The Business of Rescue

The US election has put our responsibility to refugees - victims of war and conflict - high on the moral as well as political agenda. What compassion do we owe strangers?

The International Rescue Committee, the aid organization I’ve led as CEO since 2013, has been on an incredible growth spurt, but for all the wrong reasons. There are now more displaced people in the world—65 million —than in any other time since the Second World War. Twenty-one million of them are refugees fleeing war in places like Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, and the rest are trapped within their own countries. These are people forced to flee - those migrating for economic reasons (250 million plus) are a different group.

The challenges facing our staff are immense: our last three medical facilities in East Aleppo have recently been bombed. And the short term focus of most of our government grants (we are a $700m organization managing nearly 500 government grants mainly from the US and Europe) is out of sync with long-term problems.

Last year, we helped 23 million men, women and children gain access to basic services like healthcare, education and job training, by combining the mentality of a startup coupled with the maturity of an 80-year-old organization. 

I've just come back from Jordan, home to over a million Syrian refugees according to government figures, where I visited services from employment programs to self-defense classes for women. The mission is driven by enduring values but the operations need flexible thinking.

I imagine this is the proposition that led the magazine Fast Company—known for profiling some of the world’s most innovative companies and their leaders—to choose to feature the IRC in their December/January issue. They say the work is “visionary” and needed more than ever. In this time of unprecedented crisis—where the gap between humanitarian needs and how to resource them has never been wider—we need to redesign the humanitarian enterprise. One obvious example: when people are displaced for long periods (less than one percent of refugees went home last year), they need economic help not just social services.

It was this spirit of â€œidealism, passion, engagement and experience” that made me join the Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) sector. There is more power in government, where I previously worked, but more obstacles; NGOs have less power, but fewer barriers to getting things done.

We do not apologize for hard-headed humanitarianism. Clarity about accountability for outcomes; determination to use the best evidence; embrace of value-for-money are all about putting those in need first. And our R&D drive is helping us embrace new skills (e.g. human-centered design) as well as new approaches. We are focused not just on more aid, but Better Aid.

I hope you’ll take the time to read â€œThe Business of Rescue” and learn about the innovative work we do every day. (And you and your business can help).

We cannot afford an aid system inadequate for the times. The rescue we do makes a difference every day far away. But it also affirms some of the most basic values of our own society. Rescue is about us as well as "them.”