The Trumanitarian on Bringing Agency and Non-Hierarchy to Orgs

WEBVTT

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What's working on purpose anyway? Each
week we ponder the answer to this question.

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People ache for meaning and purpose at
work, to contribute their talents passionately

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and know their lives really matter.
They crave being part of an organization that

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inspires them and helps them grow into
realizing their highest potential business can be such

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a force for good in the world, elevating humanity. In our program,

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we provide guidance and inspiration to help
usher in this world we all want working

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on purpose. Now. Here is
your host, doctor Elise Cortes. Hi

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there, welcome back to Working a
Purpose program. Thanks for tuning in again

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this week. I'm your host,
doctor else Cortes. Joining you live from

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Dallas, which is home base for
me. If you don't know me yet,

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I'm a management consultant specializing in meeting
and purpose, organizational logo therapist,

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inspirational speaker, social scientist, and
author. You can learn more about me

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and how we can work together at
a leascrotest dot com or Gusto dashnow dot

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com. Let me thank my partner
and sponsor, Work Proud. We are

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a perfect collaboration. Everybody wants to
know they matter and that the work they

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do is meaningful and appreciated. Work
Proud is a mobile platform built to encourage

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employees to share stories and recognize each
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of their work and proud of their
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With us today is Laurs Peter Neeson, who has worked in the humanitarian

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sector for more than twenty years and
lived in work for extended periods of time

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in Latin America, Africa and South
Asia. He is the director of eight

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Caps, an organization he co founded
in two thousand and nine, and also

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serves as the interim director for H
two A Networks. He teaches disaster management

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at the University of Copenhagen and hosts
the weekly podcast True Meditarian. We're talking

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about his dedicated work to the humanitarian
sector and his particular approach in doing so.

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He joins today from Denmark. Normally
he's in Geneva, Switzerland, but

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there it's midnight for him and five
pm for me in Dallas. Lars Peter,

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welcome to working on purpose and staying
up for us. Thank you very

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much. It's so great. To
have you. In fact, viewers who

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are watching this can look right behind
him and see the clock and know that

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we are not kidding about that.
There it is just a smidch after midnight

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and you still look marvelous. Thank
you. I didn't look this quarde at

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five o'clock in the afternoon, but
absolutely. And let me first thank our

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mutual friend who brought you to me, Paul Skinner, who wrote the book

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Collaborative Advantage. She is the one
that brought me to you. So thank

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you Paul for uniting us. It's
great minds here. So, Lars,

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Peter, you are up to a
lot, my dear. Here you are

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if you're at a CAPS, and
each to each network. So I want

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to help first our viewers and listeners
to understand what each of those organizations do.

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So what is ACAP do and what's
your role there? Yeah, So

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acaps in a sense help shape the
humanitarian narrative. When we see disasters across

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the world, we don't think of
them as stories, but actually they are.

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The way we think about crisis is
it's a story we tell ourselves and

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some of the choices we make in
terms of that, we desired to focus

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on Botswana or Ukraine or Bangladesh really
determines how we then respond to those crisis.

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So what we do is essentially try
to give as much evidence as we

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can on how big and how bad
are crisis across the world in order for

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decision make us to make the right
choices. So we have scarce resources,

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we don't have enough money to help
everybody. Where do you actually spend your

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money? That's the decisions we're trying
to inform. I really appreciate you how

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you brought us right into stories.
The narrative is story. You're so right,

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that's so interesting. I don't know
that I really considered it from the

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legal before, so I love it
already. But then what about H two

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H network? What do they do
sixty some agencies? I believe so if

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you look at my career for example, the first twenty years was basically a

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traditional sort of humanitarian career with the
International Committee of the Red Cross, with

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different than JOS with the UN.
But then some years ago I started working

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with ACAPS, which is fundamentally different
from those organizations because we don't hand out

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blankets, we provide data, we
enable response. We are in a sense

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b to be so we're not,
you know. So HWOH is essentially B

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to B for the humanitarian sex that
means humanitarians to humanitarian and it's a group

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of some sixty organizations who in different
ways either by providing standards, training,

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analysis data on how to use new
take all sorts of things in able better

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humanitarian responses to make sure we get
more of a more bang for the buck.

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If you want beautiful, okay,
so then let's sketch back. So

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here you are today, you're working
within these two organizations. I want to

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take us back to when this all
maybe started to begin or it began to

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brew. And you said somewhere I
think it was on one of the podcasts

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that I listened to, but you
said that your long and early career working

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in this and with human concerns actually
began with your first mission at age nineteen,

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when you went to El Salvador to
understand faith and conflict. Let us

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in what happened, How did you
get the experience, why did you go?

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What was going on? To some
personal contexts. I got in touch

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with a very socially conscious church in
Alsalvo, and I wanted to understand what

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the church was in a at Denmark
is a very quiet place and the church

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plays a very quiet role. We
have a very elaborate welfare state that takes

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care of a lot of things.
So the church basically preached the gospel.

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But if you go to a country
like l Salboro doing a civil war like

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the one we had back then,
then the church is challenged in different ways.

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I wanted to understand what that was
like, what faith was in a

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civil war basically or in a much
more active role for the church, a

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much more challenged context. And I
have to pull that back further, Large

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Peter, and that I wonder to
what extent I know your father studied theology,

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did that at all inform your choice
to look at faith? Absolutely?

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Absolutely, It's not doubt that I
got that from home and seeing seeing my

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dad, who's very active sort of
internationally also in the church work was an

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inspiration for me towards or get involved
and understand what my role should be.

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I really admire that, Lars Peter, and I'm just if we just paused

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for just a second and we let
our listeners and our viewers let this sink

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in and get that you were nineteen
years old and you have a pretty informed

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guided choice here in terms of how
you wanted to reach into the world.

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That seems pretty astounding to me.
I well, just speaking to a fifty

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some year old man by now who
probably rationalizes his life. I mean,

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it didn't feel like a choice.
I just had a strong urge to figure

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this out and place myself in the
situation to see what would happen. It

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seemed right. But I don't think
I had a grand plan. But I

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had I had a lot of had
itchy feet. I think it's fair to

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see. Okay, all right,
now that's even more interesting to me then.

