It is difficult to generate ongoing engagement with communities that have different schedules and timelines compared to UNDP. For example, some users such as migrant entrepreneurs require the UNDP team to work during non-business hours, which entails that once the learning journey is over it is hard to maintain momentum when there’s a significant difference in lifestyles and availability. How UNDP-centric should projects be? We need to leverage preexisting communities to increase engagement and gather feedback. For example, the migrant population in Peru learn about events and knowledge opportunities through WhatsApp groups managed by grassroot organizations. We shared information about CREANDO through these groups and significantly increased the number of registered participants for the second cohort compared to the first one (600 registered in 2022 vs 2250 registered in 2023). Knowledge sharing spaces can’t depend on UNDP’s involvement, we need to create conditions to promote horizontal engagement and support between users even when UNDP is not present at all times. The only way to strengthen a community is to ensure that it remains alive once UNDP is not in the equation. Digital preparation: In both the Innova Tu Mercado and Environmental Monitors projects included a step zero, where either young volunteers (digiamigos with Innova Tu Mercado) or a previous form to collect all information needed down the road, have allowed UNDP Peru to gage how digital are users and what kind of additional support they might need to benefit from the learning journey as a whole.  Sense of belonging: Learning journeys have to include a mental health component to sustain engagement. A sense of belonging and hope are essential in ensuring that users see value in the journey even before they’re fully competent in the tools provided. 

Per our RR's request, a majority of the Lab's work is done in partnership with UNDP Peru's programmes or are aligned with the Country Programme Document, so CREANDO and Innova Tu Mercado (including the digiamig@s pilot) was done jointly with the Poverty Reduction programme and there was no need to have a specific handover process other than systematizing learnings and having "train the trainers" workshops. Likewise, the work done with environmental monitors was done with the Governance programme. Knowledge products are also produced in partnership with other UNDP Peru teams, which expands the impact of the Lab's innovation methods and approach

https://www.undp.org/es/peru/blog/por-una-digitalizacion-inclusiva-con-lentes-de-genero https://lab.pnud.org.pe/es-CL/folders/creando-2023 https://www.undp.org/es/peru/blog/creating-creando-part-1-learning-community-migrant-entrepreneurs-born https://www.undp.org/es/peru/blog/creating-creando-part-2-learning-journey https://www.undp.org/es/peru/blog/creating-creando-part-3-results-our-2022-learning-journey https://pnudperu.exposure.co/migrant-talent-palante-talent https://pnudperu.exposure.co/creando-la-nueva-generacion-de-talentos-palante https://open.spotify.com/episode/1isvfaDRWty5rwVTIlWJIN?si=2788c957b264475e

GPS: We continued to use GPS data from our previous FC to understand how digital capabilities are geographically distributed among migrants in the country, and how to grow the CREANDO pilot with local partners that have greater engagement with the migrant communities in their zones of influence. Social network: We continued to use type of data for project design and to validate insights from our pilots, since official data tends to be outdated, doesn’t respond to the immediate needs in user-centric project design, or doesn’t have enough information on communities that are fairly “new” to the country such as Venezuelan migrant entrepreneurs. We also used this data to understand how digitalization and gender intersect and presented our findings through a blog written with the UNDP Peru Gender Unit.

For CREANDO, we were able to lead a co-creation process with citizens during six weeks of sustained engagement, with a focus on designing WITH participants instead of FOR participants. We used collective intelligence and crowdsourcing to gather feedback and improve the iterations for Innova Tu Mercado and CREANDO. The Migrant Talent Map (https://lab.pnud.org.pe/es-CL/projects/creando-un-mapa-del-talento-migrante) is a solution mapping exercise, through which we can best understand what are the pressing needs and opportunities for a specific population (migrant entrepreneurs). The same applies to the Environmental Monitors project, where mapping the committees also acted as a directory for further engagement among participants (https://lab.pnud.org.pe/es-CL/projects/comites-de-monitoreo-y-vigilancia-ambiental-participativo). These methods allowed the Lab to supplement the lack of updated data on migrant entrepreneurs, traditional markets and environmental monitors and support user-centric learning and knowledge sharing experiences. 

CREANDO: We were able to lead a co-creation process with citizens during six weeks of sustained engagement, with a focus on designing WITH participants instead of FOR participants. Methodologies were not only applied to co-design the learning journey, but they were applied to the users themselves so they could replicate them to scale up their businesses.  Data on CREANDO reflected on 2022 vs 2023 Sign ups 600 vs 2250 (+1650 new sign ups) Graduates 70 vs 222 (+152 new graduates) Partner organizations 15 vs 40 (including grassroots organizations) Migrant woman participants 70% vs 80%  Entries on the migrant talent map 92 vs 345 (+253 new entries) ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORS: We acted as conveners and opened the space for partners to bring their own methods and knowledge to share with other participants.  INNOVA TU MERCADO: We gained new evidence on the insight that digitalization has an in-person starting point. Working with UNV allowed us to replicate an insight gained from the El Salvador Lab with young volunteers, and later we gathered the volunteers’ feedback through a collective intelligence exercise to improve future iterations of Innova Tu Mercado project.