The Secret Life of Donors

Cord Asia help our partners carry out their vital mission.

Local Cambodian organisations supported by Cord all face a common and pressing challenge: how to access the funds they desperately need to maintain their important work in empowering communities to protect their rights and their environment, to promote sustainable development and to find peaceful resolutions to conflict.

Cord advisors in Cambodia recently held a series of workshops for local partner leaders, helping them to develop fundraising strategies to generate reliable sources of income.

Entitled “The Secret Life of Donors” the workshops were aimed at enabling partner organisations to manage their relationships with donors more effectively, as well as identifying new donors whose funding priorities match their particular remit.

‘As well as a paucity of funding our partners also lack the knowledge and skills to find funding sources and to describe their project activities in ways which appeal to donors.’ said Noel Matthews, Cord Asia Regional Director. ‘Yet many international donors actually struggle to find quality local organisations with programmes that address their core concerns.’

In this sense, Cord is in a unique position to support the progress of development in Cambodia. By building and maintaining relationships with international donors and supporters on the one hand and with local organisations and grass-roots groups on the other, Cord can bridge the gap and connect the two.

Cord Cambodia Country Director Keng BunChhoeuth said that sometimes partners don’t immediately see how the work they are doing to enable communities to protect their human rights fits into a donor initiative for democratisation.

‘When we work with them to analyse this more closely they see that it’s a very good fit and has strong potential for successful funding,’ he explained.

Cheang Sokha from the Youth Resources Development Programme (YRDP) said he and his colleague had learnt a lot from the workshops and were starting to put some ideas in practice. ‘I really appreciate Cord’s way of working with us, with plenty of motivation, encouragement and openness. It’s led to good relationships and trust between us,’ he added.

Following the workshops, Cord Advisors are using coaching and mentoring sessions to help partners apply their new found knowledge. As BunChhoeuth noted there may be an equally strong need to educate donors about the realities faced by grassroot organisations in Cambodia.

‘Perhaps in the future we may run a workshop for donors that we call, “The Secret Life of Local Organisations”‘ he added.