Ideas, words and deeds for more excellence

We are often asked where our name "PIRON" comes from, what it means or what it stands for. Basically it can be said: PIRON is not an abbreviation or an artificial word, but a personal name. Where this name comes from is a longer story that is best shared in a personal conversation. But in short: PIRON is the name of a place in South Africa, where the vision and basic idea for our work as an agency was born over ten years ago. Accordingly, this name stands for our foundation and our origins.

We are a premium service provider with a special focus on Christian development organisations (FBOs). Organizations with a church, community and/or missionary profile, which are active in development cooperation, humanitarian emergency aid as well as development education and advocacy work, face special challenges but also opportunities to shape the future. Frequently, specifically adapted strategies of internal organisational development and external procedures in the areas of fundraising, communication and project work are required, which we develop and implement together with our clients.

To the Bonn Salon - Christian Development Cooperation

Faith plays a major role for us - both internally and in our commissioned work. Christian values form the most important foundation of our company and shape our management and work culture as well as our dealings with our customers. In our daily work we also have a lot to do with Faith-based Actors (FBOs) in various countries around the globe and thus also with the issues of faith and worldview in international development cooperation.

To our Faith in Development Monitor

We continuously improve our corporate sustainability. Internally, we pay attention to business, social and ecological health and live these principles in our commissioned work. Just a few examples from the area of environmental sustainability: We order our office supplies from the sustainable mail order company Memo, we use the sustainable search engine Ecosia for our web research, we offset our air business trips via CompensAid and at Christmas we give away tree vouchers from Plant for the Planet to our customers, partners and friends.

Our work is based on a conceptual framework we developed ourselves, which we call "The Excellence-Puzzle". Excellence - or magnificence - is created when different essential elements interlock, are closely interlocked and have their proper place in the big picture - like a puzzle. In our experience, the interaction of seven elements - embedded in a framework of clarity - leads to excellence for our customers:

Seven Elements for Excellence:

• Element 1: Courageous and adaptable management and board work
• Element 2: Disciplined people-oriented management
• Element 3: Well-designed and well-implemented programmes and strategies
• Element 4: Financial health, stability and sustainability
• Element 5: A culture that values learning
• Element 6: Internal monitoring systems for continuous improvement
• Element 7: External evaluation to verify the effectiveness of the performance of the contract

Clarity* over six questions:

• Why are we here? (reason for existence)
• How do we act? (basic values)
• What do we do? (job description)
• How do we succeed? (Strategic Cornerstones)
• What's the priority now? (Thematic target)
• Who has to do what? (Responsibilities)

(* answered collectively, no internal differences)

Sources: Leap Ambassadors/The Performance Imperative; Patrick Lencioni/The Advantage