Program management Relevant subjects may include: • Data collection and entry. • Secure and efficient record keeping. This would include explaining data protection and confidentiality principles. • Respecting local norms and maintaining professional boundaries. • Accurate reporting. • Safety when meeting clients, both in offices and in the community. This might involve working in pairs. Trainers and facilitators can provide feedback to instantly boost participants’ abilities, although no training can substitute for monitoring and support while paralegals work. As a project progresses, paralegals can be excellent trainers with useful insight for new paralegals. Continuous learning To maintain paralegals’ memory of the training and update them as programs change, provide ongoing coaching or shadowing and short training reviews. In addition to keeping the project focused on an empowerment-centered approach, this is a way to make the link with wider processes of legal and policy reform. Projects should revise training materials over time. Capacity building is often a two-way street, and paralegals will learn valuable information through their work. It may be hard at the beginning to tell new paralegals exactly what to do or what to expect. Experience should inform later trainings and reviews. The following section, Supervising and Giving Constructive Feedback to Paralegals, explores ongoing training in greater depth. 7.3 Supervising and Giving Constructive Feedback to Paralegals RELATED RESOURCE The resources below are training opportunities available for paralegals and project managers working on statelessness, citizenship rights, and access to documentation: • Regional trainings on statelessness run by UNHCR regional offices • Self-Study Module on Statelessness, UNHCR • Annual week-long summer school on statelessness of the Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion, Tilburg University, Netherlands • Annual four-day course on statelessness, International Institute for Humanitarian Law, San Remo, Italy • eLearning course on Civil Registration and Vital Statistics Systems, World Bank • Courses for lawyers and paralegals, Benchmark Institute, California, USA Supervision and support improves the consistency and quality of paralegal efforts, and can make it possible to achieve extraordinary things. Effective supervision is one of the key elements of a successful paralegal program. Reasons to provide supervision and feedback include: • Supervision, when supportive, is part of ongoing knowledge training and skills building. DISCRIMINATION EMPOWERMENT • Supervision increases consistent, effective, and empowering legal services. SUSTAINABILITY DATA RELATED RESOURCES (EXTERNAL) RELATED SECTIONS (WITHIN) • Supervision and feedback allow management to identify a project’s needs and challenges, enabling the team to respond and adjust strategies if necessary. A C O M M U N I T Y- B A S E D P R A C T I T I O N E R ’ S G U I D E : D O C U M E N T I N G C I T I Z E N S H I P A N D OT H E R F O R M S O F L E G A L I D E N T I T Y | 79