2019.

It was 11 months working closely with the Government and with 70 NGO partners who are working providing and supporting temporary shelter and permanent housing. Interestingly there were also organizations which not working for shelter nor construction but actively participate in the coordination meeting. Moreover they also participated in the project together with some of the shelter NGOs.

In the areas which affected by tsunami, liquefaction and earthquake we encourage people centered housing recovery with owner driven setting . Through many ways we sent essential message in recovery, Build Back Safer (BBS). Lastly we pursued localisation to ensure local NGOs confidently step-in as key partner.

Therefore in this writing, from my own reflection, I want to share 3 things I learned during my mission in Central Sulawesi.

1 . Know Your Mission

Having a complete understanding of the mission is critical in order we can coordinate effort as humanitarian shelter agencies. Agencies should be proactive bolstering people's rights on their own recovery pathways. For instance in the first months our advocacy was – if the affected people need temporary shelter – all stakeholder should strengthen individual temporary shelter assistance. There was a debate on which temporary shelter is more appropriate, collective (barracks) or individual. Later on it is proven that the individual is much better. Even the individual temporary shelter built through process which took time but it was respecting community decision. On the other hand the collective temporary shelter, delivered as a product it seems disconnected with the recipient and their community. Furthermore there were protection issues, sustainability and also the cost is very expensive.

Other aspect that we continuously pursue is BBS. To make it successful the BBS should be everyone concern and embedded in everyone’s program. The coordination team and some of the partners who are in the strategic advisory group formulate the key messages on safer construction. It was quite challenging for engineers and architects to formulate the message since it should be easily understood by non-engineering people. Even more it should be easily understood by low educated people.

Finally the BBS messaging called 7 Principles to Build Safer House after 4 months was launched, received endorsement from government. The IEC material of 7 Principles to Build Safer House can be downloaded here for portrait layout and landscape layout.

Working in recovery post-disaster will always find a lot of noise. Political actors might want to push their political agenda because they want to be recognized and get the vote. Business people and building contractors who want to gain massive profits for their services and products. Affected people who become impatient due to long process to the recovery. And many more!  But with solid understanding about the mission, we can focus to help the people on their recovery. It will take some time, but it helps the people decide their recovery pathway. At the same time they would have safer rebuild.

2 . Coordination Skill + Creativity = More Influence

We conducted a study to evaluate 3 months coordination meeting participants in September – November 2019. There were 50 organizations participated but interestingly only less than half were working with temporary shelter and permanent housing. The bigger part were those who do not work for shelter nor construction. They work for other program such as cash and livelihood, also local organization who work for women and children protection and land issues. These non-shelter NGOs not only active in coordination meeting but also involved in projects together with shelter NGOs.

We tried to understand why non-shelter NGOs participated in coordination meeting? Also, why number of participant has kept growing? NGO partners found the information shared in the coordination meeting were reliable. The coordination meeting consistently held every two weeks[i]. The meetings were not merely for information sharing but also to find partners. There were INGOs and donor came to find local NGOs who could possibly become partners.

Not only coordination meeting, the NGO partners also strengthen their collaboration through projects. There were two projects carried out by NGO partners. The first was the commemoration of one year event of the disaster. The event was intended to send message on people centered housing recovery. In the event, NGO partners presented their program to support the community with owner-driven approach.

The last collaboration was this December 2019, there were 23 organizations supporting this event. During December, the NGOs conducted house owner training which all trainee were women. Our intention was the women might have BBS knowledge and familiar with the construction monitoring tools. Then with confidence, lead the construction of their houses. The event named ‘Women are the pioneer of reconstruction’ gained support from the Sigi District Government[ii]. The government will continue the house owner training for women using government budget. They invite NGOs participation to support government program as they need technical people and community mobilizers.

None of these two events were planned by each NGO partners at the first place. Even though they were willingly to contribute according to their resources. Some of them sent their engineers, architects and community mobilizers. They also donate construction material for practical training and also gave the funding. Why then, they were willing to collaborate which actually gave more burden to their resources and budget?

From my reflection every agencies who participated in the coordination meeting later on have the same concern. We want to respect owner-driven recovery and at the same time ensure BBS can be achieved. These messages were kept on sounding in many ways during the coordination. It need skills and creativity to gather everyone to fulfill the mission.

3 . To serve and to inspire are beyond leadership

How significant is leadership to run coordination? From my own reflection there are other elements which are more crucial than leadership. My role as coordinator is more to serve and if I am lucky I can inspire the partners. It is important for the partners understand the mission and later on they could create the momentum fulfilling the mission.

For instance once I shared that women can lead the construction of their own houses. They should have the ability to decide what kind of house they want to rebuild. They can choose the design, select the building material, and control the pace but the most important is ensure BBS. I told to some of the partners that we need home owner training for women and there should be big event to launch the idea. Then Danni Rossa from Wahana Visi Indonesia stepped in.

Danni with her team consist of technical people from several NGOs designed the curriculum. They designed homeowner training in 5 villages as pilot project. It was a big effort. She had to coordinate 23 organizations to select locations, trainers and logistics including construction material provision. Through community mobilization the team had to gather women as trainees. Around 150 women had received 2 days training on BBS and construction monitoring. Later on at the ‘Women are the pioneer of reconstruction’ event we knew the home owner training was successful. As I wrote above the District Government will continue to run home owner training program for women.

This writing will be too long, if I have to write other person like Danni who understood the mission then willingly took part. They were not just participated but led other people to fulfil the mission. I am grateful that we have Danni and other partners who can multiply our effort. As we know we always have short timeframe compare to the full recovery, but we need to set the solid foundation. Therefore I am gladly served these leaders.

Acknowledgements

I am deeply grateful to Direktorat Jenderal Perlindungan dan Jaminan Sosial – Kementerian Sosial Republik Indonesia, Pemerintah Daerah Provinsi Sulawesi Tengah and Dinas Sosial Provinsi Sulawesi Tengah. My sincere thanks to 70 NGO partners who are closely working with us, supporting us with update on temporary shelters and permanent housing progress. I am also grateful to other NGO partners even not working with shelter but help us to cover many issues and strengthen shelter program. Their support and collaboration are beyond my expectation. Thanks to my colleagues at IFRC and Global Shelter Cluster. I am thankful for the huge support of my colleagues at the Indonesia National Sub-Cluster Shelter, Wahyu Widayanto, Dave Hodgkin, Avianto Amri, Hijaz Jalil, Daris Rafi Fauzan, Darisman and Oko Jiwa Jiny. My thanks to the most awesome team whom I shared my day to day work in Palu, Tina Lamaligi, Hendri Guswanto, Johanes Juliasman and Punjung Widodo. Thanks to my beloved Linda Tobing for the love and encouragement. And above all to my Lord Jesus Christ, whom all glory belongs.

Arwin Soelaksono

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[i] Before the meeting we always share the updated partners’ progress from Information Management (IM). We presented gaps and opportunities from each sub-district. From the IM we also share potential of overlap which every agencies need to be cautious and check their plan. We also had conducted mediation for partners whose working area were overlapped.

[ii] https://kabarluwuk.com/2019/12/23/ibu-pelopor-konstruksi-berdayakan-perempuan-bermitigasi/