Author(s)

Charly Pïerluigi

Performance in the international aid and development sector

The researcher Olivier Hamant has demonstrated in his writings and lectures that modern societies are governed by ‘control and optimisation’.[1] It is not only our lives, our land and our work that are ruled by this imperative of positive performance, but also our decisions and our beliefs, according to Hamant.

In the world of work, this quest for performance relies on management methods that are ‘free’ or ‘lean’, depending on batteries of key performance indicators (KPIs); the application of IT wherever it can be applied in order to ‘optimise’ the cost of work; the standardisation of procedures; and hierarchical work relations. All these factors do harm to the social fabric that is essential to any collective business. In a society that increasingly prioritises efficiency and effectiveness, with the business sector in prime position, where do the international aid and development sector, and the NGOs, fit in? How far have they been imbued (or not) with these societal objectives, which researchers describe as unsustainable, or even absurd? Is it possible that NGOs, trying to improve, have become trapped in a set of assumptions that are contrary to their values, and militates against their social mission?

While this is a rhetorical question, we can answer it with evidence from several concrete examples. But first some definitions, which demonstrate how far the humanitarian sector has become imbued with the assumptions referred to above. According to the OECD, performance is defined as the ‘degree to which an intervention or partner operates according to specific criteria, standards and guidelines, or achieves results in accordance with stated goals or plans’.[2] Taking that definition as the starting point, we immediately note that in the international aid and development sector we are wholly committed to performance, at least in our efforts to be accountable to our sources of funds, which expect organisations to be able to produce accounts covering their ability to deliver results and to achieve planned objectives. NGOs have adopted the language of performance: indicators, stewardship, dashboards, value for money, results-based management …

 

The legacy of the sector, and its transformation

We may wonder how far this situation is willed or not. Are international aid and development actors really obliged to embark on this quest for performance? As often, the response to this question entails nuance. These management practices are the legacy of rapid social and sectoral development, over just a few decades. In 60 years, aid and development budgets have increased fivefold,[3] while there have been increasingly stringent demands for accountability for the use of funds which are, for the most part, taxpayers’ money. The latter has in practice consisted of an unbalanced form of accountability, which leans far more towards the funding sources, rather than the communities being supported. Project or programme appeals and other procedures for making claims on financial resources create a climate of competition in which organisations tend to develop competences and mobilise resources so that they can each of them ‘win’ individually, rather than joining forces to respond to problems in the real world they work in. In parallel, because of various financial and ethical scandals, the sector has been placed under detailed scrutiny by the general public, which has increased expectations of transparency. As organisations have specialised and become more professional, competition between them has increased, and they look for solutions from the world of business and enterprise.

 

An identity crisis for NGOs

This trend has been documented in plenty of practical and written work, including that led by Joseph Akol and Dr Denis Musinguzi in Uganda, based on the management practices of the Ugandan Red Cross. In their case study, they shed light on market-oriented activities by the aid and development sector, which threaten their very ‘identity and mission and also undermine the general public’s trust’, since an increase in corporatism, and the enterprise culture itself, put pressure on the sector’s traditional values, which were based on the communities it served.[4] This strong tension – between corporate values and the sector’s traditional values – has been experienced by most aid and development actors. The director of one French NGO describes it thus: ‘our management is similar to that of a business, driven by efficiency, while we try to use all the means our management processes make available to achieve the goal we are mandated to work for. We must keep both balls in the air: humanitarian and economic.’

This progressive evolution of the sector is the result of external constraints, but also of a certain degree of commitment by its actors to the introduction of performance-oriented management practices. The increase in initiatives to improve quality from around 1990 to around 2010 is another example of the rush to adopt management practices that were increasingly performance-based and standardised.

 

Complex systems and the measurement illusion

The question is no longer whether we can be sure if what we are doing is of value, but whether we have succeeded in the tasks we have been paid to carry out.

