The art and science of scaling up

William Easterly posted an article on Aid Watch detailing Five simple principles for scaling up in aid. BRAC takes these principles to heart when it scaled up its own programs:

1. Scale up success not failure - Before BRAC scales up its programs, we start with small pilots and closely monitor and evaluate the progress and outcome of our work. First BRAC makes the program effective, then we make it efficient, and only then do we take it to scale.
   
   
2. Don’t scale up what you think is most important, scale up what you do best - BRAC's holistic approach to poverty focuses on the basic needs of the people in the communities it serves: microfinance, livelihood training, health, education and social development. We focus on building capacity and strengthening our current programs, making sure everything we're doing is designed to benefit the poor people we're serving.
   
   
3. You can scale up only what requires cheap, abundant inputs; you cannot scale up something that depends on expensive, scarce inputs - BRAC not only ensures that its programs are effective before scaling up, we also make sure they're efficient. We hire mostly local staff to run BRAC's programs, and most of the staff commute by bicycle or motor bike rather than by car to save on costs. BRAC always seeks to maximize the social return for every dollar invested in our programs.
   
   
4. Things that you make routine are among the easiest to scale up - BRAC's first experience with scaling up involved teaching 13 million women in Bangladesh to make Oral Rehydration mixes to prevent dehydration from diarrhea - the leading cause of death among children under 5. We simplified the formula - a pinch of salt, a fistful of sugar and a 1/2 liter jug of water - and trained rural women to teach the formula to other women in their neighborhood. Ten years later, 13 million women not only knew how to do oral rehydration, they actually used it.
   
   
5. Evaluate whether you are still successful after scaling up - BRAC's Research and Evaluation Division was set up in 1975 as an independent entity within BRAC with the mission of measuring the effectiveness and impact of BRAC's programs in improving the health and well-being of BRAC's beneficiaries. Click here to see some of their work.

Click here to read the full article by William Easterly.