MaFI Meeting at SEEP Annual Conference 2015 - Report

SEEP Annual Conference 2015
Inclusion and Resilience: The Next Challenge
MaFI Meeting
Coming Back Home

Welcome
Special birthdays are moments of
reflection; moments to take stock of
what life has been and moments to
think about the future.
It is also a special moment for MaFI:
• how can/should MaFI evolve to
respond to the changing landscape
of market development?
• How can MaFI maximise its value
to practitioners?

Welcome
In this meeting the main
objectives were:
• To take stock of the
achievements of the last year
• To reflect about the future of
MaFI
• To identify ideas that could be
part of MaFI’s 2016 work plan

• Dan Norell, World Vision: Moving from
value chain to market systems
development, need to observe and
learn about market linkages
• How to influence the audience and
facilitate donor participation?
• Kristin O’Planick - USAID: where are
connections/overlaps etc. between
different networks and how do we
leverage these? Having a more focused
agenda for MaFI, at least for the year.
What is the biggest challenge for
facilitation?
• Ken Wood, VSO: how can MaFI work
better as a network, sharing tools, best
practice, etc.?

Eileen Hoffman, Chemonics:
• Would like to see actionable items to go
back to our organizations with.
• Facilitation is somewhat in conflict with
data driven/randomized control trial
trends in M&E. Need to find metrics that
show facilitation is building networks &
changing behaviour.
• We may need a big publication sponsored
by influential institutions to convince
donors of the merits of market facilitation
approaches.
• Bridging institutions: great that Lucho is
both in BEAM and MaFI but more people
are needed to build bridges.

• We need a more focused agenda:
• Stand alone projects
• Aligned with needs and capabilities
of SEEP members’ teams
• With large potentila to influence
practice and policy of non-SEEP
members too
• MaFI will need a new (informal)
organisational and support structure:
• The facilitator working with contact
points and champions in key SEEP
member organisations
• Better intel and comms with SEEP
members to know their needs and
possibilities in a more timely
manner

• This section was added to the agenda for the
benefit of newcomers
• The facilitator gave basic info about MaFI
• You can find more at http://bit.ly/aboutmafi
(N.B.: this info will change soon!)
• The facilitator asked experienced MaFI
members to share their ideas and experiences
about MaFI. This is what they said…
What is MaFI?

• Chris Harwood, World Vision Australia: a place to
connect with and participate in shared learning
on tools and more theoretical topics with other
market facilitation organizations. LinkedIn
discussion groups particularly useful.
• Eileen Hoffman: Great thing about online forums
is that a lot of the people asking questions and
commenting are actual market facilitators
working in the field; it’s very practical and up-
front.
What is MaFI?

Is there a subject specialist who oversees LinkedIn
discussions to assure quality of information?
• In 2007/8, MaFI had about 20 members. For a
few years, the facilitator worked with other
members to produce specific deliverables (e.g. e-
discussion reports). Now MaFI has more than 400
members. Practically impossible to do centralised
quality control. There is some organic, informal
peer-revision but not perfect.
• The MaFI Knowledge Factory is designed to
address this challenge. See: http://bit.ly/mafikf

Structure proposed for the meeting
• Main achievements in 2015
• The future of MaFI
• Main opportunities for 2016
• Wrap up

Main Achievements in 2015:
Collaboration with USAID’s LEO project

The webinar and e-discussion we produced together are
• “good examples of how to bring together
organizations and push the envelope of where we’re
applying market systems (wage labor, sustainable
poverty reduction, etc.)
• “Nearly 250 people participated in the e-discussion
over three weeks.
• “Good example of leveraging the value in networks –
broad range of thinkers and backgrounds.”
(Anna Garloch – ACDI/VOCA)
Collaboration LEO-MaFI-BEAM

Collaboration with LEO

Collaboration with BEAM
E-discussion

Collaboration with SEEP’s WEE Group

The Facilitation Tools Portal
with the support of the LEO Project

Mini webinars on facilitation tools

Three-part webinar series on…

Main Achievements in 2015

Blogs, syntheses and
collaboration with universities:
MaFI Knowledge Factory

Main Achievements in 2015: Universities keen
to pilot Research Alliances with MaFI in 2016
• Faculty of Agriculture, University of
Zimbabwe
• Economics Faculty Center for Research
and Development, King's College, Nepal
• School of Economics and Public Policy,
Srinakharinwirot University, Thailand

