096: Leading Change at Scale: Oxfam International’s Journey with Amitabh Behar

Speaker A: Listeners first. This will be my last episode after five wonderful years. I'm bringing the NGO Soul and Strategy podcast to a close to move on to other endeavors. You will hear more about that in

Speaker B: the intro to this episode.

Speaker A: And we still have one more dynamite episode for you. Some NGOs are symbolic for where the sector stands at this moment in the history of global civil society. The highs and the lows of it all, the power that NGOs have been able to build up historically, as well

Speaker B: as the threats to their relevance and

Speaker A: legitimacy that they are now facing. And all of that while the external world seems to go to hell in a handbasket. And some NGOs are iconic in terms of their influence, their unique competencies and presence, and their brand name. Oxfam, I would argue, is a good example of both. Oxfam is iconic, but it's also subject to the same stress factors and dilemmas and criticisms that others are facing. And I don't just mean the global funding squeeze. I also mean the internal norms and forms, the challenges, demands and aspirations that it has put upon itself and which are sometimes in direct tension with each other and where it becomes a hell of a job to balance all these polarities. Somebody who is in the hot seat on a daily basis to juggle all these polarities is Amitabh Behar, Oxfam International's Executive director. So when Amitabh approached me whether we could have a conversation on the podcast together, I jumped at the chance. This is truly a worthy way to end this podcast. Listen and learn.

Speaker C: Hello and welcome to NGO Soul and Strategy, the podcast for NGO leaders and managers who look change right in the eye. My name is Tosca Bruno Van Veewijken and I'm the founder and principal consultant at Five Oaks Consulting. I have over three decades of experience and helping leaders in civil society menace change, invest in cutting edge leadership development, lead organizational culture change, and strengthen effectiveness. I'm also a thought leader on these issues, including as co author of the book Between Power and the future of transnational NGOs, which is read by civil society leaders across the globe. If you are such a leader and want to look change right in the eye, this podcast is for you.

Speaker B: Hello everybody. This is NGO Soul and Strategy. First, before I launch into a dynamite episode, I need to tell you something. A word about me and the podcast. After five wonderful years, I've made the decision to bring the NGO Soul and Strategy podcast to a close. And this episode will actually be the final one. It was not an easy, uh, decision. Hosting this podcast has been deeply rewarding for me. I have learned a lot from each and every guest and I hope that you, the listener, the leader, as learner, as I've liked to typify you, you that you have learned much along, um, my side. I'm grateful for your feedback over the years, how these episodes have helped you grow in your own leadership and leadership journeys. That said, producing this podcast takes time, energy and financial resources. I've been funding it personally as a service to the sector. But like many of you, I am navigating the realities of a, uh, challenging consulting landscape. And if I'm honest, I'm also ready for my life to um, slow down a little bit more, to provide some more spaciousness and a little bit less rushing. The good news is that the full archive, and that's more than 90 episodes, will remain available to you wherever you get your podcast. And this is not a goodbye. I'll continue to share my reflections and resources on LinkedIn and I remain actively engaged as a consultant coach and team coach for mission driven leaders and organizations, both globally, but also here in my home, my second home of upstate New York in the us. So thanks for being part of my journey in this chapter. Now onto the final episode, and as I said, it's going to be dynamite. Oxfam is probably one of the top, I'm going to guess, three brand names in the world of INGOs. It has a unique reputation as being one of the most intellectual NGOs with its powerful capacity for policy research and influencing of major global actors. It does a number of other things also. But I want to emphasize this aspect now and I've been fortunate to do little bits of consulting work for the last 15 to 18 years. So I've been able to follow oxfamily little bit, um, in that sense, although important caveat not in the last two years or so. That work was an organizational culture change, change management and leadership development. The world needs an agency like Oxfam with its unique capabilities. It is also a very hard time for INGOs. I was therefore keen to check in with Amitabh Behar, the Executive Director of Oxfam International. And it's my honor to Amitabh to have you on the show. Welcome.

Speaker D: Thank you. Thank you, Tosca, for inviting me and thank you for doing what you do.

Speaker B: Thank you for saying that. And, um, I apologize you had to sit through this long intro before we got going. Listeners. For those who don't know Amitabh Behar, he is the, as I said, the executive director of Oxfam International. He's the former CEO of Oxfam India, one of the affiliates of Oxfam. He was the executive director of the national foundation for India and also of the national center for Advocacy Studies. Okay, here we go. Amitabh. So in a nutshell I have to ask you the obvious first questions. Tell me something about yourself and tell us something about the nature of Oxfam for the relatively few on this globe who don't know about Oxfam.

