As organizations of trust that provide public service using private money and voluntary services, civil society organizations (CSOs) are expected to demonstrate capacities in governance and management of its resources.

How does a CSO assess itself on these?  The Capacity Assessment Tool (CAT) helps a civil society organization measure its current level of capacities, define the gaps and provide a basis for the development of an organizational capacity building plan. It reflects the best practices of Philippine CSOs and is consistent with Philippine laws and regulations governing CSOs in the country.  The CAT is a self-assessment tool by which a CSO can measure its capacities on five (5) areas:

• Governance, Leadership and Strategic Planning and Management
• Financial Management
• Administrative and Personnel Management
• Resource Mobilization
• Program Development, Implementation and Management, Monitoring and Evaluation (PDIMME).

The tool was developed by the project “Strengthening the Capacity of Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in the Philippines.” The Ayala Foundation, Inc. led the consortium that included the Association of Foundations (AF), Caucus of Development NGO Networks (CODE-NGO), Philippine Business for Social Progress (PBSP), Philippine Council for NGO Certification (PCNC), and the National College of Public Administration and Governance (NCPAG) in implementing the project from 2011-2014. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) supported the consortium in implementing the project.

The project was designed to produce the following outcomes: 1) Strengthened CSOs’ organizational effectiveness and accountability; 2) Increased pool of CSO capacity building providers; and 3) Increased number of CSOs qualified for USAID pre-award.

Each consortium member brought its experience and expertise to the project with the goal of designing and implementing an organizational development framework, tools, and capacity building interventions that will result in more effective civil society organizations.

“Using the CAT, we realized the importance of documenting our organization’s processes to establish integrity. It is not enough that we do good by serving our community, it is also important that we do things right,” says Miraflor Mavroukakis, Managing Trustee of Northern Luzon Mother and Child’s Care Inc. (NLMCCI) in Dagupan City.  NLMMCI is a “graduate” of the Strengthening the Capacity of CSOs in the Philippines and benefited from its training and mentoring interventions.

Any CSO can measure its current level of organizational capacities by filling out the CAT survey form in this link https://code-ngo.org/cat/client/index.html#/. Once completed, the survey will generate the CSO’s self-ratings on the 5 capacity building areas above.  The CAT ratings are from 1 to 6, with its corresponding level of organizational development:

• 0 to 1.99 – Start Up
• 1.99 to 3.50 – Developing
• 3.51 to 5.0 – Expanding
• 5.01 to 6.0 – Mature.

 Roselle Rasay is the Deputy Executive Director of CODE-NGO.