A Purpose-Driven Model to Strengthen Local Partners and Deliver Critical Infrastructure

Maintaining strong ties with partners in countries where it works enables Engineers Without Borders-USA to cost-effectively and efficiently design, construct, and deliver projects that benefit people in historically underserved communities.

Over the years, some partnerships have grown organically as a result of relationship-building between EWB-USA team members and local people and organizations. These have been instrumental in efforts to deliver projects such as water systems and bridges.

Analytical tools have also helped EWB-USA leadership determine an individual country’s infrastructure needs and, in doing so, assess its ability to pursue projects given financial resource constraints and access to engineering services, among other factors.

More recently, EWB-USA has moved to shift its partnering approach by adopting the Purposeful Partnership Model (PPM). The approach supports local partners as they take on initial projects and grow, consults with them as they set their own strategy, and collaborates with them to identify and secure ongoing funding sources.

Gerard Dalziel, EWB-USA Chief Engineer, says that partnerships have long provided highly capable project allies that deliver projects and that also help build technical expertise.

“Relationships and passion” are defining characteristics of all EWB-USA partnerships, he says. The shared focus is always on delivering impactful projects to client communities.

Maximizing Impact

As designed, PPM maximizes its impact by emphasizing small, dedicated teams and supporting partnership development, quality standards, and project vetting. A no less important effort aims to help these local partners grow their organization and achieve their vision.

The basic structure of PPM stems from EWB-USA’s work over the past two decades. Between 2016 and 2023, EWB-USA developed and operated offices in places like Nicaragua, Uganda, Ecuador, and Guatemala.

Experience with the country office strategy demonstrated the benefit of having trusted partners and skilled staff available to support project work. At the same time, however, the financial cost of supporting multiple satellite offices proved unsustainable. In 2023, country offices began transitioning to PPM as the first purposeful partners.

For example, Guatemala endured a decades-long civil war that ended in 1996. During that time more than 200, 000 people were killed and much of the country’s established infrastructure was destroyed. The violence left many communities lacking access to basic human services.

A local organization, Asociación de Comités Comunitarios Medioambiental Región Ixil (ACCMARI), was formed to improve the lives of people in Guatemala’s Ixil Triangle through infrastructure projects, community engagement, and local capacity building. EWB-USA began partnering on projects with ACCMARI in 2016, and agreed in 2023 to formalize and grow the partnership using the PPM approach.

In practice, ACCMARI brings together on a regular basis more than 50 community leaders to prioritize engineering needs in the Ixil region. These meetings open communication among communities that allow for collaboration and cooperation and ease competition for projects. Leaders gain a more complete understanding of area needs and work to agree on which projects will be pursued.

EWB-USA will also help identify opportunities for capacity strengthening with partners. Capacity strengthening helps Purposeful Partners in reaching their goals through establishing a project track record, organizational structure improvement, as well as by fostering ongoing knowledge sharing.

Capacity strengthening may include training, fundraising, or certifications. By building deeper, more strategic relationships and operations, EWB-USA aims to pursue and win funding to support the financial needs of critical engineering work.

Over the course of a multi-year rollout, the roughly 130 partners at present will be streamlined to 30-50 partners which demonstrate strong, collaborative, and strategic approaches to their work. At the same time, EWB-USA will trim the number of countries where work is being done, from as many as three dozen countries to 10-15. The hope is that PPM will create a framework through which additional countries may be added as projects are successfully delivered and as partner capacities and financial resources grow.

The Road to Partner Success

Partners begin by building a track record with EWB-USA by taking on a single project. If the project is successfully completed, the partner may advance to become a certified partner, which enables them to take on up to two projects under a formal partnership agreement. These certified partners also begin capacity strengthening efforts and explore funding opportunities in collaboration with EWB-USA.

In a subsequent stage of the PPM process, a partner is deemed ready for further growth and may take on up to five projects. In addition it may receive EWB-USA grants to support its growth as it continues capacity-strengthening and applies for and secures funding.

In a fourth, steady-state stage, the partner may take on up to 20 projects, be eligible to receive even larger EWB-USA grants, and continue capacity-strengthening. Throughout the process, the partner is encouraged to secure external funding to support the work it is taking on in partnership with EWB-USA and other entities.

The Purposeful Partnership Model will be a valuable asset towards advancing EWB-USA’s mission, vision, and community impact.

The PPM is already in place with existing partners, and EWB-USA has a goal to formalize the process to make it more effective. Dalziel says that by investing in our partners, “we can increase our collective impact.”