This situation led to an extreme concentration of effort on measuring targets and results, rather than on the purpose of actions. The question is no longer whether we can be sure if what we are doing is of value, but whether we have succeeded in the tasks we have been paid to carry out. Systems for quality control and information management are in some cases so complicated that they become unworkable. A representative of an NGO in Burkina Faso confirmed this: ‘Dashboards: we fill them in. Even when we have difficulty finding much of the data, or don’t have it. Sometimes the data doesn’t exist … But we fill in the figures anyway. You know why? Because the white man loves figures’.[5] Do we measure what matters, or do we measure what is measurable?

 

From being increasingly ‘corporate’ to embarking on the search for meaning

Amid all the fuss, there was finally, around 2015, a turning point that led to quality control initiatives being rationalised, motivated by a quest for meaning and flexibility, so as to avoid being locked in by restrictive management practices. One of the participants at URD’s 2022 summer school[6] describes it thus: ‘Wanting to develop norms, we thought we were making ourselves freer, but in fact we were constructing a prison for ourselves.’ The diktat of rationalisation, simplification and standardisation is wholly antithetical in a sector where there is no room for linear thinking, where challenges need to be contextualised, where complexity is the norm, and where relationships and interactions between actors are the key to successful interventions. Making performance the goal is contrary to the very essence of the sector which must be flexible and robust, in the sense of being highly adaptable if it is to work when regularly confronted by change.

 

NGOs and the demand for performance

Having made the points above, we need to introduce some nuance, because performance can be justified in some specific cases, particularly in the context of the response to disasters or emergencies. The example of a fireman going to tackle a fire, or the human metabolism dealing with infection are illuminating: they indicate the need to perform on given occasions, for a short period of time, as a response to an emergency; and they also show that it is impossible to maintain that emergency response state for an extended period of time. Humanitarian NGOs are also in this situation when responding to emergencies: this is exemplified by the way staff rotate in and out in a matter of weeks.

Performance, which depends on securing results rapidly and at low cost, is completely contrary to the concept of equal partnerships, or the transfer of power, or capacity strengthening, of asymmetric relationships which – by very definition – take time because they rely on interconnectedness and a network of actors.

It is possible to justify this way of working in so far as it contributes to achieving positive outcomes for people in crisis situations, as part of the response to emergencies, and in so far as it observes balance in the area of accountability (donors as against communities). However, this model with its limited outputs is not sustainable in the long term because it demands too much energy and swallows up resources, and is not up to dealing with today’s challenges. Let’s take the example of the localisation of aid, which has been a major challenge within our sector for several years, yet is struggling to show concrete results.  Performance, which depends on securing results rapidly and at low cost, is completely contrary to the concept of equal partnerships, or the transfer of power, or capacity strengthening, of asymmetric relationships which – by very definition – take time because they rely on interconnectedness and a network of actors. Another illustration of the limit of performance is the need for the sector to take the environment into account. The way this has been dealt with has followed a similar trajectory to that of quality control initiatives previously and we have observed for fifteen years or so that tools, norms and standards have multiplied (MER,[7] NEAT+,[8] MERA,[9] HCC[10] …) This subject is, however, highly complex. There is no trail already blazed for the ecological transition. We need to test and learn in order to find the most effective ways of enabling us to reduce organisations’ environmental footprint, taking a holistic approach.

 

From performance to robustness

As previously explained, the performance-based model remains sustainable as long as there is fuel to keep it going. In the present context of complex crises and instability, with increasingly limited financial resources, and major challenges confronting the sector, this model is empty of substance. That being the case, how do we maintain significant, expensive systems with limited resources in order to continue helping people in crisis or in situations of vulnerability? In other words, how do we move from the world of performance to the world of robustness?

 

A robust approach to the renewal of aid and cooperation

A robust aid and development sector cannot do ‘more with less’. Its aim should be to do the best possible with the means available and above all to learn by doing.

