Joséphine Goube: ‘Build alongside, not for, refugee beneficiaries’
We interviewed Joséphine Goube, the CEO of Techfugees, a non-profit based in London, bringing together tech engineers, entrepreneurs and startups together with NGOs and other agencies in order to bring the considerable firepower of technology to the humanitarian sector in 18 cities around the world.
Nominated two times in a row (2016 and 2017) by Forbes Magazine as one of the top 30 under 30 Social Entrepreneurs, Joséphine Goube is an activist for migrants and refugees’ inclusion in Europe.
Joséphine previously worked as tech evangelist for the web-based recruitment platform, Yborder, and helped build a web-based A.I. for migrants that provide information about visas and immigration support at tech startup and global platform Migreat.
What is Techfugees, in a nutshell?
Techfugees is a global social enterprise coordinating the international tech community’s response to the needs of Refugees. Techfugees exists to empower the displaced with technology. Techfugees organises conferences, workshops, hackathons and meetups in around the world in an effort to generate tech solutions for and with refugees. It also curates and promotes the best projects it finds for partnerships & implementation in the field.
What are you doing differently to all of the other groups and communities who are working on similar issues?
Techfugees has several differentiating factors that has earned its reputation as the global advocate for using technology in refugee aid. Firstly, we emphasize co-creation with refugees, where social entrepreneurs utilise first-hand user stories to build alongside, not for, refugee beneficiaries. Secondly, we underscore the importance of partnerships and knowledge sharing within the ecosystem of government workers, NGOs, tech entrepreneurs, and private donors who are working in the space to avoid a duplication of efforts and resources and also to promote an environment conducive to scale. Lastly, Techfugees is a global organisation that is the sum of its parts. We have mobilised strong local communities in 25 cities globally, giving volunteers the autonomy to tackle the challenges that are unique to their community and inculcating a sense of ownership for social integration and inclusion.
What do you think the main limitations of technology to assist refugees are?
Technology is no silver bullet in any scenario — it is a tool with positive benefits that include faster and cheaper distribution, more efficient usage of scarce resources, and rapid growth through scale economics. By virtue of this, technology is not mutually exclusive of human interaction or implementation. In fact, they are necessary bedfellows for effective humanitarian aid.
In your opinion, which three social projects harnessing tech for refugees are creating the most impact?
Techfugees has been involved in more than 100 projects since inception, tackling social issues related to connectivity, identity, education, employment, health and social inclusion, utilising a variety of technologies including marketplace platforms, blockchain, AR/VR, AI and machine learning etc. While we are not in the practice of endorsing specific projects, 70% of the projects that have won our hackathons are still going strong and several standout projects are in the process of being incubated by global NGOs.
What are the biggest mistakes people trying to help refugees using tech commonly make?
While people have the best intentions, there can be a tendency to rely on personal experiences and perceptions given user testing on the field can be elusive. This results in overcomplicated solutions that might not be relevant to the beneficiaries’ needs. For example, many people associate technology with building a new app from scratch, which is not practical for a refugee who is in transit is using expensive prepaid data. Another example is ignoring cultural and language differences when building out the user experience. There is also a significant amount recreating the wheel, which we discourage against given the wealth of existing platforms and APIs that entrepreneurs can tap into (which also mitigates the challenge of user adoption)
Do you believe tech has the power to positively transform the world?
Technology has unlocked immense potential around the globe, most notably in providing access that was previously unattainable (e.g. Mobile banking in Africa). We believe that we have barely scratched the surface in terms of how technology can revolutionise humanitarian aid and scale social impact.
What is your advice for someone hoping to harness technology to assist displaced people?
- Keep it simple
- Co-create with the people you are building for
- Get an MVP as fast as you can, then test and iterate and scale with key partnerships
