The Emergence of Start Network
By Sean Lowrie, Founding Director and CEO 2010–2019
The emergence of Start Network is an amazing story; a story full of vision, intrigue, crisis, inspiration, sacrifice, and hard work. A story I’m proud to share with you all.
Inevitably though, it’s one of those stories whereby I’m forced to leave out more than I can tell, simply because I have neither the words nor the page space to do justice to all the incredible happenings and the exceptional people who’ve played their part. To each and every one of them, I want to say thank you.
My own Start Network journey began by being convinced that a network of civil society organisations could make the humanitarian aid system more resilient within a dangerous world. Through innovation, and through challenging the status quo, Start Network had the potential to become a public good — globally. A decade later, that potential has, in the most part, been realised. Start Network is a leader and a builder. It carries significant industry influence and impacts upon how the humanitarian aid community thinks.
Yet, the very real humanitarian challenges, for which the network was originally created and built, remain. We live in a world with populist governments turning inward just at a time when humanity’s challenges require global cooperation. A world with climate change, biodiversity collapse, disease pandemics, increasing population densities, economic uncertainty, and chronic conflicts. A world that needs a network of humanitarian organisations to adapt and respond to its increasing turbulence.
I feel proud of what we’ve been able to achieve over our 10 years. Start Network has helped NGOs regain the agency of their founders who responded to human suffering and injustice. It’s hard to retain that spirit when the bureaucracy of the aid machine is so pervasive and counter-productive, but I think we’ve enabled that spirit to live.
We’ve also changed mindsets; future-proofing, systemic resilience, fast funding, crisis anticipation, risk financing, using technology, incorporating innovation, enabling local leadership and shifting power. Start Network has the potential to give local organisations the advantages of global scale without the disadvantages of needing global systems. Time and again, we demonstrate how to deliver the vision of a more effective locally-led system with legitimate large-scale international organisations, co-existing within the same ecosystem.
The finely balanced position that Start Network inhabits today is an exciting one. My wish is that it becomes a household name and a positive force that gives people hope; that reaches across walls and boundaries, and collaborates to make the world a better place.
I’m grateful for all we’ve been able to do, but I’m equally aware that the road ahead will not be easy. As Start Network evolves into the future, the people involved will change. But I hope the spirit of the founders — of courageous collaboration for the greater good — will endure.
This journey has been about individual people who work tenaciously to build a public good, and it’s the relationships between those people that will carry the network forward over the inevitable ups and downs that lay ahead. I urge you to be kind to one another and to recognise the privilege and responsibility you carry.
Comrades, go forward with courage! And keep challenging the status quo.
A History of Challenging the Status Quo
● During the global economic crisis of 2008, humanitarian directors from leading British NGOs began to hold discussions in London pubs. They decided to create an NGO aggregator, and called it the Consortium of British Humanitarian Agencies (CBHA). The UK government awarded an £8 million grant to explore and develop the idea.
● The experiment surpassed everyone’s expectations. We successfully tested the aggregator in the Pakistan Floods response of 2010. Evaluations showed the funding mechanism was earlier, faster and cheaper than other aggregators. We were learning how to help local organisations prepare for disasters.
● Then in 2011 our funding relationship was severed in a political decision unrelated to the evidence, and we were tipped into our first great crisis. Some wanted to quit, but a majority prevailed and we continued. We were to discover that the crisis was necessary.
● As time passed, our vision evolved. “If we collaborate, we can address problems that are beyond the control of any single member.”
● We scattered a thousand seeds, speaking to anyone we could find about new business models for humanitarian aid. We worked hard to create possibilities for NGOs and discovered insurance, credit, and anticipation as new ideas. Ireland provided some financial support for our exploration, which gave us some hope.
● In a board meeting in May 2012, we came to an important realisation — we had to become global in order to survive and deliver upon our vision. Two months later, the CEOs of the 15 organisations approved the idea.
● In early 2013, we came up with the name “Start Fund”, and with the name came an identity that people could relate to. Our fortunes changed as a result, and we were soon invited by DFID to submit a technical proposal for the Start Fund.
● In June 2013, humanitarian directors met with UK officials near Westminster Abbey in central London. One by one, the directors explained that the process by which the government funded NGOs was undermining front line crisis-response capacity. They argued that money was passing through a chain of intermediaries, and by the time it arrived at the front-line of crisis response, it was late and laden with expensive and inflexible conditions.
