UNITAR New York Office

About the Fellowship

Leaflet: English Japanese 

Fellowship Objectives

The UNITAR Hiroshima Fellowship for Afghanistan aims at building leadership and management skills and providing technical and institutional support to a core group of senior Afghan government officials, academics and practitioners. A key goal of the programme is to encourage the further transfer of capacity to the Afghan professional community – in part by developing Fellows’ capacity as trainers, but primarily by preparing Fellows to become better managers/leaders of capacity building within their organizations.   The programme’s long-term objective is to build a committed and capable Fellowship Community in Afghanistan which can be a reference for planning and implementing capacity-building and training activities at the local and national levels.

Training Sites

All training activities except a study-trip to and final workshop in Hiroshima (Japan) are conducted in Kabul (Afghanistan) or in the region. Fellows continue to work at their jobs in Afghanistan throughout the Fellowship period.

Duration of the Fellowship Cycle

The programme will start in May with an orientation and planning session and will finish in November with the study trip to Japan and final workshop.

Prospective Applicants

Senior Afghan government officials, academics and practitioners can apply to the Fellowship after a call for applications have been announced. Participants are selected based on specific criteria established by UNITAR and partners, such as their background, motivation, and ‘human resource development role’ in specific areas of professional responsibility within the government or in civil society.

Mentors and Coaches

Mentors are experts, practitioners or academics from various disciplines, based in different countries. They help Fellows meet their professional goals, respond to questions, offer feedback on work submitted, and give advice where needed. Coaches are selected from amongst the most committed and capable graduates of the previous Fellowship Cycle, and support the mentoring process in Kabul. Each Mentor/Coach team commits to oversee at least one group of three to four Fellows for the duration of the Fellowship.

Team Projects

Based on their professional background, Fellowship participants are divided into groups which consist of 3-4 Fellows, a Coach and a Mentor (or Mentor team). Each group works on a team project, selected on the basis of training needs assessments conducted by Fellows within their departments/organizations at the start of the programme. The projects are related to the Fellows’ work, and primarily focus on training/capacity-building.

Combination of Different Training Methods

The Fellowship undertakes a combination of different training methods and a series of skill-building activities, such as on-site workshops, Mentor/Coach/Fellow communication, team projects and distance learning activities.    

Workshops

Up to three workshops are held as part of the Fellowship, alternating with VCs and AWCs. The first two workshops are held in Kabul or in the region, while the final one takes place in Hiroshima.  Each workshop is about four days long and focuses mainly on a single subject so that the particular set of skills can be fully developed and absorbed by the Fellows. Topics are, in part, determined by the requests and needs of the Fellows, but in general come from the following list of key themes:

• Accounting and budgeting;

• Project design and proposal writing;

• Project management and reporting;

• Team building and teamwork;

• Effective networking;

• Communication skills;

• Leading professional and organizational development; and

• Training of trainers (ToT) and development of training programmes.

Distance Learning

Distance learning mechanisms include video-conferences (VCs),  audio-web conferences (AWCs) and project work sessions  (PWS). The Mentors have “face-to-face” meeting with their teams of Fellows at the VCs to exchange information about team projects, give project updates, ask questions, and offer advice. In addition to VCs, AWCs are also used for communication with Mentors and UNITAR.   During PWSs Fellows are provided access to computers and the internet in order to communicate with their Mentors and work on their projects.

Training of Trainers (ToT) Methods

In order to expand the impact of the Fellowship, UNITAR places special emphasis on the ToT methods - in part to develop Fellows’ capacity as trainers and to encourage them to conduct training activities within their own ministries and organizations, but primarily to prepare Fellows to become better managers/leaders of capacity building within their organizations. The Fellows are provided with overall guidance regarding the organization of national workshops, as well as expert advice through UNITAR network of resource persons. Involvement of committed and capable alumni as  Coaches in following cycles is yet another ToT method that proved its effectiveness in 2006.

Course Credits and Certificates

UNITAR will provide a certificate to participants upon the completion of the  programme. The Fellowship has also been accredited by the University of Texas at Austin for academic credits.

Support for the Programme

Financial support for the UNITAR Hiroshima Fellowship for Afghanistan is generated solely from voluntary contributions by governments, agencies, foundations and individual donors. For those wishing to contribute to the UNITAR Hiroshima Fellowship for Afghanistan, please contact us.

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