AN ASSESSMENT OF WOREDA CAPACITY: THE CASE OF ...

ewards for performance and of sanctions for non-performance are factors that deteriorates
capacity building efforts (OECD, 2006; Farrell, 2007; World Bank, 2005; UNDP, 1997).
2.2.2.5 Availability and Management of Resources
A society‘s capacity to meet the needs of its members depends on the resources available to it,
and largely on to how best those resources are utilized. Developing capacity with inadequate
financial resources and physical infrastructure results in trained people and organizations without
the budget and facilities to do their job. Available and coordinated resources for managing
change, developing capacities, capital investment and recurrent costs are critical (UNDP, 1997).
The resources available to the society are wide ranging and more or less tangible in nature.
Accordingly, there are two types of resources that serve as an input to capacity development or
capacity building.
Tangible resources are mostly found at the bottom of organizational hierarchy, they are
measurable, quantifiable, and visible and they can easily be grasped and worked with that
comprises of material and financial resources, skills, organizational structures and systems,
physical assets such as infrastructure, plant and machinery and natural resources. These may also
include resources that can be described in structural terms or as tangible forms of information
and analysis. Examples of this are organizational structures and systems, legal frameworks and
policies, books, reports and the like (Lavergne and Saxby, 2001; Kaplan, 2000).
Besides, there are wide ranges of less tangible but not less important dimensions of capacity that
belongs to the top of organizational hierarchy and is invisible. They are observable only through
the effects they have to the organizations and to the practitioners. They are ephemeral, transitory,
not easily assessed or weighed. They constitutes skills, experience and creativity; social cohesion
and social capital; values and motivations; habits and traditions; institutional culture and etc.
These intangible dimensions of capacity are crucial as they determine how well the society uses
the other resources at its disposal (Lavergne and Saxby, 2001; Kaplan, 2000).Hence, capacity
development needs to embed both types of resources as they are equally important in developing
capacity.
Therefore, building effective local governance places a high emphasis on the prevailing
environment, local ownership with political leadership and the prevailing political and
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