MaFI’s Evolution
• MaFI grew and maintained high levels of
vibrancy for 5-6 years. The main
emphasis was on promoting the
paradigm of inclusive market facilitation.
• In the last 18 months, it seems that its
vibrancy has been declining in terms of
creation of discussions and number of
interactions between members (hard to
prove quantitatively since LinkedIn
eliminated its “stats” feature but it feels
like it)
Time
Vibrancy

MaFI’s Evolution
This is a critical juncture
for MaFI: it is the time to
ask ourselves how
should MaFI adapt to
regain its relevance and
vibrancy and maximise
its value to practitioners
and other key
stakeholders in the field
of inclusive markets.

Key changes during Transition
• Market systems facilitation is
becoming mainstream amongst
donors and program managers
–More knowledge codified
–More $  invested by donors
–More skilled practitioners needed

• Ongoing initiatives like Microlinks
increasing promotion of market
facilitation approaches
• Emergence of new projects and
platforms with similar objectives,
such as USAID’s LEO and Learning
Lab and DFID/SDC’s BEAM

• Growth of MaFI has taken it into a
sort of limbo:
–Relatively low number of members on
LinkedIn (compared to other similar
groups)
–But large enough to have lost the
feeling of “safe space” that has been
so appreciated since its beginings

So...?

MaFI’s Evolution

The best gift we can give SEEP on its...

… is a renewed

… a MaFI that adds value
to SEEP member organizations
and
leverage their potential
to reduce poverty worldwide
through market systems facilitation

How would a better MaFI be different?
Before From now on
Promoting market facilitation towards the
outside
More promoting of market facilitation
amongst SEEP members
Open to SEEP members and non-SEEP
members
More focus, attention and investments on
SEEP members
Helping individuals with their questions Helping teams with their questions
Helping individuals to network Helping teams to network
Top-down planning at beginning and then
more organic and light touch
Bottom-up strategic planning but aligned
with SEEP members needs and potential
Space for discussion and learning
amongst individuals
Space for solution-driven collaboration
between SEEP members
Focus on market development CoP only Focus on financial and market dev CoPs
No very clear strategic role for SEEP
member organisations
Clear roles as mobilisers, translators and
mentors – with focus on field-staff

Q - Dan Norell: Could MaFI go wider in terms of
bringing in more SEEP organizations but also deeper
– bringing in participants from field offices that
might not have bandwidth to watch webinars, etc.
but can access LinkedIn?
• A: We should get MaFI to focus on SEEP’s 130+
organizations worldwide
• A: MaFI’s success should be measured in terms of
its added value to the member organization's
teams who are trying to adopt or improve their
practice in inclusive market facilitation
Focus on SEEP and deep, long-term
engagement with field practitioners

The power of SEEP

Eileen Hoffman: do you have advice for promoting
institutional membership? I joined MaFI, but my
organization is not a member of SEEP
• The new MaFI strategy will focus on value addition to SEEP
member organizations
• Non-SEEP members will see that there is a value in joining
SEEP. MaFI will work closely with SEEP’s comms team
• Committed individuals who have been a key part of MaFI’s life
will continue to play a key role, even if they are not working
for a member of SEEP. Ideal if those individuals promote SEEP
within their own organizations.
Getting more organisations to join SEEP
and participation of non-SEEP members

For the moment, MaFI on LinkedIn will stay open to
whoever complies with the usual basic requirements to
join (even people who do not work for SEEP member
organisations) :
• Invest at least 1 hour per month to contribute to
discussions on LinkedIn, etc.
• Has relevant experience in any area related to MaFI’s
agenda/objectives (even young professionals can join)
• Has a passion for inclusive market facilitation (but with
a critical mind)
• Has an information-rich profile on LinkedIn
What will happen with MaFI on LinkedIn?