Speaker D: Thank you. Thank you, Tosca. So maybe I'll start with Oxfam first. And to put it fairly simply, um, we are an international NGO with a history of 82 plus years now and we work uh, across the globe in 80 countries. And to just put it fairly simply, there are three broad buckets of our work. The first one is the humanitarian response and this is both in natural disasters but also human made conflicts. Uh, we are there present providing uh, different kinds of services. We are particularly known for water and sanitation. So that's bucket one. The second is uh, much more um, rooted long term developmental work uh, in uh, the countries of the South. And this ranges from issues of gender justice to climate justice to um, ensuring basic livelihood climate adaptation. So it's a broad range uh, of issues that we work on. And the third is our work around uh, influencing, which is uh, influencing and campaigning and uh, increasingly as in we do campaign on essentially systems change to ensure that power is redistributed. Um, but uh, in the last several years our focus has been quite significantly on fighting inequality. And that is in many ways the uh, thread that even weaves the three different buckets that I talked of. So that's broadly in a nutshell uh what we do. Happy to talk more about it as and when you would want it. In terms of my own background I certainly come from um, the social justice movement and I've been a uh, very, very firm believer in uh, the idea of civil society, uh, and civil society as one of the fundamental pillars of the modern architecture of democracy in which civil society plays the role of uh, of ensuring substantive democracy. So which is, which goes beyond just the rule of law, which is essentially ensuring rights to everyone uh, irrespective of their caste, creed, gender. So that's been my passion. I work on issues of justice, on issues of equality, uh, through civil society as my primary uh, space.

Speaker B: I loved how you just framed that, the uh, part of the architecture of democracy, substantive democracy beyond the rule of law. Okay, now Oxfam over the years and uh, for those who don't know it um, has gone through a number of big change journeys. Right. And um, without getting too technical about it, m, um, the most recent big change cycles before the um, funding cuts in the, in at least in the global uh, north kind of the traditional funders, um, how would you describe the nature, the what, the why and the how of the most recent change cycle of Oxfam?

Speaker D: So Tosca. I would say that it's difficult in Oxfam to say that this is the most recent one because we are, I would say a fairly dynamic organization and we are constantly evolving. But maybe to try and help locate couple of key conversations in vogue. What's happened in Oxfam in the last say decade. I would say the first and really the big one has been an acceptance across the Confederation, uh, across the 80 countries that we work in, uh, that it is essentially systems change approach. That is something that we must work on. So that's, that's a quite an important shift I would say. Uh, and we have been working on, on systems change. So if you look at the global strategic framework for Oxfam, we are essentially looking at systems and not specific uh, issues. So we look at uh. You want to say something to Oscar?

Speaker B: Thanks for spotting that. Yeah. I Can you unpack um, a little bit what that means in tangible ways? There are undoubtedly some listeners who don't know what system change is. It's a very abstract and big term. I am a little bit skeptical also about maybe the overuse of this word. I'm not saying that you do it. I'm not saying Oxfam is not, I think Oxfam is uniquely primed to be capable of doing that. But it is a bit of a fad also at the moment. So can you just unpack it for the delay listener what that means system change, the context in which Oxfam works. What can I, how can I visualize that?

Speaker D: Yeah, sure. So you know, I, I, I, I can try and give you even examples. So for, for instance, I think let me start with the easier one which uh, easier in terms of uh, accessibility because people are often um, exposed to the gender conversations quite significantly. Uh, so when you know, instead of saying that we are working on violence against women, which we understand is absolutely critical and that would be uh, an approach of our work. So this is not to say that violence against women is not important. That's very, very central. However, we realize that just working with either the local communities or even working with the policy regimes of wherever you're talking of, on changing the laws around violence against women or policies around violence against women is going to be inadequate. It's a broader, complex piece that needs to be changed. So why does violence against women happen? Because of patriarchy? How women are seen as subservient to men in societies, how women do not have access to property, how women are seen as, uh, carrying the burden of carrying forward, whether it's the cultural baggage, uh, uh, and so on. So their access to public spaces is limited, their access to political participation is limited. So you're trying to then understand you're easing out the different dimensions of that patriarchal system and how that patriarchal system, uh, cannot be changed by just saying, let's try and reduce violence against women. You might be successful in a specific location. So you'll be able to change, uh, the conditions in three villages. But you'll soon realize that till you're ensuring women's right to property, you will not be able to change their fundamental conditions. So that's where the systems approach then comes in. You try and start looking at multiple dimensions. And therefore we also recognize it is much more difficult because this is really fundamental change that you are then trying to make.

