Course Description 

Participants will work with the DPMI faculty to explore in-depth the design and management of a development project of their choice.

Participants will learn a series of tools/approaches to support project design and management, including:

• Design Thinking: An approach to solving problems through ideation, selection and execution of solutions that ensures deep focus on the problem and root causes.
• Results Framework: A tool that allows users to articulate the overarching objectives of their proposed intervention and the causal pathway necessary for success
• Shared Measurement: An approach that encourages participants to identify cross-cutting goals and common measures of success.

They will also learn to apply a series of lenses to the design and management process

• Systems Lens: Recognizing that all actors and interventions exist within a larger system that has the potential to positively or negatively impact results.
• Integration Lens: Recognizing that the lives of individuals and communities have multiple facets that all contribute towards overall quality of life.
• Local Solutions Lens: Recognizing that local knowledge and expertise must be harnessed in order to achieve meaningful change.

About the Program on Design, Partnering, Managemet & Innovation (DPMI)
DPMI is a leadership certificate in international development project management and social change. Development is the process of finding creative solutions to chronic problems of hunger, poverty, disease, joblessness, and powerlessness. Social change refers to any significant alteration over time in behavior patterns and cultural values and norms. The DPMI program focuses on innovative approaches to create projects, facilitate stakeholder engagement, and strategic partnering in response to contemporary development challenges, hence creating the optimal conditions for positive social change.

DPMI has been running for over a decade, and has an alumni base of over 1000 development practitioners.

About Locus
Locus is a movement dedicated to eliminating funding siloes through an integrated approach to development, discovering the most effective development solutions through shared measurement, and developing local solutions through strategic partnerships of the best local and global organizations.

The Locus coalition is made up of like-minded partners, including Pact, IRC, FHI360, SNV USA, Africa Capacity Alliance, and Aga Khan Foundation USA, who identify effective local solutions in which community based organizations have leveraged local resources and capacity to ensure long-term, sustainable change; identify shared approaches to measurement and explore possible opportunities for scale-up; and provide evidence-based recommendations to share with influencers and policy makers worldwide. They do this through shared research, pilot projects, global convenings, a virtual knowledge hub, publishing opportunities as well as academic courses.