NGO Soul + Strategy 078. Which INGO Roles Are Still Legitimate, Relevant, and Needed (and Which No Longer): Dylan Mathews @ Peace Direct
Summary
How should INGOs discern what roles are still relevant, legitimate, and needed, at this moment in civil society history?
And which roles they therefore should *stop* playing?
Is there more here, over and beyond stopping service delivery? (Which on its own is quite the shift)
In this NGO Soul+Strategy podcast episode, I interview Dylan Mathews, Chief Executive Officer at Peace Direct. Peace Direct has been quite vocal, and has acted as a thought leader on this role question -- which I consider fundamental, and which I don't see INGOs facing head-on sufficiently yet.
Dylan's Bio:
- Chief Executive Officer of Peace Direct
- Director of International Programs at Y Care International
- Program Manager at CARE
- Worked on conflict countries and issues with Landmine Action, Oxford Research Group, and the British Red Cross
We discuss:
- While the sector is changing, once again, on several fronts (in terms of programming approaches, shifting authority/decision rights to the place of program impact representation, biz models, operating models etc.), what seems to get less attention is whether the organization should go through a fundamental role shift
- Common sense would say role and function, as well as strategy, should come before the other types of changes mentioned above
- One organization that is advocating that NGOs need to tackle the fundamental question of role shift is PeaceDirect, with Dylan Mathews as its leader.
- So what roles are still appropriate, especially for global North-founded INGOs?
- Dylan explains the nine roles that Peace Direct thinks are still appropriate for INGOs
- What are, importantly, the implications of a change in role and function for, for instance, board competencies and mindsets, organizational size, staff competency profiles, and culture?
- Dylan shares what gives him hope as INGOs traverse this journey, but also what makes him skeptical that the role shifts Peace Direct points to will actually take hold among INGOs,
Resources:
Peace Direct reading resources: Link1, Link2, Link3
YouTube video of this podcast
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