Speaker B: Yeah, that's very helpful, super helpful. And so I heard, amongst others that Oxfam and others who are its many, many peers and partners around the world, um, then those who are with you on systems change in this area would be looking for root causes and, and kind of rude actors who, who influence what ultimately manifests itself as for instance, violence against women. That's what I heard. And this is helpful. Uh, this is exactly what I was hoping for, that you could unpack a little bit. But I interrupted you. You were saying there were a couple of.

Speaker D: That is just giving you two or three big changes. I was trying to engage. Yeah, yeah, please. You asked it. So, so one, I think this is, this is really central because this gets reflected, the move towards systems change getting into the root as uh, very, very prominent in our, um, global strategic framework. Yeah, the second aligned with this. I think again, that's central. And let me be honest in saying that we are still, uh, on a journey. Conceptually, intellectually we've understood that. And that again, is pretty much a central pillar of our global strategic framework. But we are moving towards that. And, and that is the idea of people's power. So we recognize that there's enormous power in networks, in research, in knowledge, in um, uh, invitations which happen because of, uh, who you know, et cetera. But ultimately it is going to be people's power which is going to change the power relationships that you're looking at. So how do you build people's power?

Speaker B: Can I just interrupt you for a moment there again, Amitabh, or would you like to finish first?

Speaker D: No, no, please, go ahead, please.

Speaker B: Is that okay? Um, so people power, are we talking about, um, mobilization, um, collective action and mobilizing, but also organizing citizens, not just institutionally registered nonprofits or NGOs. Is that what we're talking about here?

Speaker D: Absolutely, Tosca. So that. That recognition that professional, registered charity organizations are not going to deliver change, they can be an aid in that change, but it is the people who go through, uh, uh, people who really have their lived experiences of facing injustice, facing discrimination, facing inequality, are the ones who will eventually change, uh, the course of history and therefore playing a role in working with them, not in leading them, but working with them, in helping them, uh, come together, uh, mobilize, organize, build alliances and alliances which go way beyond the traditional INGO alliances. It could be with a trade union, a journalist association. Uh, so it's really bringing actors together who believe in a vision of a, uh, just society, a vision of an equal society. And how do you galvanize all those forces, uh, together? And then they do campaigning, demonstration, use, knowledge, research, uh, to push the agenda that we believe is the right agenda.

Speaker A: Got it.

Speaker D: So. So that's, say the second. So these are the two big pieces in terms of our work that I see. Uh, the third, which, uh, I'm sure you're interested in, is we're also internally on a journey of decolonization. And that's been a critical part of our internal, organizational, structural changes that we have made. So if you really see, Oxfam was a product of the post World War liberal consensus, so to speak. We started just around that time. And most INGOs are a product of that post war consensus. So it still had very, very. Or, uh, I would say still has, I won't say had, still has very colonial roots where the whole design is, you know, it starts from whether you call it the white man's burden, whether it is, uh, hopefully, and I'm sure many, many of, uh, my predecessors came also from the solidarity framework. But the idea was that we in the north need to do something in the south where there are issues of poverty, of injustice, of discrimination. So that's been the framing. But we have been now, uh, on a journey, a um, very conscious journey of changing this. And we are changing that at multiple levels in terms of our governance structures. Happy to talk more about it. But the idea that Oxfam must be, uh, a globally balanced confederation where it's not the north and south, but it is really, uh, people, uh, who have their lived realities at the center, pretty much defining what Oxfam should do and how it's run. So that's a conceptual way of looking at it. But I can break it down, how it's played out and how it is still playing out at the moment.

