LMG/Benin Trip Report: Kristin Cooney

The project aims to strengthen the capacity of health managers, leaders, and teams to carry out health program stewardship effectively. LMG/Benin focuses on reinforcing technical skills and competencies in health service delivery, combined with leadership and management skills, as well as values and behaviors that demonstrate ethics, compassion, accountability, and transparency in public service. The project has three main objectives: to strengthen governance practices at the highest level of the Ministry of Health (MOH), to develop leadership, management, and governance practices of health leaders and managers at central and decentralized structures of the Ministry and in the private sector, and to strengthen institutional capacity of a competitively-selected local training institution. LMG/Benin is working with national health leadership to model, train, mentor, and expose health leaders and managers to best practices in stewardship and health leadership. The project is also contributing to the effective mobilization and management of Global Fund grants in each target country. LMG/NMCP Technical Advisors work closely with NMCP leaders to strengthen their coordination with the Global Fund Country Coordinating Mechanism and other Global Fund partners in line with the Global Fund's New Funding Model. In countries where the government is the Principal Recipient, LMG/NMCP is building the capacity of the NMCP throughout the grant process, from applying for grants to implementation, evaluation, monitoring, and risk mitigation. During the trip, the project staff met with the traveler, Kristin Cooney, to obtain updates on project progress and plan future activities. Meetings were held with project staff several times during the visit to discuss project partnerships, review the workplan and technical strategies, and exchange information. The project staff also participated in a meeting with the USAID activity manager and debriefed and discussed how to best respond to USAID's requests of the project. The project has continued its coordination with UNFPA, and specific opportunities may exist around gender activities. UNFPA was involved in the recent gender strategy work. Regarding IRSP, there have been several delays, but the project is in the final stages of negotiations with IRSP, and it is possible to extend the subcontract past April to complete activities. The project staff also planned a meeting with the USAID activity manager to discuss the Leadership Development Program, Plus (LDP+), and to review opportunities for him to participate in more project activities. The LDP+ alignment meeting is a key opportunity to bring together the key players, including those at the highest levels, and it needs to be done and to have appropriate preparation since the project never did it and will need to explain why they are doing it at this point. This will require some informal preparatory meetings before the alignment meetings, so that people will not be on the defensive. The project staff also discussed the possibility of extending the subcontract, once signed, past April to complete activities.