Helping to learn? Learning opportunities for seconded corporate managers

Abstract

PurposeHumanitarian disasters strike overnight causing urgent demands for assistance in complex environments. Attending to the needs of the beneficiaries requires highly trained and knowledgeable staff. However, humanitarian agencies can neither afford, nor keep on standby full‐time staff with a wide range of knowledge and expertise to meet all possible needs. Some agencies have gained access to additional trained staff through partnership agreements with the private sector. These secondments augment the capacity of humanitarian agencies placing corporate managers in a different setting where they can test their knowledge and skills. The purpose of this paper is to provide arguments to build a business case for corporate managers to be seconded to humanitarian relief operations.Design/methodology/approachThe paper uses case study research and academic literature.FindingsThe paper provides a list of the managerial roles of humanitarian logisticians to identify the learning opportunities available to seconded staff operating in disaster relief operations. The list of roles may be considered learning opportunities for corporate managers in a different context and setting.Social implicationsThe paper shows that there is a possibility to augment the response capacity of humanitarian agencies with corporate managers during a disaster.Originality/valueThe paper focuses on the value of learning during emergency operations for corporate managers.

What Skills Are Needed to be a Humanitarian Logistician?

“…Nevertheless, there is a considerable degree of competition between humanitarian organizations (HOs; Cross 2011), although at least in part this reflects the mandate or strengths of the organization (e.g. In HL, the practice of secondments contributes to skills transfers (McLachlin and Larson 2011;Tomasini 2011). At the same time, there is increasing pressure from the donors (encouraged by the media) for agencies to perform efficiently and effectively.…”

“…For example, in SCM, skills could be internalized through interorganizational teams. In HL, the practice of secondments contributes to skills transfers (McLachlin and Larson 2011;Tomasini 2011). Even in a simpler form, resources are internalized through purchasing (Hunt and Davis 2008) which, in the case of skills, refers to recruitment.…”

“…Hence, HOs have been described as "most agile" (Oloruntoba and Gray 2006) and "fully flexible" (Gattorna 2006). When it comes to skills, the practices of secondments (Tomasini 2011), volunteers (Kovács and Tatham 2009;McLachlin and Larson 2011), communities of practice and the so-called cluster approach (when HOs are grouped in thematic clusters, one of which is "logistics") further highlight the semi-permeable nature of HOs. A prime example of secondments is the Myanmar operation of the United Nations Joint Logistics Centre that drew logisticians from nine different HOs.…”

Real-time foresight — Preparedness for dynamic networks

“…Therefore, dynamics tend to be more "chainlike" than in a cohesive network (Twigg and Steiner, 2002). Differences between experts and volunteers (Twigg and Steiner, 2002;Wisner, 2004;Tomasini, 2011) and competition for visibility and funds create various initial and long term challenges. The nongovernmental tradition implies that these actors appreciate to operate independently and keep robust distance to central decision makers.…”

The Role of Private Stakeholders in Disaster and Humanitarian Operations

“…Despite all these benefits, Tomasini (2011) highlights that the literature about the participation of private organizations in disaster and humanitarian operations focuses only on the knowledge which humanitarian organizations can get for working with private companies. Thus, despite the growing number of papers reporting the importance of private sector engagement in disaster and humanitarian operations, the different forms in which such organizations participate in disaster and humanitarian environments are isolated analyzed and not consistently explored in these papers.…”