Speaker B: Yeah, and we will definitely do that in some of the questions that we, uh, that we have time for, and there will be many that I would be so curious to ask you about and that we won't have time for. But let's move to that last dimension of the change journey, the decolonization one. So, um, Oxfam as a confederate model chose uh, a route, quite a now, right. Of expanding its, uh, to become more globally balanced, as you said, and to expand its national affiliates in the majority world or Global South. Um, the thought was that this would increase Oxfund global relevance as well as legitimacy. And maybe there are some other benefits that I will not mention now to keep us within, uh, time that we have. After roughly 10 years of growing your national affiliate membership to be more globally representative. Do you have any second thoughts about the value of, and the virtue of this model? As you know very well, because I'm sure it's said in your face regularly, there are loud voices in the Global south who say that NGOs like Oxfam and others who have done, uh, this, that they are still crowding them, Global south civil society out, that it may have been well attended, but it still makes Oxfam and others like Oxfam who are on the same journey, compete unfairly, um, at the national or regional level. And at the same time it has taken auxum, as it has done with other major global NGOs, a lot of time to implement. There's been significant investment in it. And um, I'm just wondering, you have a lot of experience now to draw on between the criticism on the model and the fact that it has, um, preoccupied the organization significantly. I'm not saying it's the only thing that has preoccupied, but it has been one of those factors. So how do you, in that light then, do you have any second thoughts? Let me stop there and then I'll read you a quote from somebody who I read recently and see how you respond to that.

Speaker D: Yeah, thanks. Thanks, Oscar. So let me start first by acknowledging the criticism that you talked of. There is a lot of criticism and a lot of it is valid criticism. So we need to be, um, certainly not be evasive. We need to engage with the criticism and understand why local civil society would be uncomfortable with the kind of development that you're talking of, where INGOs are now registering as local entities. That's how I understand you're asking the specific question. And there are very good reasons for it. Uh, I've been with hoxfam for now eight years, but before that I spent more than two decades, almost 25 years as Indian civil society actor. And I can completely understand a national civil society's sense of discomfort when an international NGO with deep pockets and a massive brand comes in and tries to elbow out the local civil society. But that criticism, I think, is very important for us to learn from. And I would really say that my answer is going to be yes and no. It's not a straight answer. You often have straight answers, uh, that it depends a lot on how this localization has happened. If the localization has happened and the impulse was essentially to try and grab, uh, the funding that's available locally, or if it is, to try and raise resources locally, even through public fundraising, by, by kind of using the, the heavy brand that die NGOs have, I think they've, they have not worked and they will always. There will be a conflict. However, on the other hand, and I'm, I'm a deeply, deeply political person, um, and I have understood in the last 30 to 40 years, as in post this wave of massive globalization, power is now not particularly. The power of the billionaires or the oligarchs is not located in just one country. And if you really want to have the systems approach that I talked of, and if you're going to challenge the neoliberal economic system, uh, you will not be able to challenge it in just one country. You will need, uh, a global alliance for it. And that's where entities like Oxfam become super important. We have both the learnings and the networks to help each other from one region to another and also have the power to challenge. In this case, I'm talking of, say, the billionaires or the oligarchs in different spaces. So if we are able to do that. Well, I think the local civil society recognizes the importance of it, and therefore the story is, I would say it's great in some pieces. I feel overwhelmed now when I travel across the world and I meet, whether it's a trade unionist or even a, uh, mainstream political leader who comes up and says, thank you for doing the work on inequality. I wait for your, uh, annual, uh, Inequality report. So the power is very, very visible. And they say that we need you. This is an important alliance that we are in with you because we recognize that we will not be able to challenge, uh, the march of neoliberalism locally. And it has to be fought at the level of the imf, at the World bank, at the World Economic Forum and so on. And that's what an Oxfam can provide. But yes, uh, I also hear many, many colleagues coming and saying that you take away the money that could have come to us, there's even smaller problems. Uh, Tost, I'm sure you would have heard of those. You take away the best people. Uh, I have been told that this is not to, uh, praise oneself, but I was a important voice of Indian civil society. And I've been told, see, you were taken away by, uh, the ingos. Uh, so you take away good people, you then get invited to the large, uh, even government spaces, then starts inviting, because of your size, to listen to you. Uh, so those problems are very real. It's a journey, I think, uh, that we all need to go through. I'm those so believers in global solidarity. And I know that you cannot fight the battle for justice in today's time or of a sustainable future by locally saying that, oh, my life is only local. It has to be a local to national, to global connect. And therefore we need to do that. But INGOs need to completely reinvent themselves in honestly decolonizing themselves, in honestly keeping the brand aside and not saying that, okay, nurturing the brand is really a primary agenda. So I will keep taking the criticism and with a lot of humility and with a learning approach. But let's not make it a black or white situation that either Oxfam is here or not here. You need Oxfam and Oxfams for the global linkage, but they need to show up in a very, very different way.

