Evaluation report: we landed on our feet again

The main purpose of this report is to discuss whether the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) managed to perform as an emergency organisation after the tsunami. The evaluation highlights strengths and weaknesses in NRC's emergency organisation both at the headquarters in Oslo and in the field operations in Sri Lanka and Indonesia.

The evaluation examines the capacity of NRC to work in the different phases of an emergency situation, and the ways in which its future performance can be improved. Thus the time periods before the disaster, shortly afterwards, later on, during rehabiliation and recovery and finally the reconstruction period are use as parameters within which the NRC is evaluated.

The main observation the report highlights is the lack of preparedness of the organisation, although the authors concede that this was not an uncommon occurance. Furthermore, NRC did not have the organisational structure or procedures to react in the acute emergency phase. NRC had inappropriate contingency plans, inadequate information management and resource mobilisation systems as well as an unclear strategy about how to contribute. In short, speed and action was prioritised at the expense of planning and deliberation.

Despite the above mentioned problems, the evaluation find that the organisation landed on its feet. The institution and its staff-members proved flexible enough to improvise where that is required and roll up their sleeves to meet the challenges. [adapted from author]