● The network was a solution: an aggregator run by a group of front line NGOs that would disintermediate some of the aid chain at low cost, impartially, quickly, and effectively. It would create an entirely new network of funding from anywhere to anywhere in the world, contributing to a more resilient and effective humanitarian aid system. UK government officials offered around £20m in funding and a few weeks later we renamed ourselves Start Network.
● Over the following months, we navigated a few tricky moments and decided upon the projects that would become the Disasters Emergencies Preparedness Programme (DEPP). DEPP projects became important sources of experience and motivation for the localisation and Grand Bargain initiatives that were to follow. Yet, there were problems in how NGOs responded to and managed this opportunity. We realised there were very few investment funds or incubators for NGOs to experiment with and learn about doing things in new ways. This led us to innovation work and to seizing the opportunity to develop innovation labs as part of the DEPP.
● By the end of the year, we had agreed a vision for the future of the humanitarian aid system and secured more government support. We had worked with unbreakable tenacity over 30 months since the crisis of July 2011, and finished the year with promises of close to £50m in funding.
● 2014 concluded with a real sense of excitement and energy. But behind the scenes, we were struggling to deliver. Start Network was full of possibility and inspiration, but it was hard to manage. New NGOs were joining and the workload was increasing. We were designing, building, and sailing the ship all at the same time.
● Over 2015, the network grew with new members and new possibilities. We began to experiment with using blockchain for governance and funding transfers. We also made some high-profile assertions at events in New York of our vision for a new economy for humanitarian aid, with power at the edges of the system and funding triggered by shifts in risk. We began to talk about partnerships with Silicon Valley technology companies. The Netherlands became our third Start Fund donor.
● Then the European refugee crisis tested our resolve and ability to adapt because Syria was eligible for ODA, but European countries through which Syrian refugees were travelling, were not eligible. We struggled to find a way to work within the rules to help the migrants. Eventually, we found a way and began a UK-funded programme to support the migrants.
● By the end of the year, Start Network was becoming well-known across the humanitarian aid sector, but the team was really struggling to build and spin-off a new charity that would service the vision. The bigger we got, the harder it would be to leave our structure as a consortium hosted by Save the Children and become the independent charity that the members wanted. We needed investment and core funding.
● We reached out to the Middle East, we held our largest-ever conference week, and then we sent a delegation to the World Humanitarian Summit in Istanbul. But the turbulent world was increasing the profile of the humanitarian aid system, and the profile and expectations of Start Network were increasing. We tipped into crisis and our progress stalled.
● We began 2017 realising that a fundamental change to Start Network was needed. We invested in a process of co-creation called Start Evolves. Many questions about the future of Start Network were answered: the network structure, its finances, membership, rules, systems, and culture. By November 2017, we had achieved something remarkable. The entire network had agreed on a way forward. Everyone’s roles and responsibilities were becoming clear, and the team’s job along with Save the Children and the board was to spin-off a new charity.
● Meanwhile the IKEA Foundation had stepped forward with core funding to underwrite the spin-off. It was a fundamental act of generosity that enabled all our hard work and vision to be realised.
● However, most of our funding was from governments, whose rules usually demand at least three years’ worth of audited accounts before they would give a charity funding. There was no way that the UK would allow the untested Start Network charity to manage millions of pounds in contracts.
● PWC devised a solution using a commercial practice called ‘grant custodian’ whereby Start Network member NGOs would manage donor grants on behalf of the network. We would spin-off a small and nimble Start Network charity, and the IKEA Foundation agreed that their funding could be transferred to the new charity without three years of accounts.
● 2017 was a year to celebrate because, at last, after many years of struggle and years of designing, building, and sailing the ship, and periods of necessary but painful crisis, we had the three final pieces of the puzzle: a vision, funding, and an organisational structure.
● The year 2018 was more difficult, with the DEPP projects closing without any further support. As the spin-off approached, we hadn’t yet figured out how to deliver it with all the shifting rules and procedures. The safeguarding crisis had hit the UK charity sector and no one was willing to take any risk at all. The Start Network spin-off contained many unresolved uncertainties.
● The escalating bureaucratic complexity and reducing tolerance for risk collided in April 2018 and we tipped into our third great crisis. Our progress toward independence halted, our self-confidence was hurt, and we lost some people. But as usual, the crisis was necessary for the final push to independence to be achieved.
● There were many problems, and a lot of detailed and tedious work that was far from the reality of saving lives in a crisis, but we didn’t give up on the vision. A small number of heroes — dedicated and talented people carried the process over the final few months. Eventually, on 1 May 2019, we did spin off the new charity and, at last, with the Kafkaesque bureaucratic nightmare over, we were ready to begin the next stage of the struggle.
