Company profile

About MDF

MDF Training & Consultancy is a worldwide operating management training and consultancy organisation. Since 1984, the year we started as ‘Management for Development Foundation’, we aim to contribute to improved management of development organisations. MDF has regional offices in Sri Lanka, Brussels, Tanzania, Vietnam, D.R. Congo, Ghana and Indonesia and representatives in Colombia, Rwanda, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Kenya. Next to these branches a special MDF-NL branch is operating on the Dutch market.

MDF Training & Consultancy (Head Office) in the Netherlands is organised in four units, each addressing part of our core expertise: Project and Programme Management, Organisations and People Development, Institutional Development Sector and Aid Effectiveness.

Products and Services

MDF provides courses, workshops, facilitations and consultancy services for individuals and organisations, especially designed to strengthen the managerial and organisational capacity required to perform effectively (to achieve set objectives) and efficiently (at minimum costs).

In addition to the open courses of our standard programme, MDF offers tailor-made courses and workshops. These workshops and courses are multi-disciplinary and geared to the specific needs of the clients. Also, our regular courses can be adapted to meet specific needs. Furthermore MDF can assist organisations in the design of new strategies and organisational development plans as well as with the implementation, monitoring and evaluation of these plans.

We bring together modern management theories and tools with practical experience in development programmes and projects worldwide. Our approach to training, as well as to consultancy, is of a practical nature, rich in visual elements and with a high degree of participation. We deliver our services to clients within a wide variety of organisations. These include bilateral and multilateral donors, governments, non-governmental organisations and consulting firms, all involved in development interventions.

STAFF

MDF staff members are both trainers and consultants. They are specialists in their own particular fields and have practical experience gained from a variety of different development organisations all over the world.

Our staffs are involved both in training and consultancy activities to ensure that they maintain a close link with day-to-day practices in the field. We believe that this way of working enriches the training courses and keeps our staff always at the forefront of emerging development ideas and best practices. MDF experts are professional people with initiative. They create good and sincere working relations with the course participants and our clients in the field.

MDF employs about 110 staff members worldwide and, in addition calls upon experts from its satellite network or its pool of affiliated consultants.

Have a look at our staff members and read what they tell about themselves on the staff webpage

MDF Services

MDF provides services in the areas of:

Clients

MDF delivers its services to a wide variety of clients. They include donor organisations, co-funding agencies, national and regional government organisations, projects, international and national non-government organisations and consulting firms. MDF has carried out assignments in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Central and Eastern Europe and, of course, in the Netherlands and Belgium.

A selection of our clients:

Characteristics of MDF

The principles incorporated in all our services encompass basic values such as the interest and willingness to learn and share ideas with others, the possibility to simplify complex matters and the fact that experience and wisdom are available within networks, organisations and individuals. Consultancy objectives are reached by combining our professional knowledge and experience with those of our clients. Very often MDF thereby serves as a facilitator in a didactic learning process, while at other moments we contribute our expertise and guidance.

The active involvement of our clients in diagnosis, planning and change has the double benefit of mobilising commitment and making optimal use of existing information and views.

Working with our many, culturally diverse clients we have learned what it takes to improve the performance of individuals, organisations and networks. We wish to distinguish ourselves by the following characteristics:

• Inclusiveness through working closely together with our clients and stakeholders, and generally encouraging a participatory approach. This implies our focus on building good relationships with clients and other stakeholders
• Transparency, honesty and openness. In many settings we deal head-on with sensitive issues, addressing rather than circumventing them. Inter-cultural sensitivity, excellent communication skills and a sense of humour help us lift barriers
• Professionalism in our attitude to our work; creativity in the methods and solutions we contribute
• Visual in capturing the essence of debates and options, crisp and clarifying in summarising new agreements and outstanding issues while avoiding vague descriptions or jargon
• Solid in terms of management with strong and transparent financial control
• Quick in noticing and debating new experiences and trends, translating them into best practices, tools and new services
• Rational and experienced in our use of human and financial resources to provide the best quality price ratio
• Independence and objectivity in terms of our working relationships
• Linking up with international advisers with complementary know-how, such as public health or private sector development

As expressed in our motto ‘Our world is about people’, MDF believes that people are the key to success.

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