The champions must have made changes in their own lives – including gender, and not only peer-shared voluntarily with a certain number of people, but more importantly, set off a chain of peer sharing. Suggested criteria and process:
- Quality
of analysis on their own diagrams and keeping own records of personal changes
and outreach in diagrams - Men
should have criteria of gender justice as non-negotiables – to show that they
are practising what they preach eg should have joint land agreements. Women
champions should also have some clear gender change criteria either in their
own families or the community – depending on levels of violence and vulnerability
they start with. - Peer-sharing skills and the number of other people they
have trained in GALS, and the numbers of people in the
third and fourth tier of sharing. It is the establishment of the chain that is
importrant for exponential growth, not just the second tier. (outreach) - The changes that their
peers experienced - Certification in the form of
a licence that needs to be renewed (for example every year, like Bukonzo Joint
is doing) to encourage a constant in-flow of new people
and enable original champions to move on if they wish without anyone being made
to feel guilty, or anyone getting preferential treatment just because they
worked hard at the beginning. - Application
process should be a random sample of 3 persons from the third tier of sharing
marked on their Leadership Spider Maps) with information cross-checked by the
organisational process facilitator. If information on any one of the people
checked from the sample is incorrect, then the application would be anulled and
the person asked to reapply the following year. That should ensure that
champions will only submit figures for people they are sure of. - For
the ERC (in order for them to be accredited) there should be quota for champions
eg 60% of women and men who were really poor and have made changes. With equal
women and men. It is important that the percentage of people who started very
poor and with real challenges is greater that the percentage of people who have
an easier task. That said, it is also good to have enough champions in more
influential sections of the community to make change ‘respectable and the done
thing’ – that makes the task of the poorer champions easier and respected also. - The
champions selected should then be given participatory workshop facilitation
skills, including all the ‘fun with a serious purpose’ skills. And more advanced
leadership skills.
Concerns:
- In some projects the same
champions are always asked (…), however being a champion should be a
steppingstone for them to something else (moving on); - Once champions are
showcased, there is a risk that they either feel obliged to adopt a teaching
approach or to become overburdened with too high expectations, or worse be
exploited. For partners staff and GALS consultants a guided learning process would
be best to tackle this issue (through E@S platform?).
The challenge is to prevent exclusion, and to prioritise the more marginalised participants to emerge as champions.