Understanding the System You Work In
Weeks 1–3 · Mastering Somalia's Humanitarian and Development Landscape
Before you design anything, you must know who decides, who funds, and where your organisation stands. This phase gives you that map.
You will cover:
- Humanitarian principles, international humanitarian law and the humanitarian–development–peace nexus
- The UN system, the cluster architecture, and how Somalia's clusters actually operate
- The Humanitarian Programme Cycle and how to read the Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan
- Donors and funding mechanisms, including the Somalia Humanitarian Fund and its eligibility pathway
- The National Transformation Plan, sector strategies and the Essential Package of Health Services
- NGO registration, compliance, counter-terrorism financing and data protection obligations
- Sphere Standards, the Core Humanitarian Standard, and inclusion frameworks
Live Simulation
A full cluster coordination meeting — every participant holds an agency or ministry role.
Assessment
Context and Stakeholder Analysis + Policy Alignment Matrix.
Seminar
Inside the Cluster System: How Priorities and Funding Are Really Decided.
Evidence and Design
Weeks 4–8 · Turning Real Needs Into a Defensible Project
Weak projects begin with weak analysis. This phase teaches you to gather evidence properly and convert it into a design that survives donor scrutiny.
You will cover:
- Somalia's data systems — IPC, FSNAU, FEWS NET, IOM DTM, REACH, DHIS2, EWARN
- Assessment design, sampling, ethics and enumerator management
- Building digital data collection tools with KoboToolbox
- Data cleaning, statistical analysis, visualisation and report writing
- Problem tree, objectives tree and alternatives analysis
- Beneficiary targeting and selection criteria that withstand audit
- Theory of change construction and assumption testing
- The logical framework — objectives, indicators, verification, assumptions
Practical Lab
Build a live digital assessment tool, collect real data, analyse and report it.
Assessment
Assessment Report + Problem Tree + Theory of Change + Logical Framework.
Seminar
Why Good Projects Get Rejected: Design Errors Donors Spot Immediately.
Winning the Funding
Weeks 9–13 · Writing Proposals and Budgets That Get Financed
The heart of the programme. Every session pairs teaching with supervised writing, so you leave each class with another section of your proposal complete.
You will cover:
- Donor mapping, reading a call for proposals, and the go / no-go decision
- How the Somalia Humanitarian Fund allocation and scoring process works from the applicant's side
- All sixteen sections of a competitive institutional proposal, written one by one
- Alignment sections that reference national, sector and response-plan priorities
- Activity-based budgeting, indirect cost recovery and personnel costing
- Budget narratives that defend every line
- Financial controls, anti-fraud systems and audit readiness
- Concept notes, emergency applications, and diaspora and Islamic financing
Red Team Review
Teams score each other's proposals using the donor's real evaluation grid — then rewrite.
Assessment
Complete Narrative Proposal + Detailed Budget and Budget Narrative.
Seminar
A Grants Officer Explains How Your Application Is Actually Scored.
Delivering Under Pressure
Weeks 14–18 · Governance, Planning, Operations and Risk
A funded project still fails without systems. This phase builds the operational machinery that carries a project from signature to completion.
You will cover:
- Project governance, tolerances, internal controls and the project charter
- Start-up, kick-off, community entry and authority notification
- Work breakdown, scheduling, critical path and Gantt construction
- Seasonal and access realities — rains, road closures, market cycles, holidays
- Procurement, tendering, bid analysis and vendor vetting
- Logistics, warehousing, distribution, fleet and asset management
- Human resources, safe recruitment, supervision and staff wellbeing
- Change control, issue management and adaptive delivery
- Risk registers, security risk assessment and duty of care
- Safeguarding, PSEA and counter-fraud frameworks
Crisis Simulation
Flooding cuts access, a supplier defaults, and the donor moves the deadline forward — replan under time pressure.
Assessment
Project Charter + Implementation Plan + Procurement and HR Plans + Risk Register.
Seminar
Managing Access, Security and Duty of Care in High-Risk Districts.
Accountability, Learning and Closure
Weeks 19–22 · Proving Impact and Finishing Properly
Projects are judged on what they can demonstrate. This phase builds the systems that generate evidence, satisfy donors and serve the communities you work for.
You will cover:
- MEAL plans, Indicator Performance Tracking Tables and indicator reference sheets
- Baselines, midlines, endlines and post-distribution monitoring
- Third-party and remote monitoring in access-constrained districts
- Feedback and complaints mechanisms that communities actually trust and use
- PSEA referral pathways and sensitive complaint handling
- Evaluation design, OECD-DAC criteria and evaluation terms of reference
- Adaptive management — turning data into decisions
- Donor narrative and financial reporting, and cluster reporting
- Contract, financial and administrative closure; handover and sustainability
Practical Lab
Build a management dashboard, then draft a full donor report from live data.
Assessment
MEAL Plan + IPTT + Feedback Mechanism Design + Closure and Handover Pack.
Seminar
What Evaluators and Auditors Look For — and What They Never Find.
Final Capstone — Panel Defence
From Project Idea to a Funded, Defensible, Complete Project Package
You consolidate all fourteen documents into one integrated project package, then defend it live.
Dr. Nur Ali Mohamud
Founder, Executive Director & Instructor
Dr. Nur Ali Mohamud is a highly experienced Public Health Policy and Health Systems Specialist with over 20 years of expertise in humanitarian and development programs. As the Founder and Executive Director of the DARA Institute, he leads initiatives focused on institutional strengthening and capacity building within health systems.
Dr. Nur’s career spans extensive work with leading organizations such as the Ministry of Health, WHO, UNICEF, WFP, and the World Bank, where he contributed to policy development, program design, donor engagement, proposal development and resource mobilization.
As an instructor, he brings practical insights from programme design, governance, strategic planning, stakeholder engagement and results-based approaches to help participants develop fundable, compliant and operationally realistic projects.