A measure of commitment

I first saw the IRC’s commitment in action in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where I grew up and where I became a refugee.  I have seen how the IRC’s work saves whole families from eradication: My family was one of them. 

IRC staff braved shelling and sniper attacks to bring the residents of Bosnia’s capital, Sarajevo, clean water to drink and natural gas for heat – helping them endure the longest siege in modern history.  As the war continued and it became clear to my family that we had no choice but to leave our homeland, it was the IRC that helped us apply for sanctuary in the United States. 

 

When we arrived in New York, IRC case workers helped us get our first apartment and our first jobs in the U.S., giving us the critical support we needed to start to rebuild our lives. Today in my work for the IRC I see refugees in the U.S. taking those same first steps and quickly becoming contributing members of their communities. 

A similar process happens elsewhere in our work around the world:  I remember one young man I met in the Nuba Mountains of southern Sudan. Growing up in a refugee camp in Kenya during Sudan’s civil war, he received an education from the IRC that helped him get a scholarship and graduate from college. When I met him, he had just returned to Sudan as a part of a repatriation program run by the IRC. He was working for the local government as an education coordinator, helping his community rebuild.
   

Reflecting on the work of the IRC, what impresses me most is how much my colleagues believe in what we do – in what the IRC stands for.  It is not just ‘any old job’ for us, but something more.  That ‘something more’ is what makes us different from almost any other humanitarian organization.  

I work in the IRC’s Global Supply Chain unit, where we are known to constantly measure everything, from the time stamps on correspondence to the weight of an extra fuel tank in a vehicle.  For us, “measure” is a very important word, one we pronounce with a capital “M.”  

Just 10 or 15 years ago, the general public had no idea how much money humanitarian organizations spent on their operational costs vs. how much they spent on programs and services that directly benefit people.  When the word got out that the IRC’s program percentage was over 90% — an impressive measure of our committment and efficiency  — we were placed on the top of “best charities” lists by leading publications like Time, Forbes and Money. 

 

Just as donors now look at an organization’s efficiency, I am convinced that soon they will be just as well-versed in ratings that reflect staff donations to their own organizations.  When that happens, I am sure they will discover that the IRC is leading and excelling in that measure too.

I am proud to say that I work for the IRC. 

Semir Tanovic is the director of the IRC’s Global Supply Chain. He is based in New York.

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