Download a PDF of this issue - Field Exchange - Emergency ...

Research
Acting in the face of risk
Risk aversion and fear are widespread in
humanitarian crises, as mistakes are often
publicised and punished more than successes
are rewarded.
‘No ‘I’ in Team’– Trusting in others
Many humanitarians do not delegate due to lack
of trust and perceived consequences of poor
actions, or the fear of losing their jobs by giving
away their ‘technical expertise’. Encouraging
others to act and take risks on your behalf is
extremely difficult. However, it should be
considered imperative for leaders in humanitarian
organisations as this gives people confidence
and demonstrates trust, which creates an even
higher demand for people to act responsibly.
‘Living on the Edge’– Decision making: risk
taking and intuition
In high-risk environments where there are more
questions than answers, intuition plays a major
role in humanitarian decision-making. “Your
intuition tells you what is around the corner
and how to take action with a number of
unknowns.” However, decisions should always
utilise as much fact as possible and “common
sense based on an understanding of the politics
of where you are. Without that, you’re floundering
around in the dark.”
‘Rules were meant to be broken’– Organisational
rules vs. humanitarian imperative
Organisational rules set a general framework
for action and decrease the risk of negligence
and failure. But rules are sometimes too
detached from the reality on the ground, and in
emergency situations, when lives are at stake
and the window for action is narrow, you sometimes
have to break the rules to do what makes
the most sense. “We are living by the rule of
humanitarian imperative, which might be in
conflict with agency regulations.”
Competent humanitarians need to have the
personal strength to take critical initiatives both
with creativity and speed. “In real emergency
situations you have to balance getting the job
done, ethics, transparency, and are you going to
live with this the next day.”
‘The road to hell is paved with good intentions’
– personal values in testing environments
“When you are first starting off it’s all about
ideals, humanitarianism and doing the right
thing. With time, those ideals don’t hold up.
You have to find your own way of reconciling
these really big disparities. There’s a certain
amount of hypocrisy that has to be reconciled.”
Historical and social factors make each country
different, and institutional structures, ethnic
and religious rivalries can all test personal
values. Corruption, for example, may not be
seen as much of a problem in some societies,
and bribery can be socially acceptable as a
means of getting things done quickly. It is very
easy to empathise with the communities one
works with or with a government official,
particularly when it gives access to key decision
makers and project benefits are immediate.
In these situations, humanitarians must stick
to the ‘limits’ of their personal values. “A tough
situation was witnessing a culture of corruption
for one of the organisations I worked in. I was
instructed to utilise stolen equipment, even
after I pointed out to them that it was stolen.”
One interviewee felt that, “a morally ‘purist’
approach may not always be possible” while
another felt you should “never break personal
principles; you have to weigh whether the
conflict breaks personal principles or if it is just
an approach that can be resolved by swallowing
some pride and compromising.”
While values are context-bound and vary
across cultures and individuals, there are limits
in all cultures. Humanitarians should not
support cultural norms that undercut the longterm
stability and development a society hopes
to achieve. “Humanitarians need to understand
that an emergency is a rupture in the
normal development of a country – and the job
is to help it resume that development as soon as
possible – so we have to understand long-term
development and cultural contexts as well as
short-term emergency efficiency contexts.”
Sustaining energy
‘What’s in there, you ask? Only what you take
with you’ – Emergency response is not for
everyone
“While the mind can be very powerful, it can
very easily break (or burn-out) in high-pressure
situations. We owe it to ourselves to not walk
blind into a wall of fire.” Being aware of your
strengths and weaknesses helps you cope with
the challenges of the job and avoid situations
you cannot handle. “You need to understand
who you are before you can throw yourself into
this type of work. Nobody is effective on the
ground if they collapse when personal problems
surface due to extreme psychological
stress.” For some humanitarians, the pressures
induced by working in conflict and emergency
environments are used as a driving force. “The
pressure itself helps me. You see results faster, it
makes you motivated, it helps you pull through
and you have a goal to achieve. There is an
adaptation to work under adrenaline. But you
need to like pressure … if you don’t, you’re not
cut out for humanitarian work.”