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So a couple of weeks ago I
had Ken Banks on the show.

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I don't know if you've had chance
to talk to Ken Banks. Amazing human

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being he is. He's done all
kinds of things to empower non governmental agencies

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across the world through technology as well. But he talks about about twenty years

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of what I call wildlife scratching.
In his case, he was reaching for

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a purpose. So what I hear
you saying, which I really want to

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call out if I'm getting this right, is that there was this internal what

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I call an internal divining rod,
right that was pulling you to something and

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you had the good sense to listen
to it. Yeah, Yeah, I

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think that's probably right. And then
I think once I got involved that really

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spoke to me. I think it
never seemed like a choice. It never

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was just something that I really liked
doing, that I seemed to be quite

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good at, and that made a
tremendous amount of sense to me. Well,

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I think a lot of listeners who
listen in regularly to the show would

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like to be able to find that
internal light you got, that internal guy

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that you got and are grasping for
it so that you that you had it.

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A registribute nineteen is just I don't
want to overplay it, but it's

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just it's really remarkable to me.
Yeah, I don't know that that's how

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it was, that that that's that's
how it was, and but I think

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it's what always has been important for
me is that that when you when you

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when you're in this space of trying
to be driven by something, a purpose

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whatever. I mean for me,
the three ms always the I always thought

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of myself as a healthy mix between
a missionary, a mercenary, and a

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misfit that in the sense that I
really do believe in what I'm doing and

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I am driven by that, and
that's that's obviously the missionary right, But

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the mercenary part is I really enjoy
it. I get a tremendous amount out

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of it. I'm enumerated in so
many ways for working and I feel so

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privileged to be able to do this. And then thirdly, I probably have

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two each feet to work in the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs and then many sort

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of hierarchy or whatever wherever I might
end up. I couldn't. Yeah,

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I prefered, but in two weeks. And so I think for me,

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recognizing those three sides of it,
what I believe in, what I get

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out of it, and my need
to press the self destruct button so a

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certain extent is probably what drives it. Okay, Well, that gives me

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to my next question. And by
the way, I already love this yummy

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conversation. Thank you for letting us
come right into your cave, if you

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will. So one of the things
that you sent to me either I think

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it was on in our prelimentary phone
conversation, but you told me that you

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discovered early in your working life that
you were quite good at working in messes.

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Quite another great thing to discover early
in your life. And so first

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I want to understand how did you
discover that particular talent, and then of

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course I need to know how to
use it. Yeah, well, I

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mean I went to a salvo or
to sort of work with a church and

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volunteer, and I ended up in
the middle of a war zone, a

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very active one. And so that
was a profound loss of control, you

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know. And I think I think
experiencing that profound loss of control at a

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very early age and a very formative
part of my life, I think shapes

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you and and and certainly there are
a lot of things you don't take for

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granted. And if you then draw
that experience to what I'm doing today,

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what basically what I do today is
trying to figure out, if you take,

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for example, the pandemic we're experiencing
right now, where should we focus

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what's most important? Is it Peru? Is it the Rhinga and Bangladesh?

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Is it the states in the US
with low vaccination rates? Is it Potswana?

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Is the Zimbabwe? The countries with
high HIV prevalence? Where should we

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look? And so that sort of
level of ambiguity that we're dealing with because

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of this pandemic, for me,
there's a very very there's a straight line

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from from that very last nineteen year
old in the Salva and then building that

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experience to figure out how to deal
with such a level of ambiguity as we

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see today. Mm hmmm mm hmmm. Yes. And what I've been what

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I've been becoming present to about you
as I studied you and listening to your

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truemanitarian podcast. A couple of visions
to that is that you are you like

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a big playing field, right,
You're very comfortable in vastness. Ah,

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I guess yeah, mhm, yeah, that that's an interesting way of looking

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at I think that's right. Well
what do you mean by that? Actually,

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maybe I could ask, well,
the world is a big place.

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Let's start with that. You've been
gallivanting across the world and living and immersing

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yourself in these various cultures across the
world, and you the way, it

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seems to me, the way that
your mind works is that you know here

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you are, You're you're trying to
apply a systematic approach to understand data and

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how which inform decisions, which inform
actions, And that's just there's that's very

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chewing. Now. I do know
you studied political science in the nineteen nineties,

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and I want to hear about that. So I think your mind already

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gravitates toward complexity, right and nuance, But this is definitely this. I

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would definitely say the work that you
do is messy. Yes, yes,

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I think that that's right. I
think extreme levels of ambiguity, black swans

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messiness. However you want to deal
with the complexity, I think it's a

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good way of describing it. That's
what I do. Okay. So then

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now that we sort of service this
idea, I know you studied political science.

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How has that study informed your approach
to humanitarian work? Really maybe your

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interest in pursuing humanitarian work. So
I think I think the I think it's

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around the way at least I was
taught in political science was it was okay

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to have an opinion once you entered
this study, and it was okay to

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have an opinion once you left.
But if it wasn't shaken up to do

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while you were studying, then you
were doing something wrong. So we were

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really forced to argue all cases and
take all sides and really look at the

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data and argue the case. And
I think, really, what you need

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if you work in message. It's
two things. You need some fairly clear

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guiding principles and then you need to
really look at data and see how that

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applies and combined it to right.
So, if you're a humanitarian, you

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would want to know who are the
most vulnerable, where do I focus,

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where do I put my scas resources? And you want that to be data

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driven, not by whatever. So
I can give you an example. When

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the pandemic first stock, I spent
four years in Zimbabwe. It's a country

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I love a lot and I care
a lot about, and that's very vulnerable

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and it has a very high prevalence
of HIV. And so the first thought

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that entered my mind was, oh
my god, what's going to happen in

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Zimbabwe? You know, we it's
such a vulnerable country. We have a

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whole bunch of people who are it's
really positive this is going to be a

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disaster. And for a while it
was like, apparently not, but then

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certainly now it comes right now it
seems that there is a much higher level

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of infection and people are really beginning
to die. And so for me,

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that's a good example of how my
preconceived idea and knowledge of Zimbabwe and love

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for Zimbabwe. It drove me to
think and focus on that, but really

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it was a couple of countries in
Latin America that there was heart hit in

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the beginning, then it changed later. And so if you want to maneuver

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in messes, you on one side
have to have some principles. For example,

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look at the most vulnerable, make
sure you focus on them. And

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then secondly you really have to have
a very strong mythological and data driven approach,

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which I think I got from my
studies. Beautiful and Great would take

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us into our very first break.
I'm your host, Doctor Release Cortes.

