Impact story

Flexibility is the code word

The road to a running water programme turned out to be a bumpy dirt road, not a highway. A short piece on what that has taught the team.

12 April 2023 Kajiado County WaterStarters team

Not the road we expected.

The plan on paper looked like a highway. The reality has been a bumpy dirt road with obstacles, potholes and the occasional detour. What kept the programme moving was not stubbornness. It was flexibility.

What we changed along the way.

  • The site sequence. We reordered which communities we approached based on hydrogeology, not paperwork.
  • The launch calendar. Health workers set the pace, not press releases.
  • The tariff structure at more than one site. When the model said marginal, we listened.
  • The way we work with the county administration. Being useful to them turned out to be more effective than being noticed by them.
Flexibility is not a lack of standards. It is what makes it possible to actually meet the standards on a real road, not the one you drew on the map.

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