ALSO, in addition to the capacity building carried out for the CSOs within the country, SRIP organised a capacity building outside the country in March 2008. SRIP management led a team of parliamentarians and CSO activists from Nigerian SRIP focal states to the study tour of the South African parliamentary and CSO institutions. The tour included visit and study at the Institute for Democracy in South Africa (IDASA), Institute for Security Studies (ISS), and Open Democracy Advice Centre (ODAC), to exchange ideas and study the institutional arrangements of South Africa. The global objective of the study tour was to foster greater understanding by parliamentarians and by civil society representatives of their respective roles in improved public service delivery, while the specific objective was to provide parliamentarians and CSO executives an opportunity to experience first hand, successful examples of parliamentary and civil society organization integration in government budget planning, implementation monitoring and evaluation, which ultimately leads to accountability, prudence, good governance and poverty reduction.
So, in essence, SRIP imparted on the CSOs, the skills of events management and facilitation, interpersonal communication, administration and management. SRIP also increased their skills for advocacy and advancement of policy oriented agenda aimed at reducing poverty. SRIP encouraged integrity and commitment and respect for diversity in their day-to-day activities. The trainings and capacity building the CSO representatives received have not only broadened their mental and intellectual horizon, but have equipped them with the ability to empathize with the trends, belief systems, values and norms in diverse cultures, languages and religions influencing CSO work in Nigeria.
SRIP also promoted professional work ethics for the CSOs and prepared them adequately in the area of developing partnership with the mass media. Some of the CSOs can conveniently design or adopt, produce and disseminate advocacy materials that are very sensitive to specific community norms and values. In addition to these, they now strongly believe in teamwork and the spirit of learning as a continued process and recognizing the potentialities of every CSO member towards achieving organizational goals and objectives. 
Some of the techniques the CSOs learnt include facilitating advocacy and networking among the focal states’ CSOs, organizing training sessions and coordinating international advocacy study tours for partner civil society organizations. SRIP was cited for “profound commitment to civil society work,” and for being a “dedicated development organization with a remarkable ability to bring diverse groups and individuals together around common objectives.” SRIP assists CSOs to reach their goals for the good of themselves and society. SRIP has been recognized by the focal state governments, LGAs and other stakeholders as having “built new CSO coalitions, strengthened the voice of marginalized groups through the CSOs in these focal states in Northern, and (for having) developed new mechanisms for citizens to participate in participatory governance.” SRIP focuses on influencing how to strengthen internal governance of the CSOs for sustainable development.
SRIP also launched a call for proposal mechanism and organised training workshops on proposal writing. The training was necessitated by the need to assist CSOs to respond to SRIP’s call for proposals for small grants in support of actions aimed at promoting anti-corruption measures, accountability and transparency in the budget process as well as enhancing effective public service delivery in SRIP six focal states and focal local governments in Nigeria.
Doubtlessly, CSOs that rely on donors are faced with an uphill task of funding themselves when the donors leave. Reliance on donor funding has remained a major problem for CSOs. It is extremely important that while donor funding is still available, CSOs should be preparing for sustainability. The major source of income for CSOs is membership dues. Some introduce annual due and other minor source of income but the reality is that these fund are grossly insignificant to sustain a CSO.  All donors must wind up a particular project after its successful implementation, but no donor would like to see CSO closing down because the donor is closing. CSOs must explore funding options; respond to call for proposals, organize fund raising events, and explore internet advertised grants usually advertised annually and periodically. They should also set aside their earnings and use them judiciously when the need arise.
CSOs should also keep records of their activities; write reports after each activity, even if it is a one-day event, so as to make theses reports references to potential partners in the future. They should form coalitions, be transparent and be ready to be accountable to everyone.