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We were in the air with laws
Peter Nissan, who's the director of ACAPS,

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an organization he co founded in two
thousand and nine that is directed to

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see the crisis change the outcome.
We've been talking a bit about how we

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got into the space and how he
navigates it. After the break, we're

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going to hear more about ACAPS and
what it does stay with us. We'll

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be right back. Doctor Release Cortes
is a management consultant specializing in meaning and

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purpose and inspirational speaker and author.
She helps companies visioneer for greater purpose among

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stakeholders and develop purpose inspired leadership and
meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance,

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and commitment within the workforce. To
learn more or to invite Elise to

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speak to your organization, please visit
her at elisecortes dot com. Let's talk

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about how to get your employees working
on purpose. This is working on Purpose

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with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach
our program today or open a conversation with

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Alise, send an email to Aleise
Alise at elisecortes dot com. Now back

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to working on purpose. Thanks for
staying with us and welcome back to working

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on purpose. As I want the
pandemic continue on, we look for ways

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to help companies support the employees handle
their anxiety, stress, depression and feeling

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disconnected while also helping to lift and
inspire them with ongoing professional development. So

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we now offer a wellbeing webinar learning
series called Grab your Gusto Vital well Being

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from the inside Out. You can
learn more about it at a leastcore test

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dot com or should we an email
to at least at least core test dot

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com if you're just joining the program. My guest today is Lars peter and

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Essen, director of a caps an
organization he co founded in two thousand and

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nine. He also serves as the
interim director of H two H Network,

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which comprised sixty highly innovative humanitarian agencies
creating an enabling environment for humanitarian action through

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service delivery. He judged today from
Denmark or he's on vacation. Normally he's

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in Geneva, Switzerland. I'm your
host, Alist Cortes. Okay, So

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I do want to get into you
speak. It's so interesting how humble you

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are about this, Lars Peter.
You talk about working with ACAPS, but

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yet you co founded it. You
don't just work with it. You created

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this beautiful thing. And I understand
it's to help humanitarians with assessments and see

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the crisis. So where did this
organization come from? And really, what

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are you up to today? Help
us really get behind or under the hood,

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if you will. So it's it's
been quite a journey for me actually

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to work with ACAPS. I spent
the first part of my career being actively

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involved in response in countries like Afghanistan, North Korea, Zimbabwe, wherever,

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and then suddainly here I am starting
this organization that's supposed to help people like

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me make better decisions. And really
what I came to discover was that probably

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I wasn't as good at what I
was doing as I thought it was,

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and that very often, once we
have worked under extreme conditions in the human

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same sex, we don't often know
what the problem is. It changes very

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frequently and you have to do something
really quickly. It's a very very difficult

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decision making situation to be in,
and so working one hundred percent on figuring

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out how to quickly appreciate what's happening
and provide a good evidence base for decision

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making really made me I think question
my previous work in some ways, I

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don't think I did well enough.
I don't think we as a as an

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industry if you want to did well
enough. And so what I strive to

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do today, or what the ACAP
strives to do today, is to help

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provide a second opinion if you want
an operationally independent point of view, to

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make sure that we make the right
decisions once we try to help people who

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are falling through the cranks. First, I want to acknowledge what you've said

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about why was it maybe doing a
good job right. It's amazing when we

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go through our careers and we accumulate
more experience and knowledge, we can see

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things differently. We have a different
lens and so we can maybe see those

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areas that maybe we miss the mark
on because we have different eyes, more

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informed eyes. Yeah. I mean, I think if you have figured out

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the world at the age of twenty
three, it's going to be a pretty

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boring world. That right, Yes, give it up, right, exactly

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right. And so I love the
idea that once we were, the older

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we get, the more we realize
we just don't know. Yeah, or

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you you you. I think if
you are thinking human being, you challenge

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yourself more and more, and I
think hopefully you gain some insight, but

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you also gain some humility. I
think I would hope, Yes, yes,

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I would hope so too. Yes. Okay, So at this point

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I want to dive deeper into this
whole COVID thing. You started to talk

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about it before, but then I
heard your interview with you on your podcast

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Truemanditarian. Great name for a podcast
by the name Truemanditarian. You're wrong with

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Sarah Spencer on the episode called arms
Race for Data, and you said in

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that episode that you think the secondary
effects of COVID will make the first ones

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look minor, and you're worried we
won't manage to adapt to the fallow up

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with business? What do you see? What are those I see? Yeah?

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So first, I mean, just
to be clear, the primary effects,

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obviously is the people who get infected
and who become sick or even die

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from the pandemic. The secondary effects
around loss of livelihood, protection issues,

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all these other derived effects we see, and I think we only at the

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beginning of the we're seeing the tip
of the iceberg. If you want,

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in terms of the secondary effects,
you can just take three recent news stories.

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If you look at what's happening in
Brazil, in South Africa and in

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Thailand. You know, you have
demonstrations in all of those countries. You

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have the leaders of these countries being
challenged because of the way they've handled the

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pandemic. You've had the worst violence
in South Africa since Apatite. You know,

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these are just examples. You could
probably pick out fifteen twenty thirty countries

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that are being severely destabilized because of
this. If you then go to the

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refew gee camps, or if you
look at motorcycle taxis in Kampala, Uganda,

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who makes his money during the day
and then he spends it on food

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at night, and he's then locked
down for three weeks. And you see

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the impact that this crisis is having. And then you have the rest of

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us thinking about whether we should get
vaccine or not, and trying to get

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a pet for kids because they're both
sitting at home. I mean, it

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is a highly discriminated This pandemic discriminates, and it is reshaping humanitarian outcomes across

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the world. And I think you
are going to see is cascading effects over

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the coming years. I think we
only see in the beginning. Now we

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are very versilent. We you and
I are lucky. We live in very

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resilient societies with a lot of resources
to bail out companies, to send checks

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to individuals. That's not the case
in Nicotau, right, And so I

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think you will see it's very corrosive, and I don't think we can predict.