Speaker B: Yeah, so it's that combination. I really liked that you gave a very nuanced answer. It is not black or white. And sometimes, um, in some activist circles it is presented as black or white. And I think it's important that we try to tease out some of these nuances. So thank you for doing that. Um, is there a way I'm going to ditch my idea of reading a quote to you? Because I want to move to, um, change management question about this, about this becoming more globally, um, representative through expanding affiliates. From a change management and change leadership perspective, what have you learned about what works and what does not? In that regard, in this Model of becoming, of expanding affiliates,

Speaker D: lots and lots of learnings and the learning curve continues to be steep. It's not that we have learned how to do it. So there are many things. Let me start by very basic things. For instance, the hiring of uh, a lot of teams that we do are hiring, made for the INGO model who then gradually graduate into those local entities. And that I think itself is um, a contradiction of sorts because as an ingo, the function is different. Uh, you are at times a project manager, you are a fund manager. Uh, whereas if you become locally rooted, your legitimacy is then about what you do locally. Uh, and how relevant are you in terms of your presence in society, in communities, in uh, the larger public sphere of that region. So that itself in terms of change management, I think how do you get the right people is critical. It's absolutely critical because if you essentially transition the existing teams, they still have, whether you call it the baggage or that is their DNA, where they're still seeing their role as a ingo. M uh, and the power of the INGO is still present. So that's one uh, massive change that I would immediately talk of. The second I think, and that's, that's a bigger learning for um, the whole INGO sector. I do believe, um, that, that the north and south are different in so many ways. It is the history, 300 years of history of colonialism and imperialism.

Speaker B: Mhm.

Speaker D: Our ability in the south, as in just, just to give an example. I don't know if I'll be able to communicate it or not. For me to understand what's happening in Myanmar. I still, I live in India. I'm an Indian, a Poro Indian. I take pride in understanding this country. Um, but for me to even understand Myanmar, which is my next door neighbor, I need to go to the BBC or to the CNN or to the Cartier. It's still completely mediated via the lens of the old colonial masters, so to speak. And I think that again is so important in bringing back to say the INGO change management. Because the vision, the visibility of somebody sitting in Oxford for us or um, uh, sitting in uh, Netherlands is very different compared to a person sitting in the South. Uh, and that's again about change management. Because what we really want is when you're decolonizing, then you're saying that locally rooted organization should be able to have a perspective which is both local, regional and global. But very often that global perspective is not there. So how do you ensure uh, that those local organizations and Oxfam India should have the same global perspective as, um, Oxfam, um, in Germany. So that's the other piece, the third, which is the big one I'm sure you would be interested in that, is that we still live in a world where resources are concentrated in the north. And you're, uh, still seeing most of the fundraising resources coming from the North. How do you distribute those resources, uh, equitably is one of the central questions for decolonization. I don't think we have cracked, uh, is still, uh, uh, a very, very live conversation within Oxfam. Um, but it is one of the most important pieces.

Speaker B: It continues to haunt, it sounds to haunt a lot of big global INGOs and haunt in the worst sense of the word. And I don't want to go into that now. There's, uh, been a lot of discussion about that, but I see completely why you need to absolutely mention it. It continues to be a big factor.

Speaker D: Yeah. So, Tosca, I was just saying that. And I think it's really important for, uh, particularly your audience to appreciate that I'm not talking only of bilateral multilateral money with the big countries. Even your ability to raise resources, uh, from the communities, which is, I think, the real power of inos for us. It's. I, I don't think, you know, if, if you look at our budgets, probably 50% comes from institutional funding. I don't think that's the real power. It's the other 50%, which is that five pound ten, dollar five, uh, that average person on the street is giving you on a monthly basis. That's your real power. But to generate that, uh, it's possible only in the north at this moment. We have not created the infrastructure in the south. People do not have, uh, those resources to be able to give, uh, to the not for profits. In the south, people still give much more of community giving. So one needs to understand this and also recognize INGOs raise money, uh, by talking about their work in the South. So I keep reminding everyone that that money is actually off the south because that person who's working through the week and giving you ten pounds is actually giving that money after seeing the face of, uh, a child in the south, let's ensure that it is delivered where it is supposed to be delivered.

Speaker B: That's true. And a full disclosure. I'm a monthly giver to Oxfrom America and a proud one. I know.

Speaker D: Thank you. Thank you.

