ODS (Organisation Development Support)

Organisation Development Support is a full-service consultancy cooperative working with European and international non-profit organisations to achieve greater societal impact.

Our vision is to see a world in which civil society contributes actively, effectively and efficiently to achieve peaceful, democratic, green and fair communities. We do this through our four areas of practice:

• Monitoring & Evaluation
• Learning, Managing, Delivering
• Organisational Development
• Strengthening Performance
• Strategy & Research
• Intelligence & Effective Action
• Toolkits & Facilitation
• Sharing & Creating Knowledge

What makes us unique is the way in which we look at the world. Within our team, we exercise a daily conscious effort to challenge our own perceptions, and to constantly unpack the realities around us. To address this in our work, we have developed a practice that integrates certain lenses in our work areas. Specifically, these lenses are:

• decolonisation;
• localisation;
• anti-racism;
• feminism;
• intersectionality;
• wellbeing.

Through these, we systematically question power; deeply analyse context; focus on the importance of localisation for anything to be sustainable; and interrogate impact from the point of view of the different social positionalities of stakeholders and beneficiaries due to intersectionality. Yet even in applying these lenses and methodologies to evaluations, we remain aware of the challenges of deconstructing a system with such deep socio-historical roots. The multiple layers that uphold coloniality, which manifests in inequalities in evaluations, range from structural to non-structural- including donor culture and requirements; individual staff member biases and an operational field that is strongly influenced by dominant cultural norms. 

These lenses are based on one core value that underlies all our work: humanness. We are genuinely interested in the cause, vision and mission of the non-profits we work with, instead of trying to impose what we think is right. We value horizontal management structures and diversity (embodied not only as a ticking-the-box exercise but as a part of an organisational work and thinking culture). In our practice, we do not have a one-fits all method, but rather we listen radically and always co-create our methods while applying our lenses of anti-racism, feminism, localisation and decolonisation. Finally, we are always open to and ask for feedback on our work from our clients, acknowledging our shortcomings and potential for growth to even better serve non-profits, through tools such as After Action Reviews or simply having an open ear.

Our team consists of committed individuals from various educational, cultural, professional and geographic backgrounds, and includes English, French, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Turkish and Hugarian native speakers.

To know more about our services, vision, lenses and practices, do send us an email at: info@odsupport.eu