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Actually, the thing I try to
do these days is to just not

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make up my mind, but to
really just acknowledge how much we don't know

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and what levels of ambiguity we're dealing
with, and then to keep my eyes

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wide open. I don't know if
that made sense that was a bit rambling.

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But you know, I've read the
statistic about mascara or I makeup and

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lipstick, right, Yeah, I
think I heard you talking about it.

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Yes, go ahead. Well,
so lipstick drops because we're all wearing masks,

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and the eyes you put makeup on
because you need to look good on

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soon. Now, that's one small
example that I had never thought about before

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I heard it, And I think
that there are fifty examples like that of

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much more magnitude that we haven't thought
about, of changed behavior that's gonna create

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effects that will hurt the most vulnerable
people we have in this world. So

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I think COVID nineteen is reshaping humanity
and outcomes as we speak, and I

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don't think we've understood yet how that
is. Okay, So then let's go

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back to your core, which of
course is data. So you also talk

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about the challenge of how to factor
in the voice of the local community to

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help humanitarian responses, and so how
can technology and help there? Yeah,

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so I think I think we all
into human cerisics have this dream of having

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an humanitarian airbnb that fixes the shelter
needs of people on the move, that

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we can find a way of somehow
leveraging the fantastic power of technology. And

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actually this is you. You mentioned
Paul's skin earlier. This is one of

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Paul's ideas. He talks about United
Beyond Nations turning every person into a humanitarian

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and finding a way of creating a
platform where we can collaborate. So you,

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in a sense create a marketplace where
some people want to to give another

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people have needs, and then that's
that's a great idea. Yeah, it's

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fantastic and we are hunting for that, but we haven't cracked it yet.

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We haven't. We haven't found a
way of really doing that, and I

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think, I think, I think
it will happen. It's stage. But

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the problem we have is again back
to message, right, that the situations

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we work in are just very messy, and when societies fall apart, it

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can be really hard to then get
these solutions to work. M H.

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I think one of the things that
you and Sarah Spencer were talking about,

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I if memory serves me with regard
to using technology, especially to incorporate the

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local community with something along voice recognition, Do I have that right? Is

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that part of what you were talking
about. So Sarah and I spoke a

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lot about some of the dangers that
are around the AI and and how I

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mean we are human terms are very
paranoid people. We think a lot about

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how things can go wrong because we
work in situations where they do go wrong

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and where the most vulnerable people are
I hit the hardest. And so if

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you have a population that, for
example, has fled their country, and

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you apply AIO machine learning and you're
able to identify individuals for example to voice

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readiness or other things, so you
use any sort of biometric identification at the

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individual level. If that data is
handled handed over, for example, to

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the state that these people have fled
from, that's an incredibly powerful tool in

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some real bad access hands. And
so it's a double edged sort, right.

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We can all see the potential.
We can see how fantastic effectivity is

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and how we could scale responses in
ways we've never been able to. And

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at the same time, we are
also really scared of the concentration of power

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and the level of control that this
gives to people who may not have the

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best intentions. I like that you're
having that you're afraid of that. I

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appreciate that that fear. I think
that's extremely healthy and I certainly would want

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somebody who's looking through data and trying
to help to have that kind of a

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lens so I versus being, you
know, willy nilly about the whole thing.

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So I certainly appreciate that. And
having lived in Spain and Brazil myself

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and gone through all over South America
and seeing a lot of these different populations

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that are really really very vulnerable,
very exposed, I really appreciate that.

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So and to that end, I
think there's something else on the other side

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of that that I want to cover
next that I think is really important and

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perhaps and probably connected. And that
is what I have discerned is a very

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strong value for you around non hierarchy. Yeah, and so first I want

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to know you know why that is, and I want to talk a little

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bit more about that. So where
it seems like it almost like it gives

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you, like to use my word
before the Willies, that word alone just

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seems to bother you, hierarchy,
Yeah, yeah, I think. No,

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I'm obviously probably quite an anti authoritarian
in many ways, and I think

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I have a very deep rooted skepticism
towards the exercise of power. I think

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it has to be done in an
ethical way, and probably the thing that

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scaves me the most is for myself
to abuse power. And so when I

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became a manager and began to move
off to the hierarchy, then the thing

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I asked myself was, how do
you avoid this having power changing you?

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How do you avoid that you become
a different person, and and how do

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you do the right thing with this
power you've been given? And for me,

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a lot of that answers around seeing
your success through the agency of others,

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in the sense that you're there to
enable others to be base they can

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be in the position day rather than
you pushing through your small ideas. HM.

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So when I was when I was
living in Brazil, I was doing

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my master's degree at the time,
and so I studied the I was very

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interested in the environment and what was
happening there, so I studied the social,

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economic, and political contributions of the
deforestation of the Amazon. And talk

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about power, right, So I
really understand what you mean. It's really

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something to behold. And there's a
couple other things I want to talk with

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you about that when we get a
little further into the conversation. But further

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though, let's just while we're on
this notion of non hierarchy. One of

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the things that you said that I
think it'd be great for our listeners to

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hear about is I know that Frederick
L. Lou was a great influence for

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you and that you appreciate his thinking
around organization. So why him, why

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his thoughts? Yeah, I when
I he has written a great book called

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Reinventing Organizations that has been I found
that really inspiring. What I liked about

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it is that he portrays a vision
of a company that is it's not that

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it's non hyberarchical, but it's like
the herocue is very right. So it's

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whoever is best suited to solve a
certain problem solves it. It's not it's

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not always it doesn't always end up
on the same desk. And the type

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of organization describes its very evolving and
sensing its environment, sort of changing with

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the environment. And and not only
do I think that that's that's a great

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way of working because it gives great
agency and freedom to individuals to bring all

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of themselves into work, it also
is probably more effective than sort of a

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more new public management approach to things, I think, And so it really

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speaks to me it's also very difficult
to implement, but it really speaks to

