Call for Proposal – Pathway to scale in a rapid response setting: Learning Partner – Remote

OVERVIEW

Humanitarian Innovation Fund (HIF) research has found that the humanitarian sector struggles to understand or use the full range of scale strategies available (Too Tough to Scale). One of the key barriers to scale for humanitarian innovation is a lack of clarity of the pathways needed to support routine integration of new evidence and solutions into live responses. Another is the lack of incentives for organisations to move beyond the status quo and experiment with new solutions – even where the evidence may be superior to that of existing solutions, or where no other solutions exist. In 2024/25, we would like to tackle those barriers which inhibit the integration of innovations into live responses for rapid onset or acute crises.

Our objective is to explore, test and map out the pathway for the use of innovation in solving the most pressing humanitarian problems in rapid onset and acute crisis settings. We will do this by launching a Rapid Response funding call which aims to explore a potential route to scale for innovations through the incentivisation of adoption by larger, multinational organisations and their local/national partners to support the integrate of innovations into response plans in rapid onset or acute setting(s).

OBJECTIVE

We are looking for a learning partner to support with this funding call that will be awarded to one grantee. The focus for the learning partner will be to explore and define potential pathways to scale. You will explore challenges and opportunities around positioning innovations to be delivered in a rapid response. You will accompany the grantee during the preparation and delivery phase of the project to answer the following questions:

• How may partnerships between innovators and humanitarian agencies ensure that mature, well-evidenced innovations can be pre-positioned and effectively and ethically deployed in rapid humanitarian responses within very tight timelines?
• What are the key challenges for humanitarian agencies in partnering with innovation teams to pre-position and effectively deploy innovations in rapid responses? How may these challenges be addressed to create a clearer, more effective and sustainable pathway for innovations to response programming?
• How may Elrha and other humanitarian innovation funders support, incentivise and enable these types of partnerships?

TIMELINE

The intended start date is March 2024 and the final report deliverable must be completed by the January 2025, with dissemination activities completed by February 2025.