Speaker B: That's not why I'm saying it. What I want to say now is I'm giving it actually to Oxfam America. Amongst us. Because I want and need Oxfam to do work here in the us, not just because of that face of somebody in the global South. I actually needed to become more and more powerful here for the very same reasons that you have said. If we're going to address billionaires, oligarchs, et cetera, et cetera, then there is so much work, or inequality for that matter, in this country. I mean, then there is so much work that Oxfam America as an example, as just one example of many, needs to do. So I'm going to pivot, Amitabh, uh, to a question that I should have asked you before and I'd like you to please give a short answer because I love to get to one or two more questions after that. I have to ask you the obvious question. How have the steep bilateral and ODA kind of cuts and the fact that also in Europe, over a longer period, public fundraising has. I'm going to simplify it. Just say plateauing and going down all these trends, how have they affected Oxfam in the last two years? It's must have been painful. Once again, um, for an organization like yours. Can you typify a little bit what the impact has been?

Speaker D: Yeah, thanks. So I would say that we are privileged in some ways and I think it was a conscious choice. Particularly you talked of Oxfam us. Oxfam US took a, uh, policy decision decades ago not to accept money from usaid. So that has kind of saved us from this massive hit. Uh, however, as in the question is still valid because of the right word shift of governments, International Development assistance is going down. So we have just been privileged that it has not hit us with a sudden 40% cut in one year.

Speaker B: We can see although Oxford, Great Britain has had to absorb waves of cuts before. So overall what does that picture imply for what needed to change?

Speaker D: So as I was saying that it is more gradual than the dramatic cuts in some entities where it's suddenly overnight things have changed, uh, dramatically. So it's slightly better. But I think we are clearly recognizing, uh, that this almost, um, the last two, three, uh, decades of the bubble that was created has uh, been burst now, uh, not for the right reasons and therefore we need to reinvent ourselves. And uh, it's very clear for us that uh, and that's where I think our systems change work also comes in. Our decolonization, uh, approach comes in where we are seeing ourselves uh, show up differently with kind of hopefully reduced footprint, not in terms of countries, but in terms of the flap that often INGOs develop, um, on the other hand, invest much more in working with communities so that we are able to raise uh, public resources, uh, for the work we do. So. Yeah, so, so there's a very conscious um, appreciation of the changed reality and we're trying to adapt to that. But I would really say that um, entities like Oxfam, uh, must also uh, acknowledge the enormous support there still have. M. I have been part of Indian civil society. I've worked with the largest of the Indian civil society organizations. Do not have budgets of more than 3 to 5 million USD. And they're the bigger ones. Yeah, yeah. So, so, and, and, and they do fantastic work. It's not that you cannot do good, uh, work. So, so we need to learn how civil society has been working with limited resources and still making an impact. And that's somewhere, I think the whole decolonization re. Articulation of the Ingo space is going to help us. As in your book, uh, your book's newer version, as you're saying, hopefully we'll address some of these challenges because I don't see INGOs continuing beyond five to 10 years if they continue the way they are. They have to completely show up differently. A radically different avatar is what we need.

Speaker B: Yes, exactly. So let me move there actually. Why don't we move there then? And then I'm going to ask you one kind of a little bit provocative question because that's all we have the time. So, um, as you noted, um, in our book Between Power and the future of transnational NGOs, we already argued somewhat in the first edition that the role question. What is the role or what are these still legitimate, needed and effective roles of those INGOs that are global north founded? I'm not saying that they're still only based in the Global north in terms of power bases, resources, but still they were originally, as you said, also founded in that post World War, um, uh, consensus, um, um, that um. Sorry, I'm losing my train of thought. So we already talked in the first edition of the book that those roles needed to uh, change. But we're going to uh, pinned that down a lot more in the last chapter to the new edition that hopefully comes out in 2026. So I am sure you have, because it is our observation that lots of Global north founded I Angels have gone through a lot of different change cycles in the last 10, 15 years, in the last five years, changes to business model, operating model, uh, uh, leadership, governance, staffing, you name it. But it is our contention that the role question Coming to a much drastically changed role that is probably much more narrow and specific, um, and limited if you will, has actually been underemphasized and we would argue that it should have started with that. So I'm sure you've seen the work by for instance Peace Direct and they talk about nine roles still appropriate, right? Interpreter, knowledge broker and producer. We've heard about that for a long time. Trainer, coach and co learner, convener, connector, ecosystem builder and advocate and amplifier are ah, some of them. I don't have time to mention all of them. Now I'm going to pitch something to you and please push back. Uh, I'm sure there are reasons why Oxfam may not choose this way, but my opinion is that what I think Oxfam should do at this moment in the global history of civil society and given the challenges around oligarchy, et cetera, et cetera, billionaires that you've talked about, the deepening inequality, is this not a time where Oxfam with its unique standing in the policy research and public research and influencing space should become essentially a think and do tank and not much more that all the long term development work and the humanitarian work these days can be done just as well by many Global south actors and that um, should think tank, but a think and do tank should become its core role. Why might it be a good time to drastically reduce, but at the same time empower Oxfam, um, to choose just that one role? And why might it not be a good idea?

