Spotlight on Learning

Flickr/ EU Civil protection and humanitarian aid

How does the humanitarian sector learn?

In our 25th anniversary year, ALNAP is shining a spotlight on learning to understand how and when learning happens in the humanitarian sector - and when and why it doesn’t. This series comprises four distinct but complementary projects, exploring the accelerators and challenges to learning that occur in different humanitarian contexts.

This series aims to promote the use of learning to improve humanitarian response by providing useful insights into how and when organisations and individuals across the sector learn effectively.

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Learning to change

Valuing and supporting the learning of frontline staff

Communicating humanitarian learning

Lessons of lessons

Blog

21 Dec 2022

Putting learning to work: Voices from ALNAP's first 25 years

news

06 Sep 2022

Find out more about ALNAP: explore our digital timeline

Learning to change

What have been the most significant changes in the humanitarian sector, and how did learning contribute to these changes?

‘Learning to Change: The case for systemic organisational learning in the humanitarian sector’ by Ben Ramalingam and John Mitchell aims to understand the different forms that humanitarian organisational learning has taken over the last two decades, and how, if at all, such learning contributes to change and improvement in the humanitarian enterprise.

Report / Study

December 2022

Learning to change: The case for systemic learning strategies in the humanitarian sector

Ramalingam, B. and Mitchell, J.

Blog

19 Dec 2022

Systemic Approaches to Learning: what are they and why are they important?

John Mitchell

Valuing and supporting the learning of frontline staff

The knowledge of frontline humanitarian staff is fundamental to good humanitarian action yet frontline learning has consistently lacked support.

ALNAP has now designed, trialled and refined two new practical resource packs on tacit knowledge and action learning, as a well as a new paper with reflections on the learning from piloting these approaches. Both packs are also available in Arabic, French and Spanish.

Our new 'Sharing Tacit Knowledge' resource pack helps individuals and organisations better capture, share and listen to the learning staff gain through everyday experience – otherwise known as ‘tacit knowledge.’ It provides ideas on how to strengthen an enabling learning environment and offers techniques to capture and share this learning in different ways depending on individual and organisational priorities.

Our 'Action Learning for Frontline Humanitarians' resource pack provides a step-by-step guide to one of these techniques that focuses on supporting frontline staff to share their learning and problem solve with their peers. This resource can be used by frontline staff or their managers as a new approach to blend learning with action in fast paced environments.

Event

08 Dec

WATCH | ALNAP Webinar: Are humanitarians paying enough attention to learning on the frontline?

8 Dec 2022

Blog

16 Dec 2022

Continuing the conversation: participant insights from our recent webinar on frontline learning

Jennifer Doherty

Tools/guidelines

01 Nov 2022

Action Learning for Frontline Humanitarians: a resource pack

Doherty, J. and Sundberg, A. with Obrecht, A.

Tools/guidelines

01 Nov 2022

Sharing Tacit Knowledge for Humanitarians: a resource pack

Hafez, S. and Knight, J.

, The Research People

Communicating humanitarian learning

Humanitarians produce a wealth of knowledge. So why is there so little evidence on how to best communicate this knowledge to maximise its impact?

'Communication humanitarian learning: What do we know?' a scoping study by Jo-Hannah Lavey explores what is known about how the sector communicates learning to inform and improve policy and practice. It highlights a glaring gap in the evidence base in this area. Since effective communication of lessons is essential to improve humanitarian response to crises, it is critical that those communicating knowledge and evidence are informed about the most successful ways to do this. Read the paper and the associated blog and find out how ALNAP plans to fill this gap in our collective knowledge.

Report / Study

30 Aug 2022

Communicating humanitarian learning: What do we know?

Lavey, J-H.

Blog

30 Aug 2022

Why communicating learning is vital for the humanitarian sector

Jo-Hannah Lavey

Lessons of lessons

For the past 25 years, ALNAP has shared critical lessons about humanitarian sector performance. What can we learn from looking back at these lessons?

‘Lessons of Lessons: A window into the evolution of the humanitarian sector’ by Jessica Alexander and Emmeline Kerkvliet, sets out to identify where and how the humanitarian sector has evolved over time and to offer reflections on areas where it has changed, where progress has been weaker, and where attention is still needed.
The paper presents a review of the hundreds of lessons featured in the ALNAP’s Lessons Papers which have been published over nearly two decades.

This paper is due to be published this summer.