Executive director Marième Daff shares her reflections upon joining Firelight
As the former director of programs and partnerships for a private foundation working to improve food security, family health, financial wellbeing and education, I have seen how effective support can change lives and whole communities.
While visiting our grantee partners in Kenya recently for the first time since taking over as Firelight’s executive director, I had the chance to witness what makes Firelight's approach so special: the transformations that can be achieved when communities have the power and agency to drive change for themselves.
“The work speaks for itself,” said Isaac Tobiko, programs director of Nareto Latia Indigenous Peoples’ Program (NLIPP), a community-based organization that supports women and youth to build sustainable livelihoods in Kenya. This statement stayed with me throughout my visits, as communities shared powerful stories about their journey to drive change.
Here are three things I learned from my visits and interactions with communities in the Eastern and Rift Valley regions of Kenya:
Community-based organizations are driven and highly capable
Community-based organizations (CBOs) are often overlooked by traditional funders, considered too small, informal, risky or immature. The reality is that CBOs are rooted in the communities they serve and hold legitimacy that most well-established NGOs will never have. Evident in the interactions I observed was that our CBO grantee-partners are well-respected, not only by their respective communities, but also by local governments and other local stakeholders. They are attuned to the issues faced by their communities and committed to community-led processes to identify the most pressing needs.
The CBOs I had the pleasure of meeting are part of a new initiative launched by Firelight in 2022 and supported by Imaginable Futures, called Community-Driven Systems Change for Youth Resiliency and Belonging. Grounded in a community-driven systems change approach, this initiative supports youth-led groups to design solutions to improve social, economic, and health outcomes with and for youth in their communities. When I visited Jumuisha Initiative CBO, a woman-led organization based in Makueni county that supports young women farmers, I was inspired by their resilience and resourcefulness. With minimal resources, the organization leverages local knowledge and expertise to help group members improve their vegetable production. Jumuisha Initiative closely collaborates with other CBOs in their cluster, including Kitise Rural Development, also based in Makueni. Speaking with them in their offices and in visits to community gardens, I was struck by how openly the two groups discussed the challenges they faced in their work and moved by their commitment to act in solidarity. These youth-led groups deserve recognition, greater visibility and investments to drive systems-change within their respective regions.
The local ecosystem is the foundation that supports change
In every community I visited with Carolyne, I was reminded that the work was not happening in isolation, but was supported by deliberate, local-government efforts. Too often, there is an assumption that the development infrastructure in these contexts is somehow lacking and civil society is there to address a failure. To the contrary, robust systems exist at the regional, county and sub-county levels in Kenya, where CBO efforts align with local government agendas in a true partnership.
Together, we build the evidence to demonstrate the impact of our work
Firelight’s commitment to learning is the cornerstone of our work. Our approach begins with a planning phase during which CBO partners, along with other local key stakeholders, engage in participatory inquiry to develop their visions and action plans. Unlike in traditional development, in this community-driven approach, the learning agenda is defined by communities themselves, with support from our CBO grantee-partners. Because they “own” it, communities are invested in deeper and more honest dialogue to ultimately strengthen their work.
Rarely in my career before have I observed grant partners discussing with their funding partners their challenges, worries or mistakes with such openness, like I have on these visits. This transparency is in large part due to the mutual trust I observed between Firelight and its CBO partners, fueled by Firelight’s values of integrity, humility and inclusion, which Carolyne embodied beautifully. No topic was considered off-limits, which I found refreshing.
Learning and research is used throughout the initiative to inform programming, to assess impact—both intentional and unintentional—and to generate knowledge to influence our sector.
The road ahead
Firelight is transforming communities. Even more than that, it is transforming the way that people think about, and deliver, development.
As an organization, it is transitioning resources to communities in ways that are fair and equitable, and that address the power imbalances inherent in our sector. I could not be more excited–and proud–to join the team. It is an honor to work alongside our brilliant and highly experienced majority-African team, strong CBO grantee-partners, and supportive funders who believe in doing philanthropy differently. Together, I look forward to building on the strong foundation that my predecessors and Firelight’s devoted Board of Directors have built.
On behalf of Firelight, I am pleased to introduce our FY23 annual report that highlights our achievements and learnings in the last fiscal year.
As you will see, the work truly speaks for itself.