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me to create an organization where we, for example, the first value of

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ACAPS we have we have value.
So our first value is we choose to

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create ACAPS as an enabling platform.
You know, we we trust each other

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to create an enabling platform for excellence
and professional growth. Right, So it's

407
00:33:22.440 --> 00:33:28.359
a platform where we trust each other. We want to excel and we want

408
00:33:28.400 --> 00:33:32.839
to grow professionally. Right That,
that for me is the key that that

409
00:33:32.960 --> 00:33:37.319
if we can create a work environment
like that, then I think we get

410
00:33:37.319 --> 00:33:39.559
the best out of people. And
for an organization as ACAPS where eighty percent

411
00:33:39.599 --> 00:33:45.799
of our constructures is salaries, if
people are not happy, you're not getting

412
00:33:46.079 --> 00:33:52.000
your money worth right. Well,
now bringing that over is not this idea

413
00:33:52.160 --> 00:33:55.359
of hierarchy into in the humanitarian efforts. One of the things that you and

414
00:33:55.359 --> 00:34:00.319
Sarah Spencer talked about in the Race
for Arms episode is how humanitarian efforts are

415
00:34:00.359 --> 00:34:05.880
run and funded through a hierarchical way. Help us understand what that means.

416
00:34:08.039 --> 00:34:14.639
The fundamental problem we have is that
and I should say, when I use

417
00:34:14.679 --> 00:34:19.440
this whole market language, I don't
think that you can reduce the humanitarian effort

418
00:34:19.559 --> 00:34:25.440
to a market issue. People have
rights, and I think that changes things.

419
00:34:25.480 --> 00:34:30.440
But if you think of it,
who is the customer actually in a

420
00:34:30.559 --> 00:34:36.400
humanitarian crisis? Is it the person
affected by the earthquake or the dono who

421
00:34:36.480 --> 00:34:40.639
signs the check. So there's a
disconnect between what we could call the upward

422
00:34:40.679 --> 00:34:47.119
accountability towards the person who fund the
tax payers ultimately primarily in the Western world,

423
00:34:47.119 --> 00:34:52.159
who who foots the bill and the
people who receive the assistance, And

424
00:34:52.679 --> 00:34:59.119
a lot of it is around are
we really responsive enough to the wants and

425
00:34:59.199 --> 00:35:05.000
needs of the people affected by crisis
or are we driven by other agendas?

426
00:35:04.039 --> 00:35:07.880
That's that's what it boils out.
Okay, that makes a lot of sense.

427
00:35:07.880 --> 00:35:10.159
And one thing that you did also
say that I thought was quite fascinating

428
00:35:10.199 --> 00:35:15.400
with regard to data is that can
you correct me if I say anything wrong

429
00:35:15.440 --> 00:35:17.519
here? But what I what I
remember you saying was that you have plenty

430
00:35:17.519 --> 00:35:22.360
of data from the donors. You
know exactly who those people are and how

431
00:35:22.400 --> 00:35:24.400
you find them and how you can
target them and talk to them. But

432
00:35:24.840 --> 00:35:30.280
with regard to operation operating knowing data
operationally, that's a whole, other,

433
00:35:30.440 --> 00:35:36.360
whole, other beast yeah, yeah, I mean it's we are dealing with

434
00:35:36.400 --> 00:35:40.599
such levels of ambiguity and uncertainty that
that often we have to operate in very

435
00:35:40.719 --> 00:35:45.639
murky situations. And I don't think
for me that's not It's not that we

436
00:35:45.639 --> 00:35:50.639
are not professionals. I think some
of the most professional people I know work

437
00:35:50.639 --> 00:35:52.880
into human exence sextors, some of
the most driven people I know. But

438
00:35:53.079 --> 00:35:59.480
we just work in really really difficult
situations where we often don't actually understand fully

439
00:35:59.559 --> 00:36:05.960
the christ So the problem dealing with
whereas dealing with a government's financial regulations and

440
00:36:06.280 --> 00:36:12.760
their strategic framework. That's very well
lived territory. Got it. Let's grub

441
00:36:12.760 --> 00:36:16.000
our last break Here. We've been
on the air with Lars Peter Neesent,

442
00:36:16.079 --> 00:36:20.119
director of ACAPS, an organization he
co founded in two thousand and nine that

443
00:36:20.199 --> 00:36:23.119
is directed to see the crisis and
change the outcome. We've been talking more

444
00:36:23.159 --> 00:36:29.119
about the work that he does in
humanitarian angles across the world. After the

445
00:36:29.159 --> 00:36:32.239
break, we're going to hear more
about the ethics of data collection. Stay

446
00:36:32.280 --> 00:36:37.559
with us, we'll be right back. Doctor Elise Cortes is a management consultant

447
00:36:37.840 --> 00:36:43.800
specializing in meaning and purpose and inspirational
speaker and author. She helps companies visioneer

448
00:36:43.920 --> 00:36:50.679
for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop
purpose inspired leadership and meaning infused cultures that

449
00:36:50.800 --> 00:36:55.679
elevate fulfillment, performance, and commitment
within the workforce. To learn more or

450
00:36:55.719 --> 00:37:00.440
to invite Elise to speak to your
organization, please visit her at Eleasecortes dot

451
00:37:00.480 --> 00:37:12.639
com. Let's talk about how to
get your employees working on purpose. This

452
00:37:12.800 --> 00:37:16.400
is working on Purpose with doctor Elise
Cortes. To reach our program today or

453
00:37:16.400 --> 00:37:23.199
open a conversation with Alise, send
an email to a lease Alise at Eleasecortes

454
00:37:23.280 --> 00:37:35.360
dot com. Now back to working
on Purpose. Thanks for staining with us,

455
00:37:35.360 --> 00:37:37.360
and welcome back to working on Purpose. I mentioned after the first Breek

456
00:37:37.360 --> 00:37:42.239
about the Grab Your gusta Wellbeing webcast
learning series. The content of that program

457
00:37:42.280 --> 00:37:45.000
is adapted from part one of my
recently published book called Purpose Ignited, How

458
00:37:45.000 --> 00:37:49.960
Inspiring Leaders Ignite passion and Elevate Cause, which is now on Amazon. I

459
00:37:50.000 --> 00:37:52.480
wrote that book to awaken leaders to
their passion and purpose and help transform them

460
00:37:52.480 --> 00:37:57.880
into inspirational leaders who enlive in the
workplace and elevate the contribution of business to

461
00:37:57.920 --> 00:38:00.960
all stakeholders. That's why it's for
if you're just joining us. My guest

462
00:38:01.039 --> 00:38:04.920
is Lars Peter Neesen. He is
the director of a CAPS and he also

463
00:38:04.960 --> 00:38:07.679
serves as the interim director of H
two inch Network, which comprises sixty highly

464
00:38:07.719 --> 00:38:14.559
innovative human humanitarian agencies creating an enabling
environment for humanitary action through service delivery.