A robust international aid and development sector should not depend on competition between aid actors. Its objective should be that different aid actors should complement each other and actively cooperate. A robust sector should not be putting so much energy into demonstrating what it does. It assesses the changes aimed at from the point of view of those principally affected. A robust sector should not use standards and norms as conditions of access to funds, thus leaving out a myriad of aid actors who constitute its diversity and vitality. Rather, it handles those standards and norms like direction-finders that carry a shared vision of the endpoint to which all actors involved wish to aim. A robust sector should not be buttressed by expectations of transparency that are increasingly demanding and constraining. The sector should rely on trust when checks on conformity are required. A robust partnership should not be based on one-sided assessments of gaps that need filling to strengthen risk management. It should aim to create alliances and relationships based on trust, shared vision and interdependence, in other words cooperation where the development of shared common interests makes it possible to share resources (physical goods, and knowledge) between stakeholders. A robust aid and development sector cannot do ‘more with less’. Its aim should be to do the best possible with the means available and above all to learn by doing.

Changing the way we do things is not easy, but there are encouraging approaches to try.

  • COOPERATION – You go faster on your own, you go faster together: this saying may raise a smile, but it is nonetheless relevant. Aid and cooperation entail building things together, and for that to happen we need to forge lasting alliances in order to ‘act together’, to coordinate, to help and exchange with each other, to build upwards and outwards, to create networks. Strengthening the ‘nexus’ approach among aid actors with different perspectives takes us in a similar direction. Sustainable relationships of mutual aid and solidarity are created over time, by cooperation, through diversity, through renewed experimentation and by forging bonds of trust.
  • LOCAL APPROACHES – We need to adopt approaches based on territorial realities and the network of aid actors that are rooted there. International aid and development actors cannot continue to think ‘away from the field’. They need to give due weight to existing dynamics on the ground, including among diasporas and within informal, endogenous processes which are often fertile ground for local arrangements to thrive, being especially careful not to dislocate the social tissue that is already in place locally. The example of the resilience compass or direction-finder developed by CEREMA and adapted by the project RESILAC inspires us to see how the localised approach is likely to succeed.[11]
  • FUNDING – we need to pose new questions about the funding of the aid and development sector; develop more local funding mechanisms or approaches (i.e., Country Based Pool Funds); experiment with pilot funding schemes while stressing the importance of ‘learning from one’s mistakes’; reduce demands on implementers; reject the application of standards as pre-conditions for funding; develop long-term financing approaches, that are not subject to retrofitting to match the way aid actors work at the level of organisational structures.[12]
  • ORGANISATIONS – modify our organisational culture in favour of more flexible, adaptable management methods; ask hard question about accountability and the meaning we want it to have; re-think the place of each actor in a narrative that he/she can be excited about, with a vision of an aid and development sector where momentum to take things forward is solidly rooted in local territories ready to deal with future change.[13]
  • QUALITY – Adapt our quality control management systems and processes to make them more robust; prefer simple, practical tools rather than more elaborate but over-complicated tools (i.e., Excel rather than Power BI); explore cost-free approaches based on open sources (such as OpenStreetMap)[14]; question systematically what needs to be measured, and why; use reflexive rather than prescriptive methods, thus avoiding the ‘one size fits all’ concept;[15] adopt solutions oriented towards change, not solely centred on results; prioritise qualitative approaches, plan collective learning exercises and collective study projects[16] or exercises in hybrid capitalisation, and distribute the results widely, encourage participatory approaches that make use of adaptive management practices (i.e., outcome harvesting); highlight the value of informal data which may represent a mine of information that has not been adequately exploited[17] as a complement to data that is gathered in traditional ways.
  • ADAPTABILITY – support adaptability-based solutions that make it possible to learn by doing and which accept that it is not possible to know everything; prioritise iterations of solutions that centre on learning (i.e., Iterative Evaluations with Mini Seminars); think through action plans by seeing how they will stand up to inevitable instability;[18] be open to complexity and subjectivity because not everything can be objective and quantified.

