excerpt:
Khalil Shariff, Chief Executive Officer, Aga Khan Foundation Canada
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The third panellist was Khalil Shariff, Chief Executive Officer of the Aga Khan Foundation Canada. Mr. Shariff said, “We are going to be a panel in violent agreement” about what is needed. He encouraged taking an approach of “symbasa”, which roughly translates to “giving a boost.”
He told the audience that four principle premises should guide development work:
- Ideas and innovation, not scale. If we want to have impact without scale, we should think seriously about innovation and ideas. We now know that the basic model developed by CIDA is now generalized throughout the world.
- Take relationships seriously. In future, the countries with the greatest influence will be those that can hold and nurture the deepest set of relationships with the broadest set of actors. If we took the idea of relationship-building very seriously, we could become the hub of a whole series of ideas.
- Take a long-term approach. It simply cannot be overemphasized that development is a process, not an event. Unless we can nurture that process, we cannot command it.
- Focus on learning, research and communication. There is no reason why we should not have a vibrant constituency for development in this country. We have not ensured that our citizens are the best connoisseurs of development in the world. A vacuum will be filled. We need to exercise thoughtful leadership on what learning lessons looks like and sharing them with our constituents and with everyone else in the world.
In summary, Mr. Shariff said that the ripple effects of following these premises would be seen far beyond their immediate effect.
Ismailimail 