‘You are what you eat’ – Preparation before
entering the field
Many respondents stressed the interdependence
and importance of both physical and mental
preparation. “Psychologically preparing yourself
for the length of your assignment is critical.
“I was in Darfur as an emergency coordinator
for a few months, which was fine, because I
knew it was a few months. It’s psychologically
important to know duration, because if you’re
in an intense location and don’t know how long
you’ll be there, it’s draining.”
‘Lean on me’ – Relying on colleagues to
monitor stress
Staff burnouts harm humanitarian relief operations
because an individual’s quality of work
can deteriorate to the point that there is a gap in
operational capacity and a replacement is
needed. Due to the lack of training and preparation,
most humanitarians develop their own
ad-hoc strategies to maintain themselves in
crisis situations.
Relying on and communicating with
colleagues working under the same external
pressures is fundamental in identifying your
own levels of stress and coping with the pressures.
“Make sure everyone on your team is
doing OK … make a pact with a friend who
would tell you if you are near to burnout.”
Beyond symptoms of extreme stress, respondents
identified indicators to know when
colleagues are nearing a burnout point.
“Reaching the edge, humanitarians often resort
to over use of alcohol as a negative means to
deal with stress, and people tend to become
extremely ironical and sarcastic.”
‘Leave the ball on the field’ – The importance of
disconnecting from work
“People who have burnouts don’t detach themselves
from a cause and don’t move on.” It is
important for humanitarians to be efficient
while at work, but to limit themselves, and once
they leave, try to switch off from their job.”
While working in an emergency context, “You
need to relax, know yourself, have something to
do after work, have a comfortable place to
stay.” Being able to find some peace after a hard
day is easier said that done, but if you can
empty your mind by doing something that has
nothing to do with work, it helps to get the
stress out of your system. This is particularly
difficult for humanitarians, because shutting
one’s mind to suffering is not easy. Mechanisms
are diverse, and range from meditation, exercise,
to reading a novel.
‘The horror’– Dealing with trauma, one way
or another
The period following a difficult mission is just as
significant as preparation in avoiding burnouts.
One organisation had psychologists who do
systematic debriefs of staff who are departing
psychologically damaging work situations, but
this support is not always effective for everyone,
and informal channels need to be explored.
Talking with colleagues, friends and family can
help to express the traumas experienced.
Conclusions
Somewhere within this physically and psychologically
demanding and politically complex
environment is where humanitarians find
themselves working and living day-by-day. As
there are very limited training mechanisms,
each humanitarian is often making their own
way through the field, learning from their own
mistakes and successes. Humanitarians have
devised innovative (and sometimes unusual)
practices to overcome the old and modern challenges
of working in the humanitarian field.
1. Maintaining meaning in work and life in
order to sustain personal effectiveness and
satisfaction.
2. To convert stress into opportunity, positive
framing was seen to project confidence and
tranquillity on the team and encourage outsidethe-box
solutions.
3. Leveraging connections included developing
informal community and interorganisational
connections to maintain realtime
updates in emergencies, and an ad-hoc
system of mentoring as a source of information
and inspiration.
4. Learning to act in the face of risk is achieved
through having a thorough understanding of
the local context to limit failure, knowing how
to work around organisational rules, and
understanding the limits of personal values.
5. Sustaining energy is the most difficult aspect
to control in emergency situations. It is a factor
of personal character and self-awareness, physical
and psychological preparation, relying on
colleagues to monitor stress, disconnecting
from work, and effectively dealing with trauma
when it occurs.
Through this study, we have seen that a
humanitarian’s unique, individual practices
can be combined to fit together within a larger
framework maximising work effectiveness and
personal satisfaction. Each humanitarian finds
their own way to cope with the challenges they
encounter, and keeping the balance is key.
For more information, contact: Deborah
Nguyen, email: deborah.nguyen85@gmail.com
14