Developing an accountability strategy in organisations is important for building an accountability culture and creating the necessary accountability processes and tools.

An accountability strategy

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An accountability strategy can help promote an accountability culture and guide the development of accountability processes and tools in our organisations.

There are three areas that comprise an accountability strategy. These are:

• Taking account.
• Giving account.
• Being held to account.

We will now look at each of these areas in turn.

Taking account

This is where we seek to understand the community we are working with and its local context. It means we need to assess the needs of the various groups and hear how they prioritise their needs. We also need to tackle the power imbalances around gender, age, disability and sexual orientation, and ensure the interests of these groups are heard. By taking into account these differences, our safeguarding measures are more likely to be successful through being more inclusive.

Giving account

This is where we give account of ourselves and our actions to affected communities, local partners and donors. Decisions need to be made as to how best to communicate with these different stakeholders and what the messages should be. This is the ‘how’ and ‘what’ of communication, which will be different for different stakeholders within the confines of confidentiality.

Stakeholders such as donors and local partners need to be kept up to date with decisions taken on how an organisation is responding to a serious safeguarding report. Organisations may also have to give account to the elders of a beneficiary community or survivors (and their families) of sexual or other forms of misconduct by their staff or partners.

Being held to account

This is where we are held to account for the behaviour of our staff and all those who represent us. This would include how effective, relevant and timely our safeguarding measures are, including how we communicated with communities about the conduct they could expect from our staff and associated personnel. It means being held to account for fraud, corruption and SEAH by our staff and associated personnel among the communities we serve.

Effective complaints and feedback mechanisms are needed for affected people to report abuse, express their views and have confidence that action will be taken (the first course in this series, Introduction to Safeguarding in the International Aid Sector, gives further information on this).

By asking the following three questions at all stages of a project and when meeting with affected populations, you should be able to take steps to improve accountability and safeguarding:

• What do we need to take account of?
• What do we need to give account of?
• What are we held accountable for?

(Source: Humanitarian Leadership Academy (n.d.))