Some International Groups Saying Hiring More Locals Boosts Results

Photo by Anna Watts

One day last summer, employees of Pathfinder International gathered on the banks of rivers — the Potomac, the Nile — and the shores of oceans — the Pacific, the Indian — to toss salt in the water and watch it disappear. The ceremony signaled the dissolution of its traditional organizational structure, one common to many international aid nonprofits: a headquarters in the United States and field offices in African, South American, and Asian countries.

“However well-intentioned it is, it reinforces almost a historical way of working that’s colonial in nature,” says Lois Quam, chief executive of Pathfinder, a 60-year-old reproductive-health nonprofit.

Pathfinder’s new nonhierarchical structure puts every office on equal footing. That should better position non-American staff members to take leadership roles and influence the organization’s agenda.

“Our talent is distributed around the world where we work,” Quam says. “By this approach, we are more able to give opportunities for advancement across the organization, wherever people are located.”

Pathfinder is one of several international aid organizations shifting power to field offices and the locals who work in them. The goal is to take more direction from frontline staff and ultimately deliver better program results.

To do this, some groups have created programs to train locals for management positions. Other organizations are eliminating their headquarters entirely or moving them from Western cities to developing countries in the global south. For example, Oxfam International will move its headquarters this year from Oxford, England, to Nairobi, Kenya.

“We believe the closer we are to the people we serve and the work we’re doing, the more creative and effective we’ll be,” says Quam, who works in Washington and visits other Pathfinder offices around the world.

As the shift in focus empowers staff members native to countries where programs take place, it will also likely change conditions for American and European nonprofit staffs. Long gone are the days when expatriate aid workers could expect benefits packages that would allow them to transport their entire families abroad plus pay for nannies, drivers, and private-school fees. Now there are layoffs as headquarters shrink and field positions are transferred to locals. Oxfam’s affiliate branches in European cities have had to lay off workers, for example.

For Western staffers who wish to stay on or join one of these organizations, a different set of skills may be required. Fluency in a foreign language is even more important when working in a field office staffed primarily by locals. Organizational and negotiating skills are more in demand, while there is a reduced need for Westerners to dig wells, plant crops, or distribute medicine.

Fewer Parachutes

For years, international nonprofits founded in the West have been reducing the number of American and European expatriates working in foreign field offices, instead hiring locals whose language skills and cultural knowledge make them more effective workers. Among other things, say nonprofit leaders interviewed for this article, they’re also less expensive to employ than expatriates and more likely to stay in positions long-term.

At Mercy Corps, 85 percent of field staff are from the countries where they work, says Lynn Hector, senior communications officer. At Relief International, that figure is 95 percent, according to Elia Makar, vice president for human resources. At Catholic Relief Services, it’s 84 percent, up from 70 percent in 2013, reports Tom Price, senior communications manager.

That means these days, when you walk into Oxfam’s Damascus office, you’ll encounter mostly Syrians or people from Lebanon or Jordan, says Shannon Scribner, associate director of humanitarian programs and policy at Oxfam America. With more needs on the ground than ever, she explains, “it doesn’t make sense to have expats parachuting into all of these countries around the world.”

But increasing the number of local employees doesn’t automatically give them more authority. In the field of international aid, inequities persist that prioritize Americans and Europeans. For example, after the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, disaster-relief meetings were conducted in English, not Creole, the language of local Haitian nonprofit leaders.

“We have often treated local actors, people from these countries, as someone who doesn’t have the same power as international actors,” Scribner says.

Shifting Power

So nonprofits are changing their structures to shift power.

At Pathfinder, leaders hope that removing the headquarters designation from its Watertown, Mass., office will elicit “creative approaches” from local staff around the world, Quam says. The new approach uses temporary teams rather than fixed hierarchies. Employees from different offices with the skills needed for specific projects will collaborate remotely.

Global leadership roles that formerly were based in Massachusetts can now be filled by the best candidates, wherever they are located. Pathfinder recently named a new chief of programs and impact, Mohamed Abou Nar, who will do the job from the organization’s office in Cairo.

“A year ago, he would have moved to Massachusetts to do that job,” Quam says. “It’s powerful to have him in a country where we work.”

Oxfam International is making big changes of its own. Under the leadership of Winnie Byanyima, a Ugandan, the nonprofit has committed to open more independent affiliate offices — most of which are currently in European cities — in the global south, where Oxfam’s programs are. Nairobi was chosen for its new headquarters in part because it already serves as a hub for programs throughout Africa.

Donor Concerns

Some have worried about how the shift will affect revenue and whether donors will be comfortable communicating with local staff. Oxfam wants donors to acclimate to the reality that modern international aid work doesn’t rely on white Americans or Europeans “to save the day,” Scribner says. The organization is promoting blog posts written by and news stories focused on its local staff and partners.

She imagines a future in which American and European coverage of disaster-relief efforts looks very different: “What if you had someone from the country featured on the news in Holland talking about the crisis rather than a Dutch reporter?”

Conversely, including local staff members in fundraising may actually pose new opportunities. Donors to Child Aid, a U.S. nonprofit that promotes literacy in Guatemala, have responded positively when some of the organization’s indigenous Mayan staff have visited the office in Oregon. Indeed, after one such visit, one donor doubled her annual donation.

“It makes a big impression,” says chief executive Nancy Press.

Another challenge is the fact that some jobs, like policy positions, may be hard to fill with local residents, especially in countries where potential employees don’t commonly study relevant topics, Scribner says. For example, Oxfam had trouble hiring an Ethiopian to work as the policy adviser in its Ethiopia office.

In response, some nonprofits aim to train local employees for careers with their organizations. More than 250 people from Mercy Corps field offices have completed the nonprofit’s annual three-week training program for emerging leaders.

Relief International developed a professional-training program designed to enroll 3 percent of its local staff at each field office. Country directors or human-resource managers nominate employees, who get a personal letter from the organization’s chief executive. They are then considered for short-term assignments in other field offices to boost their experience.

“We want to give them this level of recognition, that this is really important,” Makar says.

Half of Pathfinder employees have used an online training tool that teaches languages and project management, among other skills. The nonprofit’s board allocated money to create the tool because it recognized that “in the end, our work is all about people,” Quam says. She was pleased to see a poster advertising the tool during a recent visit she made to the organization’s offices in India.

Empowering Employees

It doesn’t always take an entirely new strategic plan to start empowering frontline staff. Sometimes a simple, inexpensive policy change will do the trick.

In addition to more formal professional development training, Child Aid has used book clubs and reading challenges to help its Guatemalan staff members sharpen their critical-thinking skills by encouraging them to form opinions and ask questions. The organization, which has three American and 21 indigenous Mayan employees in Guatemala, also provides $500 stipends for staff members to use for furthering their education.

These practices, plus paying salaries that are generous by Guatemalan standards and providing opportunities to advance within the organization, have improved the quality of applicants for open positions, according to Press.

“We found that people in Guatemala are incredibly hungry to be in an organization where they have some control, are involved intimately in decision-making, and held accountable for their work and the direction of the organization,” she says.

Pathfinder used to send Americans to help field offices that needed extra support, but the organization now plans to tap professionals from regional offices for those assignments so they can benefit from the experience and build their resumes.

For example, to open its new Ethiopia office, Pathfinder sent a human-resource expert not from the United States but from another African nation, Burkina Faso.

“Instead of having an expert fly out from the U.S., we’re going to do more sharing between countries where we work,” Quam says.