Anna Garloch: “One of the things I like most about MaFi is
that it is individual, broad, and open. I can see the benefits of
focusing on organizations, but could risk restricting things too
much and damage organic, inclusive value.”
• The idea isn’t to make MaFI exclusive to SEEP members
only –there are amazing individuals who do not work for
SEEP member organizations- who have been part of the life
and soul of MaFI for many years. They should stay.
• The key in the new strategy is that the limited resources of
MaFI (funds, facilitator’s time, etc.) will be used to benefit
SEEP member organizations; particularly the field teams
who are trying to reduce poverty through market systems.
Protecting the “individual, broad and
open” nature of MaFI

Eileen Hoffmann: “Strikes me to think about the
difference between interacting as individuals (we’re
professionals with shared concerns) versus interacting as
organizations (some of us are competitors), but actually
this is the exact problem we face trying to work in the
field. Maybe MaFI can play a role in getting people to
collaborate in useful ways in the field?”
• Indeed! MaFI could explore ways to contribute to this
collaboration. Through better communication with
SEEP member organizations, we will know where
opportunities for useful collaboration exist –especially
at the ground level.
Collaboration and Competition

• The comparison table above provides many clues about this
• Example: if a MaFI member (on LinkedIn) poses a question, the other members
may reply and help, but SEEP’s resources such as the facilitator’s time, core
staff and funds will not be prioritized in the promotion of these
conversations, unless they can contribute to needs of SEEP members’ teams.
• The focus of MaFI’s efforts and investments will be on projects that have been
identified and prioritized by SEEP member organizations and that contribute to
their field teams’ capacity to use inclusive market facilitation effectively.
• MaFI will not invest resources in the production of documents and discussion
topics that don’t directly address problems on the ground faced by SEEP
members’ teams.
• We currently do not know all the details about what MaFI will or won’t do. The
evolution of MaFI will be shaped by the most active representatives of SEEP
member organizations and other committed members as we implement our
plans.
What things would the new MaFI do that the
current one does not do? (Paul Bundick)

Lorenz Wild, Mercy Corps: “on the importance of having field
staff grasp market facilitation – it’s not just going deep within
SEEP member organizations but also with local partners on
the ground.”
• This is a great idea! These are precisely the insights that
SEEP member organizations can bring to MaFI’s new
strategy to make it work at the ground level
• The engagement of local partners can be enabled by the
SEEP member organization acting as a local connector,
mobiliser and translator.
Broadening the local scope

• After a 30-minute break, the group was
presented with a list of six ideas
• Interest? Relevance?
• Good list? Need to drop ideas? Need new
ones?
• Group decided which ideas to focus on
Breakout Groups

• Each group focuses on one idea
• Please discuss (20 min):
– What you think about the idea. Interesting? Useful?
– How would you modify it to make it work for your
organisation?
– What synergies with your organisation do you see?
– What risks do you see and how should we prepare for
them?
• One person takes note and shares key points (max
5 min per group).
Breakout groups instructions

1. Adaptive management – what are the skills,
capabilities and behaviours that organisations who
show effective adaptive management are building and
why?
2. The Art and Science of Market Facilitation – a set of
minimum standards?
3. The Complexity for Scale Dialogues - From pilots to
scale: Bringing market system facilitators, donors and
complexity experts to discuss about the practical
applications of complexity science to the design,
analysis, implementation and M&E of market
development programmes.
List of ideas – Part 1

4. Practitioner Learning Groups: a model to
produce knowledge through a solution-driven
approach, peer-support and networking.
5. The Systemic Finance Meeting Point: bringing
the markets systems and financial sector
together through facilitation.
6. Regional/Local market facilitation conferences:
co-organised by SEEP member organisations –
designed to learn and network around topics
that matter in local contexts.
List of ideas – Part 2

Some participants said it would have been better to come
up with a list of problems first, and then discuss solutions
rather than starting from ‘good ideas’
• The list was designed as a starting point to discuss
known, key issues and challenges
• The group was presented with the list to find out if
some ideas should be dropped or could be the subject
of further development
• This approach gave the participants some time to
discuss concrete ideas to overcome the challenges they
considered more important
Comments and questions before
splitting into subgroups

Taking into account:
• pending issues from MaFI’s previous work plans
• work plans from LEO and BEAM
• inputs from MaFI members and SEEP staff
• inputs from field practitioners
• opportunities like the recent CGAP paper called
“A Market Systems Approach to Financial
Inclusion - Guidelines for Funders”
• changes and challenges in market systems dev.
How was the list of issues developed?

