This information relates to ways that a mentoring approach to capacity development can be useful in supporting county government officials perform some of their key tasks around the Public Expenditure Management (PEM) cycle, which is the cycle of policy making, planning, budgeting, implementation, monitoring, reporting and review that county governments follow.
The concept of mentoring entails an ongoing relationship between the mentor and mentees, where they engage in two-way ‘learning by doing’, in order to work out the best way to achieve their goals—in this case, successful execution of the steps in the county PEM cycle.
Part of good mentoring is incorporating Adult Learning principles into the mentoring approach, and the following resources are designed to help mentors do this. Mentees could be stakeholders working within county governments, or members of Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), or other practitioners who need to learn more about county PEM processes.
A mentor’s task is to guide mentees to undertake the various steps and processes in the PEM cycle for themselves. Their role is not to ‘do it for them’, nor is it to simply transfer the necessary information, for example, a PowerPoint presentation without any follow up support.
So, what does this mean for the work of a mentor? Read the helpful advice and insight below from other mentors who have worked with county stakeholders:
- “Even though you may be an expert, success will depend on the interpersonal relationships and the process, so keep an open mind.”
- “Know when to push, know when to stop. For example, if you meet resistance you may be pushing too hard and need to back off for a while. Again, the process is paramount.”
- “Don’t be afraid to admit when you don’t know the answer. You might need to go and find out some more information about something. Be honest, your people will respect that.”
- “Know the power dynamics of where you are—how is power playing out here?”
- “Give them their space—to learn, and to make mistakes.”
- “Don’t be afraid to ask other mentors for help if you need it.”
Resources
The AHADI Mentoring Approach
Suggested mentoring approaches for the County PEM cycle
Your role as a mentor may be for a very short, specific period, where you are tasked to guide mentees to undertake one step in the PEM process, for example, to develop sector plans. You may find that you are required to interact with your mentees on and off over a longer period, to guide them in several of the PEM steps, and the tasks that form part of each step. You will need to familiarise yourself with all the steps in the PEM cycle before you can start the mentoring process.
Regardless of whether your mentoring is more short-term or over a longer period, there are several methods you can apply to help with whichever steps you are tasked to work on:
- Discuss: Lead a discussion about the step, for example, what work have the mentees done in this area in the past? What have they found challenging? Is there a particular area where they would like your support? Are there any roadblocks that need to be overcome before any meaningful work can take place in this area?
- Brainstorm: Use brainstorming techniques to identify what your mentees already know, and what their ideas might be for how to approach a particular task.
- Assign: You could assign your mentees a task, to be done during the session and/or in the days between sessions. For example, you might ask your mentees to find some data on particular topics, that could help them to use a strategic tool at the next session.
- Guide: You could guide your mentees through an example, such as how to use one of the strategic tools. By demonstrating with a real example, it can be clearer to your mentees how to go about it when it is their turn to undertake the task for real.
- Present: You can present information about the step, for example as a PowerPoint presentation. However, as discussed above, you should take care to avoid ‘information transfer’, without follow up discussion and guidance. In addition, try to limit the amount of time spent presenting information in a session, and allow more time for discussion and hands-on activities.
- Link: You can link the work you are doing to other resources, either those connected to this toolkit website, or to other resources that you have come across through the course of your work.
- Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, identify a timeframe and responsible people for each of the tasks that form part of a particular step. Make sure that each mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what the mentees are expected to have done between now and the next session.
See below for some specific examples of mentoring approaches for each of the steps in the County PEM cycle, that you can incorporate into your mentoring sessions:
Policy Making
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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Discuss: Lead a discussion about policy, for example, what policy making work have the mentees done in the past? What have they found challenging? Is there a particular aspect of policy-making where they would like your support?
Guide: You can take your mentees through a policy-making exercise, which also involves the use of strategic planning tools.
Review: You could ask mentees to work in small groups to review an existing policy against the Policy Development Guide and Checklist, to see how closely the policy matches what is set out in this document. Where there are gaps, note these as areas to pay close attention to for when developing policies themselves in future.
Present: You can briefly present some relevant information, for example, it would be useful for your mentees to understand how the SDGs have been linked to Kenya’s Vision 2030. However, take care to avoid ‘information transfer’, without follow up discussion and guidance.
Link: Ensure that your mentees have access to the resources provided on this website, to help them in their policy work.
Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, if setting a policy-making task, identify a timeframe and responsible people. Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what the mentees are expected to have done before then.
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Sector and Spatial Plans
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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Brainstorm: Brainstorm the different sectors in the county, and their different elements and stakeholders.
Brainstorm the different spatial plans that exist in the county, if any, and identify where this data is held.
Brainstorm the different information sources on cities and urban planning within the county, if any, and identify where this data is held.
Review: Review any existing sector planning documents that may exist, even if not comprehensive. It is good to get an idea of what is available already before guiding mentees through a new sector planning process.
Review any existing spatial planning documents that can be obtained, to identify the gaps where more information is required. For example, the review process should identify whether the county has GIS spatial planning capability, or whether the spatial planning needs to be done manually (as described above) in the interim. Review any existing cities and urban areas planning documents that can be obtained, to identify the gaps where more information is required.
Guide: You can take your mentees through a demonstration of the different tools provided, and test out the tools based on a real sector from their county, for example, sector planning guidelines. This familiarisation exercise can be a starting point for using the tools across all sectors in the county.
Present: You can briefly present some relevant information, for example, the sector planning process map gives a good visual overview of what the process looks like.
Link: Ensure the mentees have access to the resources listed on this website, to help them in their sector and planning work. In particular, the draft sector and spatial planning guidelines and the templates should form the basis of their sector planning.
Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, if setting a sector or spatial planning task, identify a timeframe and responsible people. Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what mentees are expected to have done before then.
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County Integrated Development Plan (CIDP)
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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Inform: It is important that the mentees are made aware of the following points about the CIDP, and the mentor should ensure that they clearly explain—
1) The CIDP is a legally mandated document for County PFM—no public funds should be spent outside the approved planning framework.
2) The CIDP needs to be aligned to National Planning and Economic Policy as required under the PFM Act, County Government Act, and Article 209(5).
Discuss: Lead a discussion where the mentees share their experiences of developing their previous CIDP (for those who were involved). What do they think was done well, and what could be improved for the next round?
Review: Conduct an exercise where mentees review their county’s previous CIDP to see where improvements can be made for the next CIDP, based on the CIDP checklist provided in the County Public Participation Guidelines (Section 2.2.2, item 33):
- Is there a planning unit at the county?
- What are the economic, physical, social, environmental and special planning priorities of the county?
- Have priorities been set from the village level up to the County Executive level?
- Has social mapping taken place to spell out the exact demographics of the county?
- How does the CIDP mirror national and development goals?
- Does the CIDP need to be reviewed through annual development plans?
- What are the available resources to implement the CIDP?
- Who have been involved in the CIDP process?
- How projects are identified, appraised, selected as well as how and when they will be implemented?
- What is the monitoring and evaluation framework of the CIDP?
Guide: You can guide your mentees through a demonstration of the strategic tools. provided, and test out the tools based on a real example from their county. This familiarisation exercise can be a starting point for using the tools as part of the CIDP process.
Assign: You could set mentees a task to plan out the process for the development of their next CIDP, based on the process and timelines set down in the MoDP.
Link: Ensure that your mentees have access to the resources listed in the toolkit, to help them in their CIDP work. In particular, the CIDP planning guidelines should be followed.
Plan: Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what the mentees are expected to have done before then.
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Annual Development Plan (ADP)
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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Review: You can review the previous year’s ADP according to the Checklist provided in Annex A4 of the Guidelines for County Integrated Monitoring and Evaluation Systems (CIMES).
Link: Ensure that your mentees have access to the resources listed in the website, to help them in their ADP work. In particular, the Performance Management Framework for County Governments, Section 2.6, is important for the ADP.
Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, if setting a task, identify a timeframe and responsible people. Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what the mentees are expected to have done before then.
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County Budget Review and Outlook Paper (CBROP)
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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Review: You can review the previous year’s CBROP. Imagine that you are at a public meeting and have to answer the above questions put to you by members of the public, about your county’s CBROP. How could you respond in a way that is clear and easy to understand by members of the public, who may not have much formal knowledge about the budgeting process?
Link: Ensure that your mentees have access to the resources listed in the website, to help them in the development of their next CBROP.
Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, if setting a task, identify a timeframe and responsible people. Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what the mentees are expected to have done before then.
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Sector Reports
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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Review: You can review some examples of the National Sector Reports, to give an idea of how the reports might look when prepared at county level.
Link: Ensure that your mentees have access to the resources in the website, to help them understand what needs to go into a Sector Report.
Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, if setting a task, identify a timeframe and responsible people. Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what the mentees are expected to have done before then.
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County Fiscal Strategy Paper (CFSP)
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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Inform: It is important that the mentees are made aware of the following point about the CFSP and the mentor should ensure that they clearly explain—the County Fiscal Strategy Paper (CFSP), which guides County Budget, should be aligned to Budget Policy Statement (BPS) as required by PFM Act.
Review: You can carry out a similar exercise as for the CBROP. Imagine that you are at a public meeting and have to answer the above questions put to you by members of the public, about your county’s CFSP. How could you respond in a way that is clear and easy to understand by members of the public, who may not have much formal knowledge about the budgeting process?
Link: Ensure that your mentees have access to the resources in the website, to help them better understand the CFSP.
Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, if setting a task, identify a timeframe and responsible people. Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what the mentees are expected to have done before then.
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Programme Based Budget Estimates and Revised Estimates
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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Link: Ensure that your mentees have access to the resources listed in the website, to help them better understand the process of budget estimates.
Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, if setting a task, identify a timeframe and responsible people. Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what the mentees are expected to have done before then.
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Budget Execution, Reporting and Implementation Steps
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, if setting a task, identify a timeframe and responsible people. Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what the mentees are expected to have done before then.
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Monitoring and Evaluation Steps
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Suggested mentoring approaches
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M&E Technical working group: Ensure formation of a multisector technical working group who are champions of the M&E system set up.
Brainstorm: Brainstorm the different M&E actors in the county, and their different elements and stakeholders.
Review: Review any existing sector planning and reporting documents that may exist, even if not comprehensive. It is good to get an idea of what is available already before guiding mentees through a new M&E process.
Guide: You can take your mentees through a demonstration of the different tools provided, and test out the tools based on a real sector from their county. This familiarisation exercise can be a starting point for using the tools across all sectors in the county.
Present: You can briefly present some relevant information, for example, the steps in setting up an M&E system process in order to give a good visual overview of what the process looks like.
Link: Ensure that your mentees have access to the resources listed in the website, to help them in their sector M&E work plan. In particular, the steps for setting up an M&E system and the designing of data collection and reporting templates should form the basis of their sector planning.
Plan: Help your mentees to think about how they intend to tackle the step—for example, if setting a sector M&E system set up task, identify a timeframe and responsible people. Make sure that your mentoring session ends with a firm plan about when the next session will be, and what mentees are expected to have done before then.
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