465
00:38:14.840 --> 00:38:17.679
Each of today from Denmark. Normally
his home is Geneva, Switzerland. I'm

466
00:38:17.679 --> 00:38:22.880
your host, doctor Lea's Cortesse.
So for this next part here, Lars

467
00:38:22.880 --> 00:38:25.079
Peter, I wanted to get into, you know, the ethics piece of

468
00:38:25.119 --> 00:38:30.280
what you what you work with,
and so part of what you say,

469
00:38:30.360 --> 00:38:31.679
and I heard you say this in
one of your episodes as well, is

470
00:38:32.159 --> 00:38:36.679
that actions get taken by whether or
not they land on the front page of

471
00:38:36.719 --> 00:38:43.239
a paper, not whether they actually
help people in need. Yeah. I

472
00:38:43.239 --> 00:38:45.920
think that is what we could call
a perverse incentive structure in many ways in

473
00:38:46.599 --> 00:38:52.719
terms of of how we I like, I like the language of how we

474
00:38:52.760 --> 00:38:59.119
shape the humanitarian narrative, how we
we decide what the problem is. And

475
00:38:59.480 --> 00:39:02.239
I think when I say this,
I always want I want to clarify that

476
00:39:02.360 --> 00:39:07.119
I don't think that the suffering that
people are going through is a story I

477
00:39:07.119 --> 00:39:09.920
think it's very real for them.
But I think the way we deal with

478
00:39:09.960 --> 00:39:15.559
it is a story. The way
we analyze it and think about it,

479
00:39:15.559 --> 00:39:20.360
it's a story, and often that
story is not accurate. I'm not driven,

480
00:39:21.679 --> 00:39:28.400
not driven by evidence or even by
the once the needs of the people

481
00:39:29.480 --> 00:39:35.159
in need. I think it's really
important that this gets talked about right,

482
00:39:35.239 --> 00:39:37.199
so that people are aware of this. And one of the things, of

483
00:39:37.239 --> 00:39:38.519
course, that I want to be
able to help listeners and viewers is to

484
00:39:39.000 --> 00:39:44.360
expand their sources of views and where
they get information so so important, rather

485
00:39:44.440 --> 00:39:47.000
relying in just one singular or even
two for that matter, and then questioning

486
00:39:47.000 --> 00:39:52.360
it, where did this information come
from so so important? So then we

487
00:39:52.400 --> 00:39:54.639
can then look at this next question, which you already talked about before,

488
00:39:54.679 --> 00:39:59.239
and that's the ethics of data collection. And you've said before in one of

489
00:39:59.320 --> 00:40:00.360
the episodes. I thought that was
so interesting. You said, there's a

490
00:40:00.400 --> 00:40:06.079
deep fear that we humanitarian organizations will
gather data from local populations and the government

491
00:40:06.119 --> 00:40:09.159
will use it against them, and
thus we actually accidentally do them harm.

492
00:40:09.360 --> 00:40:14.639
I can't imagine a worse feeling,
a worse outcome. Yeah, that is

493
00:40:14.679 --> 00:40:20.880
sort of the worst nightmare in it. And I mean we we we we

494
00:40:20.960 --> 00:40:24.920
see this. We see in many
different ways humanitarian aid being politicized, being

495
00:40:25.760 --> 00:40:31.519
being used in different ways. They
examples of some countries of governments using food

496
00:40:31.519 --> 00:40:36.840
distributions to decide where to bumb because
they know people come where the food is,

497
00:40:36.880 --> 00:40:42.119
for example. I mean it.
We just have to recognize that we

498
00:40:42.280 --> 00:40:45.079
even though we're not we're not political
in what we do, we are part

499
00:40:45.119 --> 00:40:50.639
of a political game in the context
we're working. And the scary thing about

500
00:40:50.880 --> 00:40:54.000
the information technology as we see today
is that it just scales these things to

501
00:40:54.119 --> 00:40:59.400
a frightening level, right, And
so so how do you how do you

502
00:40:59.440 --> 00:41:06.199
how do youically go about this?
How do you ethically go about using you

503
00:41:06.239 --> 00:41:08.639
know, information technology for these things? And I think I think one of

504
00:41:08.679 --> 00:41:15.920
the things we have to talk about
is what don't we want to know if

505
00:41:15.000 --> 00:41:19.719
you choose to collect data, especially
and I think we are primarily, if

506
00:41:19.760 --> 00:41:25.239
not exclusively, here talking about individual
personal data. Right. It's really once

507
00:41:25.320 --> 00:41:30.719
you get down to this person in
this refugee camp, in this tent,

508
00:41:30.199 --> 00:41:35.039
with this family, with this background, once you begin to identify individuals,

509
00:41:35.119 --> 00:41:37.880
that's when it becomes really dangerous.
I think the more consextual stuff. I

510
00:41:37.880 --> 00:41:42.119
think that's out there anyways. I
don't think we're doing any harm there.