Margie Brand, EcoVentures: are these ideas things MaFI
would implement, or ideas of things members should find
other organizations/funding to do? This affects the
viability of strategies, and whether or not people will
want to discuss them right now.
• The idea of this activity is to start a reflection about
how we can all work together to implement those
ideas we are most interested in and that can add the
greatest value to our colleagues on the ground.
• If needed, MaFI will work with SEEP to raise funds to
implement the solutions that members need the most
Comments and questions before
splitting into subgroups

• Irina Ignatieva, Concern Worldwide: the discussion on complexity is
appreciated but what I am experiencing in my work is that you
actually need simplicity.
– This is a very useful insight. Perhaps the term “complexity” is loaded
or has been abused/misunderstood and switches people off even
before they have a chance of learning about it.
– In the past we tried different ways to get MaFI members to learn
about complexity. However, we did not link that learning to practical
challenges.
– This time the idea is to learn about complexity to see how it can help
us to improve our capacity to promote scale up in our programs.
– Complexity can help facilitators to understand scale up processes that
depend on self-organization (though not all scale-up processes are
self-organizing)
• Paul Bundick: I agree; you can simplify some of complexity but you
can’t reduce it to equations. It is linked to the adaptive
management idea.
Yes to complexity, but…

• Lorenz Wild, Mercy Corps - PRIME: would be interesting to talk
about how market facilitation tools apply in areas outside of market
development (like nutrition, natural resource management, etc.)
• Eileen Hoffman, Chemonics: Similarly, it would be useful to delve
into market facilitation, still in markets, but outside of agriculture.
For example, working with SMEs, tourism, etc.
• Anna Garloch, ACDI/VOCA: the reality is that USAID is pressing ag,
but I agree that if you look at economic development trends it’s a
shame that we’re not contributing more to other industries; could
also be a ton of learning for the ag. sector
• Sheldon Yoder, Habitat for Humanity: most market system
development tools look at the poor as producers, but Habitat for
Humanity looks at them as consumers and it’s difficult to find any
literature/evidence on the poor as consumers.
Market facilitation beyond agriculture

After presenting the list of six
original ideas, the group
decided to focus on five. The
one about regional/local
market facilitation
conferences was not discussed
because it’s implementation is
quite standard. However, it
was seen as an important idea
that we should try to
implement.
So, what did the subgroups do?

• Participants: Glen Burnett, Eileen Hoffman, Laura Rovamaa, Elizabeth Fustos,
Lorenz Wild, Anna Garloch, Karri Byrne, Irina Ignatieva
• Perhaps we could call it “Adaptive Program Management” to make it a bit more
specific (focus on how implementers manage their programs and learn from them)
• Adaptive management is many times a buzzword but there are simple tools and
good principles that can be applied on a management level.
• We need a literature review, basic tools and examples than can take us beyond the
theory. We cannot separate this from facilitation!
• Donors are calling for this. Need to cultivate champions in these donors. USAID’s
Learning Lab – PPL: enabling environment. PPL Case studies on CLA are important.
• Possible to do donor training on adaptive management to influence mission staff?
• Amplify-Leverage-Advocate. How do we make this global?
• Need to be gentle and go for baby steps because this is a major shift in many ways.
• Webinars, e-discussions, and then more formal products. How about (sort of) TED
Talks on how adaptive management has worked in different spaces?
• Is there a tension between adaptive management & donor requirements for
monitoring, etc.? YES – but practitioners need to come together & think about
what they’re doing (involving donors) before advocating for change.
Adaptive management

• Participants: Hayden Aaronson, Margie Brand, Adam
Keatts, Andrew Hull, Moses Ssimwogerere, Ruth Campbell,
Sasha Muench
• Need practical guidelines for facilitators in the field – not
only for agriculture but across sectors
• Current materials are too high-level and contain too much
technical language.
• Need a market facilitation practical tactics working group
with representatives from SEEP members.
• One priority would be quality control, done by a technical
advisory group to supervise online content.
• Many resources on facilitation are too high-level and
theoretical.
• MAFI should initiate a Market Facilitation Tactics Project.
The art and science of facilitation (1)

