Spring Impact has officially kick-started Scale Accelerator: Women’s Empowerment in Southern Africa – a fully-funded scaling consultancy programme for locally-led NGOs in Southern Africa who want to scale up and take their vital work to more people, in more places.

The Scale Accelerator programme will help participating NGOs figure out how to implement their programme, service or intervention elsewhere in a financially sustainable way, and develop scaling approaches for long-term impact. 

To ensure our support is rooted in a true understanding of the context NGOs are working in, the programme is delivered in partnership with expert associates and advisors with local knowledge and experience, alongside Spring Impact’s team of specialist scaling consultants. 

This approach is part of Spring Impact’s own ambitions to develop a more globally rooted team and work with colleagues with local understanding and expertise, to ensure the best outcomes for NGOs. The consulting team and advisory board will play an integral role in offering guidance, knowledge and challenge to optimise the success of NGOs taking part. You can meet them below. 

Associate team 

Our team is composed of specialised scaling consultants and freelance associates, with expertise in multiple forms of replication, including scaling with the government, working in partnership with other NGOs addressing a common goal, facilitating community adoption, and more, alongside strong knowledge of the local sector and region. 

• Felix Ngosa, Lusaka, Zambia

Felix Ngosa is a technically competent and passionate Development Specialist with over nineteen years of progressive experience in conceptualising and implementing Resource Governance, Social Accountability, Human Rights, advocacy and gender programmes from a Right Based Approach. Felix holds expertise in organisational management, system development, programme design and management, policy influencing, movement building, fundraising and grant management, with professional work experience with national and international organisations such as Zambia National Women’s Lobby, Catholic Relief Services, Norwegian Church Aid, Danish Church Aid and Renavatio. Felix is a pioneer of the Company Community Assessment (CCA) in Zambia and has led five CCAs, a process where the relationship between companies and the communities they work in is assessed, measured and developed.

• Lucy O’Keeffe, Eastern Cape, South Africa

Lucy O’Keeffe ​​is a skilled coach, mentor, facilitator and consultant focusing primarily on organisational and leadership development in the non-profit sector. Lucy has worked for over 15 years in the NGO sector, with nine of those in a senior leadership role. Most recently in strategic leadership for a leading-edge South African rural development trust with a national reputation for innovative and impactful programme design and implementation. Lucy combines a strong academic background in social sciences with extensive hands-on experience as a community development practitioner. She has a proven track record of innovative and effective leadership at organisational, board and sector levels.

• Lusanda Magwape, South Africa

Lusanda Magwape is a passionate education and youth empowerment practitioner and Founder and CEO of Dream Factory Foundation, an award-winning women-led organisation with a  mission to end the economic inequality of youth from low-income communities through holistic education. She also serves clients such as Google, UpSkill Digital, and the African Union as a facilitator and coach. In 2015, Lusanda spearheaded the Emergent Academy, awarded the Google Rise Award and the Young Women Transform prize by USAID. Lusanda is a qualified attorney with a master’s in Commercial Law from the University of Cape Town.

• Sarah Lindiere, Lilongwe, Malawi  

Sarah Lindeire has over a decade of programming experience in gender and governance, ending violence against women and girls, school-related gender-based violence, vocational training for youth, human rights and child protection. Sarah is the co-founder and Executive Director of Tingathe, an NGO specialising in social and economic development for peri-urban youth in Lilongwe. She has also worked at the international, national and grassroots levels, engaging stakeholders, including international donors, senior government officials and civil society.

The consulting team will also include Spring Impact’s team of specialist scaling consultants:  

• Alice Metcalf, Senior Consultant at Spring Impact, UK
• Alice Kennerley, Consultant at Spring Impact, UK
• Dana Palii, Consultant at Spring Impact, UK
• Nirmean Sawi, Consultant at Spring Impact, UK
• Nora Dettor, Director of Capacity Building at Spring Impact, UK

Advisory Board

• Ayla Schlosser, San Francisco, USA 

Ayla Schlosser is the Director of Platform at F-Prime Capital, where she provides post-investment support to early-stage technology companies. Ayla has worked with startups for 10 years as an operator and an investor. She spent 6 years in Rwanda as the Founder & CEO of Resonate, a social enterprise that provides leadership and professional development training to women and youth in East Africa. She has worked as a growth strategist, design thinking consultant, and leadership coach for dozens of social impact organisations and entrepreneurs across 5 continents.

• Alice D. Kanengoni, Johannesburg, South Africa

Alice is an African feminist and social justice activist with over 25 years of experience advocating for social justice, gender justice and women’s rights on the African continent. She has served in a number of regional organisations in roles providing strategic leadership, programme design and management, grant-making, advocacy and communications, research and knowledge management, as well as accountability and learning. She is a qualified leadership and team coach and currently serves as the CEO of the Southern Africa Trust.

• Devin Hibbard, Denver, USA

Devin Hibbard believes we can end extreme poverty in our lifetimes. She is a serial social entrepreneur, having founded and scaled a number of organisations. These include BeadforLife, a multi-million dollar fair trade jewellery company and Street Business School (SBS), an entrepreneurship training program uniquely targeted to the needs of women living in extreme poverty, enabling them to open small businesses and triple their income. Devin used a social franchise model to expand SBS from one country to over 30, training NGOs to adapt the award-winning entrepreneurship curriculum.

• Jimmy Kawaye, Lilongwe, Malawi

Jimmy Kawaye is a passionate economic development specialist with over 30 years of experience working in donor agencies, embassies and INGOs in Malawi and South Sudan. He has led teams to design, implement, and evaluate projects that have changed people’s lives across a number of sectors. He works with the Embassy of Ireland, Malawi, as an M&E and Results/Impact Adviser. He is committed to eliminating poverty and economic injustices among the vulnerable. Jimmy believes scaling up, and replication of successful development interventions in Malawi and other countries in the SADC region is the step change needed to realise a significant impact on people’s lives.

• Rose Buabeng, Accra, Ghana

Rose believes in building the leadership of marginalised populations and communities in advancing social and environmental justice. Rose has more than 20 years of experience working with various civil society and social justice organisations. She has fundraised, planned and implemented social justice programmes at various levels. She has also worked in the philanthropic sector and works with the African Women’s Development Fund, as a gender, environment and livelihood specialist. Her work is focused on resourcing women’s rights organisations and building movements for advocacy and social transformation. Rose holds a PhD in Environmental Science from the University of Ghana.