511
00:41:42.159 --> 00:41:45.280
But if you actually have very granular, individual level data and that gets into

512
00:41:45.320 --> 00:41:49.239
the wrong hands, I think that
is really dangerous. And so maybe we

513
00:41:49.280 --> 00:41:52.679
need to think about what we don't
want to know, agreed, well,

514
00:41:52.719 --> 00:41:55.960
And to that end, then you
go and talk about the more sophisticated means

515
00:41:55.960 --> 00:42:00.559
of dataforational you use, the more
vulnerable you become to just looking at the

516
00:42:00.639 --> 00:42:06.639
data and not making sense of it. That's interesting. M yeah, And

517
00:42:06.719 --> 00:42:13.159
I think it's obvious. I mean, you know, we we when I

518
00:42:13.199 --> 00:42:16.119
started out, I would send the
facts home to my parents every two weeks

519
00:42:17.000 --> 00:42:23.039
maybe fact okay, whatever that was, Okay, let's millennium, right,

520
00:42:23.119 --> 00:42:29.360
And then we had these big we
had these big satphones we would drag around

521
00:42:29.880 --> 00:42:34.119
which would would be the size of
a suitcase. And today, I mean,

522
00:42:34.199 --> 00:42:37.159
the level of connectedness is scary.
Look at what we're doing right now,

523
00:42:37.519 --> 00:42:45.599
right, I mean, and and
so it it has just accelerated in

524
00:42:45.440 --> 00:42:52.639
a way that creates vulnerabilities. I
think, hmm. Yeah. And so

525
00:42:52.679 --> 00:42:54.920
then we go back to what you
started to say before. I picked this

526
00:42:55.000 --> 00:42:58.280
up on one of your other episodes, you said, know what you need

527
00:42:58.320 --> 00:43:00.079
to know? Who's your decision maker? And what what will he do with

528
00:43:00.119 --> 00:43:07.719
the data? What's the objectives of
the data? So important? And it's

529
00:43:07.760 --> 00:43:13.159
so obvious rights You mentioned a couple
of times a KEPS taglines see the crisis,

530
00:43:13.199 --> 00:43:15.920
change the outcome. And what I
always tried to tell people, and

531
00:43:16.000 --> 00:43:23.239
actually it comes back to purpose,
I think is if if you write a

532
00:43:23.400 --> 00:43:29.719
clever one hundred and twenty page report
and nobody has time to read it,

533
00:43:30.199 --> 00:43:35.000
you're not changing the outcome. I
doubt whether you're even seeing the crisis if

534
00:43:35.000 --> 00:43:38.599
what people need is a map,
and this I once we work. We

535
00:43:38.639 --> 00:43:45.800
did some work on Syria around eight
years ago, and I traveled around the

536
00:43:45.840 --> 00:43:50.760
region and we had just published a
regional report, a coartantly regional report.

537
00:43:50.760 --> 00:43:53.320
I think it was more than forty
pages actually, and I had it and

538
00:43:53.360 --> 00:43:57.320
I said, have you seen this? They said, all, fantastic piece

539
00:43:57.320 --> 00:43:59.639
of work, great piece of work. I said, have you read it?

540
00:44:00.159 --> 00:44:02.679
Nobody had, but they intended to, but they hadn't. And at

541
00:44:02.719 --> 00:44:07.559
the same time we had we had
done just a one page map with some

542
00:44:07.599 --> 00:44:10.159
border crossings and some catchment. It
was a really clever piece of work and

543
00:44:10.159 --> 00:44:13.880
they all had that and they said, I remember one guy think, I

544
00:44:13.880 --> 00:44:16.119
bring this to all the meetings and
I put it on the table. So

545
00:44:16.159 --> 00:44:22.199
when people talk, right, And
so if you if you don't think about

546
00:44:22.320 --> 00:44:28.320
who your decision maker is or the
situation he or she is in, you

547
00:44:28.400 --> 00:44:30.599
end up writing for yourself and not
for that person, and then you're not

548
00:44:30.719 --> 00:44:37.679
changing the outcome. M hm,
yes, well, and then say more

549
00:44:37.679 --> 00:44:40.639
about this you have you're very clever
with how you use words and put together

550
00:44:40.679 --> 00:44:44.199
prices. You say, makes sense, not data? What do you mean

551
00:44:44.239 --> 00:44:47.639
by that? It's back to what
we just talked about, right, So,

552
00:44:47.639 --> 00:44:51.199
so the first rule is know who
your decision body. Are you trying

553
00:44:51.239 --> 00:44:52.920
to achieve here? What's your purpose? Who's your decision maker? What does

554
00:44:52.960 --> 00:44:59.239
he she need to know? Secondly, makes sense if you're not data now,

555
00:44:59.320 --> 00:45:02.000
don't just call it colect data.
We are so we're so data,

556
00:45:02.239 --> 00:45:07.840
we're so in love with data these
days, we're so spoiled with data.

557
00:45:07.920 --> 00:45:13.960
But we've work in situations that are
fairly poorly lit. There's not a lot

558
00:45:14.000 --> 00:45:16.920
of data often, and so if
you collect data, there's a big costs

559
00:45:16.960 --> 00:45:22.360
associated with that. Do you spend
a lot of time on that. Wouldn't

560
00:45:22.360 --> 00:45:27.119
it be better to maybe analyze instead
of running around with a clipboard in the

561
00:45:27.119 --> 00:45:31.599
field. Okay, absolutely, we
wanted it an exercise where we spent I

562
00:45:31.639 --> 00:45:34.880
don't even want to think about how
much money it costs. But it took

563
00:45:34.960 --> 00:45:37.360
us three four weeks and we had
more than how people involved in this,

564
00:45:37.559 --> 00:45:40.840
and we spent We use maybe twenty
percent of the data we collected in the

565
00:45:40.840 --> 00:45:45.480
final report. So eighty percent of
all those efforts was just wasted. Yeah,

566
00:45:45.519 --> 00:45:49.440
yeah, right, And so makes
sense not data. It's not a

567
00:45:49.519 --> 00:45:53.119
data collection exercise. It's a sense
making exercise to understand crisis. Okay,

568
00:45:53.159 --> 00:45:57.480
And then we got to bring this
point on. This is probably going to

569
00:45:57.480 --> 00:46:00.840
really bother some people that really like
cleanliness. But you said, don't be

570
00:46:00.920 --> 00:46:07.199
precisely wrong, be approximately right.
Yeah, and that, as you say,

571
00:46:07.239 --> 00:46:10.159
that ties back to the message.
It's also for me linked to complexity.