Speaker D: Tosca, you would be pretty happy to hear that next week all the executive directors of, of different Oxfams are meeting in Stanburg. This is once in a year we meet and we would be actually looking at the role and mandate of Oxfam. So this is pretty much on the table. And in fact just to say, because you quoted Peace Direct, in fact that's one of the first readings uh, that we have for this conversation. So it is there. We are certainly engaging with it and we are cognizant that uh, Oxfam must um, reinvent itself at this juncture and both because of the values that we are talking of, of decolonization, feminist principles, but on the other hand also because the world has changed dramatically. So having said that, I'll still substantively respond to your question as I'm not sure about what a think and act tank would look like. Um, I'm intentionally saying that this is to kind of not get engaged with a limited framing of how think tank or an act tank might ordinarily be seen. However, I'm taking the spirit of the question. Yeah, I totally agree with you, uh, just with the nuance that we are fairly convinced that our legitimacy is not because we write good papers. Our legitimacy comes from the roots that we have absolutely at the local level. So it is really the legitimacy of being rooted, of being connected with people's lives, with their lived experiences, is what gives us, uh, our credibility and then the work that we're able to do. So how do we ensure that with limited footprint, where we are not occupying too much space? That's what you're saying. Totally in service of the movement for a just, sustainable, equal future. That's how I would look at it. And we need to reinvent. There's absolutely no doubt about it. Ingos, uh, you should be more challenging, more critical of us. Ingos do occupy a lot of space, and we need to kind of recognize it. Sometimes we tend to forget what our role is. I really hope Oxfam, um, does that seldom. But we forget and we end up serving the brand more than the issue. So, you know, these are hard questions that I would be very welcoming of from, uh, all our peers and comrades.

Speaker B: Okay. Okay. I'll be excited to see what comes, uh, out of next week's meeting and the, uh, follow up to that. Okay, we have barely time for one more question. I'm going to cram it in.

Speaker D: Um,

Speaker B: so you talked in the beginning about systems change, um, and that is now the core of what Oxfam does. And I'll read you very quickly one quote that, um, Oxfam's communication colleagues sent to me. Quote, we are on a journey of addressing the lingering effects of colonialism in global systems. We, uh, advocate against the colonial legacies embedded in, uh, economic, political culture and knowledge systems. I want to push back a little bit on that type of language in communicating with the public. So what I am seeing, uh, is that language is very, to my mind, inaccessible. It can only be understood by specialists within the sector, not by everyday people. And at the same time in a bunch of countries, not just here in the US but definitely amongst others in Europe as well, where I'm from originally, at least in those sets of countries. I see a lot of citizens in recent elections, and not just in the last one. They seem to say to government and nonprofits, um, alike, drop that kind of ideological and as well as identity talk. I want you nonprofits, NGOs and governments to make my life materially better. Just the nuts and bolts, the bread and butter of my life, because that's where I'm hurting. Given the inequality issues. What do you say when I say that the kind of language that I get from Oxfam in these kind of communications comes to me across as a little bit of tone, depth in view of the current political mood amongst a lot of citizens. Please feel free to push back.

Speaker D: No, I don't believe in pushing back when being critiqued because it's important to engage with the critique, try and understand, uh, and try and really imbibe, uh, what, what is the positive of that critique. So first, as in, we are in the business of communicating with people and any language which is not accessible just in terms of the format of the language. Yeah, uh, I totally take your point. We must keep simplifying it. So, you know, there's no, no disagreement on that. Even one person saying that, oh, this is, I don't get it. We must try and simplify and simplify and simplify because the point of communication is to communicate. It is not to, uh, show off your ability to write jargon, uh, so on, on that I'm totally, totally or

Speaker B: to be in a left wing kind of intellectual bubble that all of us, including are always at threat of.