Being robust is far from being a rejection of efficiency – but as an approach it is not yet well known. In the current situation, it is unquestionably an interesting avenue to explore if we are collectively – as a sector – to survive.

 

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Charly Pierluigi has been URD’s head of research, evaluation and training since September 2022. He takes the lead on Quality, and in this capacity he contributes to the analysis of practices within the aid and development sector, and the way they relate to challenges and questions about quality.

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[1] Antidote au culte de la performance (Antidote to the cult of performance), Olivier Hamant, Tracts Gallimard, n°50, August 2023.

[2] Glossaire des principaux termes relatifs à l’évaluation et la gestion axée sur les résultats pour le développement

Durable (Glossary of Key Terms in Evaluation and Results-Based Management for Sustainable Development), OECD, 2023. See https//www.oecd.org/content/dam/oecd/fr/publications/reports/2023/06/glossary-of-key-terms-in-evaluation-and-results-based-management-for-sustainable-development-second-edition_2767e14e/632da462-en-fr-es.pdf  p. 14: ‘performance’, with p. 48 definition of performance, cited in this article, above.

[3] In 1960, total ODA was $41.17 billion; it was $207.60 billion in 2024, down from a peak of $223.45 billion in 2023. Source : APD en flux et en équivalent-don par les membres du CAD (ODA in flux, and gifts in kind by DAC members), OCDE, 2025 (https://www.oecd.org/fr/topics/sub-issues/oda-trends-and-statistics.html).

[4] J.Akol & D. Musinguzi Marketization of Humanitarian Work in the 21st Century: Balancing the Survival and Moral Imperatives for NGOs: A Case of Uganda Red Cross Society”, EAJIS, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 352-364, May 2025.

[5] Vincent Pradier. Changement climatique et ONG françaises : une analyse décoloniale de leur outillage gestionnaire. (Climate change and French NGOs : a decolonial analysis of their management toolkit). Gestion et management. IAE Paris – Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne,2025. Français. ffNNT : ff. fftel-05124318f

[6] https://www.urd.org/fr/evenement/uah-2022-entre-normes-et-contraintes-comment-redonner-du-sens-a-la-qualite/  (Between norms and constraints: how to give meaning to quality).

[7] ec.europa.eu/echo/files/policies/environment/guidance_on_the_operationalisation_of_the_mers_for_eu-funded_humanitarian_aid_operations.pdf

[8] https://reliefweb.int/report/world/nexus-environmental-assessment-tool-neat-enesfr

[9] https://www.environnementhumanitaire.org/ressource/matrice-multi-sectorielle-danalyse-de-risques-environnementaux-et-de-mesures-de-mitigation-mera-gt-evaluations-environnementales-du-reh-October-2024/

[10] https://www.climate-charter.org/humanitarian-carbon-calculator/

[11] https://www.environnementhumanitaire.org/forum-reh-robustesse-versus-performance-17-07-25/.

[12] See examples financed by the Fondation de France: https://fonda.asso.fr/ressources/acteurs-cles-de-changement-cooperer-pour-inventer-demain.

[13] See the text of the project Pledge for Change 2030: https://pledgeforchange2030.org/.

[14] https://cartong.pages.gitlab.cartong.org/learning-corner/en/intro_OSM

[15] This is the idea behind URD’s COMPAS Quality, which is a method for managing quality control and accountability based on the Core Humanitarian Standard: https://www.urd.org/fr/publication/compas-qualite-redevabilite-guide-methodologique-October-2018/

[16] https://www.urd.org/fr/publication/rapport-et-messages-cles-de-letude-collective-urgence-beyrouth/

[17] Highlighting the value of slight indications: advance information, which may be incomplete, unstructured and apparently marginal, but may indicate a changing trend, the evolution of a situation, or a risk/opportunity arising.

[18] The robustness of an idea or approach is measured by its capacity to survive in the face of change. We speak of ‘robustness tests’.