572
00:46:12.519 --> 00:46:16.039
When you work in situations where the
problem you're dealing with is predominantly complex.

573
00:46:16.559 --> 00:46:21.119
We know that simple rules or complex
settings is one way of doing things,

574
00:46:21.199 --> 00:46:25.159
and that if you develop an overly
granular picture, you have to update

575
00:46:25.199 --> 00:46:30.119
that. So if you collect a
thousand data points, you have to collect

576
00:46:30.159 --> 00:46:34.760
a thousand data points to update.
Now, if the situation changes every six

577
00:46:34.800 --> 00:46:37.960
hours, you don't have time to
do that. And so what's happening is

578
00:46:38.000 --> 00:46:43.360
it takes you a couple of days
to collect a thousand data points and then

579
00:46:43.400 --> 00:46:46.639
you have a beautiful picture. It's
just precisely wrong because that's no longer what

580
00:46:46.679 --> 00:46:51.320
the world looks like. So you
have to do a good enough approach.

581
00:46:52.559 --> 00:46:57.639
You have to you have to find
that sweet spot where you are in tune

582
00:46:57.639 --> 00:47:01.440
with how rapidly things are changing and
evolving, and and then have the courage

583
00:47:01.440 --> 00:47:07.360
to put out what is good enough. You have to put your you have

584
00:47:07.440 --> 00:47:10.199
to put your best guess out there
and then hope that that's good enough.

585
00:47:13.679 --> 00:47:16.760
So great way to finish because we
started with complexity and fastness, and that's

586
00:47:16.800 --> 00:47:19.360
a great way to finish. So
here we are at the end of the

587
00:47:19.360 --> 00:47:22.800
show Mars Peter. You know the
shows that Knew Why Peter by people all

588
00:47:22.800 --> 00:47:25.440
over the world. And what we're
up to is trying to help create organizations

589
00:47:25.440 --> 00:47:29.719
people actually want to come to work, give their best or do business that

590
00:47:29.800 --> 00:47:35.000
better in the world. What would
like to leave us with? So I

591
00:47:35.039 --> 00:47:39.920
think I think as a manager,
as a leader of an organization. I

592
00:47:39.920 --> 00:47:49.920
think I think it's about inteqrity and
authenticity. I know that's a very abused

593
00:47:49.920 --> 00:47:55.719
word, but zero bs. If
you want. You may be wrong as

594
00:47:55.719 --> 00:48:00.119
a leader, you may, but
you have to believe what you tell the

595
00:48:00.199 --> 00:48:04.599
organization, your staffy. And then
people pick this up in two seconds flat.

596
00:48:04.639 --> 00:48:07.679
If you if you have, if
you really believe what you're doing,

597
00:48:07.719 --> 00:48:10.000
you may be wrong. They'll forgive
you for that, especially if you have

598
00:48:10.079 --> 00:48:14.119
towards say hey, this was not
right. I actually messed up here.

599
00:48:14.400 --> 00:48:17.519
And so for me, it's two
things. It's it's be as authentic as

600
00:48:17.559 --> 00:48:22.039
you can bring as much as you
can of yourself into a situation, and

601
00:48:22.039 --> 00:48:27.960
and then secondly fail forward and show
people that you're failing and that you're moving

602
00:48:27.960 --> 00:48:32.119
forward. Also that we will begin
this conversation as Peter, thank you so

603
00:48:32.199 --> 00:48:36.679
much for joining us and sharing the
beautiful heart and mind with us and helping

604
00:48:36.760 --> 00:48:38.400
us and hopefully create a better world
and serve it better. So thank you

605
00:48:38.400 --> 00:48:43.239
so much for being a guest.
Thanks for having me on Elise It it

606
00:48:43.280 --> 00:48:45.480
was great. I hope I made
sense. In spite of the very late

607
00:48:45.519 --> 00:48:52.079
hour, I feel my cognitive abilities
deteriorating very quickly so that for you to

608
00:48:52.199 --> 00:48:54.679
hit the second Yeah, I would
say so. If these are failed cognitive

609
00:48:54.719 --> 00:48:59.199
abilities, the rest of us are
doom. So listeners, viewers, if

610
00:48:59.199 --> 00:49:00.719
you want to learn more about Peter
Neiessen and the work he does, you

611
00:49:00.760 --> 00:49:07.559
can start by visiting ACAPS dot org. That's acaps dot org. And thanks

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00:49:07.559 --> 00:49:09.920
again to our partnering sponsor, work
Proud, which helps companies build a platform

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00:49:09.920 --> 00:49:14.920
where your workforce receives meaningful feedback and
thanks for their work from people across your

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00:49:14.960 --> 00:49:17.199
company. Last week, you've missed
the live show, you can always catch

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00:49:17.199 --> 00:49:22.760
it be recorded podcast. We were
on the earth kena io Yosi talking about

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00:49:22.760 --> 00:49:24.440
his latest book, Puts Your Purpose
to Work, How to find fulfillment in

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00:49:24.480 --> 00:49:28.920
your nine to five and the work
he does is a sweet Spot Scout coach.

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00:49:29.559 --> 00:49:31.239
Next week we'll be on the air
with Swadi Thea Gajran, who is

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the author of Born Wild and the
associate producer of the smash documentary My Octopus

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00:49:36.480 --> 00:49:40.320
Teacher, talking about the profound beauty
and wholeness connecting with nature affords our health,

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00:49:40.360 --> 00:49:44.559
fulfillment and spiritual journey. See you
there. Remember that works at least

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00:49:44.599 --> 00:49:52.000
or third of our lives so let's
work on Purpose. We hope you've enjoyed

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00:49:52.000 --> 00:49:57.239
this week's program. Be sure to
tune in to Working on Purpose, featuring

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00:49:57.280 --> 00:50:01.079
your host, doctor Elise Cortes,
each week on the Voice America Empowerment Channel.

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00:50:01.719 --> 00:50:08.280
Together, we'll create a world where
business operates conscientiously, leadership inspires impassioned

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00:50:08.280 --> 00:50:14.239
performance, and employees are fulfilled in
work that provides the meaning and purpose they

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00:50:14.400 --> 00:50:17.000
crave. See you there, Let's
work on Purpose.