Humanitarian Organization ICT field specialists training: Bridging theoretical and practical humanitarian knowledge

Abstract

Information and communication technologies are central tools for Humanitarian Organizations operations. ICT field specialists are real practical experts, but the lack of theoretical knowledge prevents them from being self-sufficient and efficient in unexpected situations. United Nations (UN) members have agreed on defining 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). As a University of Applied Sciences, we are concerned about the development of skills in information and communication technologies (ICT). This concern is shared in the “SDG 4: Quality education”. Training can be a controversial topic in the humanitarian field because of the priority of operations activities. Our aim was to design a training device which could cope with this priority. Through our partnership with a Humanitarian Organization (HO), we built a full and innovating hybrid training methodology for ICT field specialists. This methodology is based on state-of-the-art education and ergonomics techniques. Work analysis and ergonomic theory assume that in order to offer a pertinent and transferable training, the learnings must be built on the real work the trainees do. In this study, we present our global training concept in broad terms. We focus here on the results of the first implemented phase. This phase concerns the assessment of the ICT theoretical knowledge of our HO partner's specialists.