What would the Market Facilitation Tactics Project look like?
• Perhaps an on-line compendium of a range of market
facilitation tactics and tools.
• Could be arranged by light and heavy touch, intervention
point, or value chain/sector.
• Keep it simple and avoid market systems jargon.
• There would also need to be guidance provided on how to
use each facilitation tactic.
• It would also be useful to have some evidence base, even if
anecdotal, for how each tactic has worked previously.
• We would not want to make the evidence barrier too high.

How could we make this happen?
• Send out requests to SEEP members to nominate a representative
to the “Market Facilitation Tactics (MFT) Working Group”.
• The MFT Working group would agree on further details of the
concept and develop a work plan
• The MFT would also agree on a Technical Advisory Selection
Committee who would select well respected experts to sit on the
Technical Advisory Committee and provide overall quality control to
the project. Having recognized experts would also give the tactics
tool gravitas and build excitement around it.
• The group felt this is an initiative that could be undertaken without
external funding. There should be incentive for SEEP member
organizations to contribute to the facilitation tactics project, by
promoting their involvement, shaping the content, and utilizing it
for their respective field projects.

• Participants: Ken Wood, Alyssa Casey, Frank Tembo, John
Chettleborough, Bethel Tsegaye, Netsaalem Bahiru, Gareth
Davies, Kristen Donnelly, Paul Bundick.
• There’s confusion around complexity. People are ascribing
different meanings to it creating more problems than it’s
worth. Maybe a better approach is starting with adaptive
management and moving from practical issues to the more
useful complexity-related concepts, methods and tools.
• Concrete examples of complexity would make it easier for
practitioners to understand how to use it in their programs.
• How to use systems and complexity to make market
analysis more cost-effective?
• We need to close the gap theory – practice and MaFI can
be instrumental in that.
Complexity for Scale

• Participants: Dan Norell, Sovanna Yun, Vanhsy Chindavong, Adebiyi
Bode, Rommel Fuerte
• These can bring field workers together with key stakeholders to
discuss both complexities and simplicities.
• Short, down-to-earth lessons with the primary goal of building
trust.
• Exchange problems, develop case studies.
• Tap into experience of the SEEP practitioner learning programs.
• Not sure about the platform – virtual; field visits not always cost
effective?
• Building trust is context specific, not just geographic but sector.
How do you build a system in which knowledge doesn’t remain with
just a few stakeholders but really is shared?
Practitioner Learning Groups

• Participants: Ruth Odera, Justin Kosoris, Mario
Moran, Sheldon Yoder and Julia Enyart.
• Microlinks is already doing some activities to
fill gap between finance and market systems.
• CGAP guidelines are valuable but could be
improved w/ case studies, examples, tactics
and tools to show how a market systems
approach can interact with finance and multi-
sectoral approaches.
Systemic finance meeting point (1)

• Microfinance institutions are working with larger
financial institutions to develop products for low-
income clients.
• Document success and uptake of clients and how
new products influence the regulatory framework
• More can be done to improve guidance and
capacity building on financial inclusion
• How to inform and help visualize what market
systems look like in different settings such as
health & housing? For example, using market
systems to increase access to finance for low-
income housing builders and families.
Systemic finance meeting point (2)

• Convert the ideas discussed in the meeting into
concrete projects with concrete deadlines and
deliverables
• Build a map of SEEP members, their market
development projects and their market facilitation
champions
• Convene small groups of SEEP members who self-
select to drive and support the implementation of the
ideas discussed in the meeting
• Identify and put in place the right incentives and
processes for the champions and their colleagues and
partners
Next steps

• Thanks to SEEP for all its support to MaFI
• Thanks to the SEEP team for making this
Conference possible
• Meeting facilitated by Lucho Osorio
• https://uk.linkedin.com/in/luchokool
• luchokool@gmail.com
• https://twitter.com/alchemistbutter
Thank you all so much!

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Editor's Notes