The initiative for development of a future generation of young leaders of Workshop for Civic Initiatives Foundation /WCIF/ will help to speed up the development of a new generation of civic leaders in Bulgaria, equipped with knowledge and skills to operate effectively in an environment of shrinking space for civil society and stringent resources. WCIF will offer a capacity building program for 60 young CSO leaders, divided in 2 cohorts of 30 trainees each. The program shall be implemented through group trainings, webinars, online consultations and ongoing mentoring during the course of the project. Participants will be selected among NGO staff that have joined in the last 3 years and are keen to build a career in the third sector. The capacity building program will nurture leadership qualities. • Firstly, it will build strong analytical skills for applying a norm-critical approach in addressing global issues, which contribute to impoverishment and marginalization of some social groups. The trainees will learn how to counterbalance the negative trends of shrinking civil society, and foster the creation of new social capital. • Secondly, they will be challenged to develop fundraising plans and learn about mission-based fundraising with measurable short term and long-term impact. • Thirdly, they will be involved in developing strategic communication plans, including the task of building coalitions with various stakeholders for achieving advocacy goals. • Last, but not least, the trainees will be in multicultural work teams, involving people from ethnic, religious and other minorities, reinforcing a deep understanding of the perspective of "the other". At least 25% of the trainees will be from minorities; gender balance will also be observed. The training program will also strengthen public speaking, effective message framing for reaching to the hearts and minds of different audiences, and debating skills. The interactive learning program will create space for self-empowerment of the new leaders of the next generation CSOs in Bulgaria.
Workshop for Civic Initiatives Foundation encourage different communities to take responsibility and to work actively for social development utilizing fully local resources. These communities are not only geographical but also professional and interest based. WCIF works with all of them toward local development, as well as toward developing and implementing donor practices, by offering different ways of realizing these ideas in Bulgaria together with business organizations and individual donors. WCIF staff has almost 20 years of experience in providing capacity building services to civic organizations.
The project „Building the Next Generation Civic Leaders” is being implemented with the financial support of Active Citizens Fund Bulgaria under the Financial Mechanism (FM) of the European Economic Area (EEA) 2014-2021 funded by Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway. The program will function until 2024 and will contribute to the achievement of the general objectives of the EEA FM and Norwegian FM to reduce economic and social disparities and to strengthen bilateral relations between the recipient countries and donor countries. The objective of the Active Citizens Fund is strengthened civil society, active citizens and empowered vulnerable groups. To the EEA Grants 2014–2021 site.