Donor support to human resource capacity building in Namibia: experience of resident technical assistance support for workplace learning and assessment of alternative options

The initiation and implementation of development programmes in developing countries places demands on professional staff to acquire new skills and adopt new approaches to drive new development paradigms. It has been found that formal training plays a relatively small part in learning new skills in the workplace, compared with informal learning‐by‐doing within a supportive institutional environment. This paper describes and contrasts the ways in which two donor funded technical assistance projects in Namibia applied four learning support strategies identified in the literature. The experiences described suggest that resident technical assistance can offer types of support for workplace learning and institutional development through mentoring and backstopping, that alternative short term assistance or training course oriented projects lack. It is concluded therefore, that in seeking alternatives to capacity building through resident technical assistance, donors and recipient countries should assess the options not only in terms of skills transferred, but also in terms of building confidence to undertake new areas of work and the development of institutional processes supportive of workplace learning. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.