DMP helps federal agencies like the U.S Agency of International Development (USAID) Bureau for Latin American and Caribbean Office of Cuban Affairs and the U.S. Department of State (USDOS) Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL) strengthen the financial and award management capacity of non-governmental organization (NGO) federal award recipients around the globe by successfully implementing a complementary mix of comprehensive post award technical assistance reviews, training, and targeted technical assistance. DMP’s 360-degree compliance and capacity building solutions help new and existing recipients that often lack the requisite financial and grant management technical capacity to comply with federal award requirements (e.g., missing or ineffective policies and procedures, insufficient internal controls, and inadequate accounting systems) achieve compliance and increased capacity.
Beginning in 2010, DMP worked with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and its program recipients to address oversight and financial management deficiencies identified by the General Accounting Office (GAO). After our involvement, in December 2012, GAO reported that “USAID’s program is improved,” and there were no recommendations. In October 2018, the USDOS Office of Inspector General (OIG) issued a report titled Inspection of the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor’s Foreign Assistance Program Management, in which the OIG included the following regarding our work with DRL’s International Religious Freedom program: “DRL’s training provider also visits individual grant recipients to conduct financial reviews and provide technical assistance to improve grant recipients’ financial operations. DRL staff said that ‘this training helped improve grant recipients’ compliance with Federal financial standards. OIG has consistently identified financial management deficiencies among grant recipients, such as unsupported or unallowable costs and incomplete financial reporting in its previous oversight work, making this training valuable to address a key grants management risk area.”
DMP has worked with numerous federally assisted NGOs that are organizationally and culturally different. These NGOs carry out programs of all sizes and complexities (programmatic, cultural, and environmental) that are focused on strengthening civil engagement around the world on human rights and governance issues; fostering religious freedom and tolerance; assisting independent media; and fostering equality and inclusion of gender (LGBTQ+ community) identities.
Although we are not on the programmatic “front lines,” DMP’s work strengthens the organizational capacity of the federally assisted NGOs that are implementing mission-critical programs and projects aligned with federal interests. We do this by helping program participants understand and operate in accordance with program and financial management principles inclusive of federal and local laws, identifying organizational strengths and areas of needed improvement, identifying and sharing best practices, delivering large-group training and targeted technical assistance, and implementing a compliance-based risk assessment methodology to determine training and technical assistance priorities.
Our work helps NGOs achieve and repeat expected programmatic outcomes by ensuring compliance with federal award and financial management regulations and ensuring that federal funds have been spent appropriately and in accordance with NGO award agreements.