Speaker D: So totally with you on that. However, I would just say that I do feel that our, uh, inequality report does, uh, reach out to all kinds of audiences, uh, and it has the ability, uh, to transcend the language barriers that we are talking of or the jargon barriers. And I want to bring that in, you know, to kind of now substantively engage with the part B of your question. I do not think that, uh, the anger that you're talking of, which is real, not just in the U.S. in Europe, uh, in India also. I'm seeing a similar kind of anger against that liberal ethos. Uh, but that anger is not against a progressive worldview. It is not against, um, loving your neighbor. It is not against compassion. It is not against ensuring that you also have a life of dignity. So I think that needs to be brought back and that is very central to the work we do. Safe on inequality. So therefore I take your point in how do we frame and articulate our issues which are not speaking again to that jargonistic circles where you kind of feel happy that I have been able to give the jargon but connect with people's realities. Because at this juncture, if you really look back. So I would want to challenge, uh, you on that bit, please. I think that if you look at the global movements in the last, uh, say five years. Let me just take the Last one or two years. I live in South Asia, so Sri Lanka saw a people's uprising. Bangladesh saw people's uprising. I spend a lot of time given. Our headquarters is in Nairobi. I live in Nairobi. I've seen young people push back, uh, a regressive tax, uh, regime. These are people pretty much uh, actually campaigning, protesting, ah, building a movement on the same issues that we work on.

Speaker B: Mhm.

Speaker D: In fact what I would say is that the issues are the same. In fact, we need to learn to connect with these people's energy. I have been a firm believer, as in post Arab Spring, um, that we are behind the curve. The narrative of anger, of people is finding spontaneous expression in different ways. The ingos, with all the rhetoric that we have must uh, absolutely be present with these citizens, with these common people, shoulder to shoulder. But we are not there because we are stuck, as you're saying, whether in our own jargonistic world or uh, the lock frames that we create. So we need to be agile and we need to recognize the reality and build power against uh, the injustices that we see growing every day. As in just look at the question of Gaza, the massive, massive number of people who come out in Europe, even in the U.S. uh, in protest against uh, uh, what's happening in Gaza. So I think that it is us who need to relearn how to connect with communities and their energy and um, strengthen the movement.

Speaker B: That's fully understood. I'm very conscious of the fact that our time is up. So Amitabh, I need to ask you the obvious last question. Where should people go when they want to learn about you as an individual and about Oxfam, obviously.

Speaker A: Obviously.

Speaker D: So I think people, I'm sure uh, Oxfam is um, you can just access Google Oxfam and you'll find all kinds of reports. And as I said, we work on gender justice, climate justice, economic justice. So depending on the issue you'll be able to find uh, enough resources. I do a little bit of writing so I'm sure it can be accessed uh, just using my name. So I don't write in one particular place. It is in different spaces, different spaces to engage and happy to learn from, uh, the feedback that we'll get.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, the uh, listeners, we will make sure to put a couple of those links in the show notes including where you are writing. So with that, Amitabh, I want to thank you very much for how you helped our listeners today, uh, learn and how you help me learn. So thank you for that. Um, and thank you again, dear listeners, this is where I turn to you for this final UH, episode and for all the episodes that we've shared together over the years. If you found today's conversation with Amitabh meaningful, I invite you to revisit past UH episodes on topics like leadership and and leadership development, organizational culture, and change management. They will remain available wherever you get your podcast. And don't forget, I'll continue to share insights and resources over on my LinkedIn page and my YouTube channel offers additional content as well. So with that, I am saying goodbye this time for the last time. See you around and thank you for having been part of NGO Soul and Strategy.

Speaker C: Thanks for listening to my podcast. If you valued the content, please leave a review on, um, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, or Spotify so that other leaders of social change organizations can find it too. And if you want to learn more, have a look at my website, fiveoaksconsulting.org where you will find blog posts, recordings of interviews with me, as well as information about my co authored book Between Power and the future of transnational NGOs. If you sign up for my email list, you will receive a free sneak

Speaker B: peek at the book or uh, feel

Speaker C: free to email me at TOSCA

Speaker D: or

Speaker C: contact me through my website and follow me on social media, LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. Till we talk again. Go Soul and Strategy, the podcast for NGO leaders and managers who look change

Speaker B: right in the eye.