Extracts from USG Fletcher’s message to staff on the OCHA reset

10 April 2025 

Dear OCHA colleagues,

The context we face is the toughest it has ever been for our mission as OCHA, and the system we coordinate. The humanitarian community was already underfunded, overstretched and literally, under attack. Now, we face a wave of brutal cuts.

We can see the impact on the communities we serve. Vital lifesaving work is ending. Our partners – NGOs and the UN humanitarian family – are hit hard. We are hit too: a 2025 funding gap of almost US$60 million. We must address this to protect our mission.

Action so far

In February, I convened the heads of international humanitarian organizations under the Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC) to regroup in the new context. We agreed to remain calm, brave, principled, and united. To win afresh the argument for international solidarity. To draw confidence from the extraordinary progress made by humanitarians over decades. That our mission is right, and our allies are still out there. But we need to be lighter, faster, reduce duplication and be less bureaucratic. We need to devolve power to local partners and empower our Humanitarian Coordinators. We agreed on a ten-point plan – The Humanitarian Reset

Following this, two critical prioritization exercises took place across the sector, supported by OCHA. Each Humanitarian Coordinator led reviews of how to preserve as much lifesaving work as possible. Using this, the IASC Emergency Directors Group (EDG) led a prioritization exercise at the global level. Brutally tough assignments. 

Of course, as we all know, these exercises are driven by funding cuts and not by a reduction of humanitarian needs. On the contrary, as reflected in our 2025 Global Humanitarian Needs Overview, more people need support.

We are not starting from scratch at OCHA. We have an excellent Strategic Plan for 2023-2026 , with strategic foresight. We will now adapt it for the new reality. As part of the Humanitarian Reset, I have asked others to focus on what they do uniquely well, and not drift into the work others are there to do. For us that means that we are here to coordinate, not replicate. We will be a strong, agile, fearless team of humanitarians with a clear and distinct purpose: to coordinate life-saving work.

Since February, as OCHA, we have taken austerity measures to protect our mission. These resulted in savings of US$3.7m. Meanwhile, ASG Msuya [Joyce] has continued to follow up the efficiency review she carried out with Jan Egeland, NRC Secretary General. You have responded with hundreds of ideas to decentralize decision-making, streamline processes, maximize resources, and invest in digital innovation and technology. 

At the same time, we have reviewed our priorities. There are different ways to approach these exercises. We opted to ensure that OCHA, rather than external voices, remained at the heart of our approach, and that the consultation is as inclusive as possible.

We now need to move from consultation to tough choices. We have been guided by the following principles. First, the core mission of saving lives. Secondly, the work we have already done to identify how to be more efficient, including investing in humanitarian leadership, crisis readiness, and outstanding coordination of the humanitarian community. Thirdly, our values, and the wider work we are doing to build a genuinely open and inclusive culture. Central to everything we do are our people: building the right organizational culture is as important as defining the savings we will make. This reform is in alignment with the wider change our partners are undertaking, and the UNSG’s UN80 initiative.

What next?

I am grateful to staff for the measures we already have in place, including recruitment freezes and travel restrictions. While we implement the wider changes, these will stay in place. 

We will reduce bureaucracy and reporting layers. We will become less top heavy, substantially reducing senior positions, both in Headquarters and our Country and Regional Offices, and we will focus more of our resources in the countries where we work. All Divisions and Branches in Headquarters will reduce senior staffing. We will work in fewer countries, but have dynamic and full responses where we are present, while we lead in coordinating the sector at a global level. 

We will refocus our work in HQ around three strategic priorities: crisis response, sector renewal, and humanitarian leadership, underpinned by a strong financing, communication, and partnerships division. All will report to the USG/ASG. 

A division focused on crisis response will lead the humanitarian community as we meet the humanitarian challenges ahead. A division dedicated to system renewal and reform will provide innovative thinking and agile tools to partners for a coordinated humanitarian response, including a revamped Thematic Advisory Group (including our vital work on gender, climate, IDPs). A third division, on financing, partnerships and communication, will raise money for humanitarian action, build new alliances, and advocate for what we do. In support, information management will become part of all coordination rather than a standalone function.

To support my focus on humanitarian leadership, this team will report directly to me. We will establish a Humanitarian Task Force under the ASG, to provide us with a much more agile capacity.

OCHA will scale back our presence and operations in Cameroon, Colombia, Eritrea, Iraq, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Gaziantep, and Zimbabwe. We will adjust our geographic footprint in line with the lifecycle of operations to “right size” the majority of our operations, also in line with the financial realities we are facing.

Office structures will be further standardized, less top heavy, and include greater generalization. We will invest in a common services approach by default; and reduce overall office sizes. We will close many Humanitarian Advisory Teams. 

As a result, we will reduce more than 20 senior positions (P5s and above) in Headquarters and in our Country and Regional Offices. We will reach a 70/30 ratio between Country and Regional Offices and HQ. *OCHA currently has a workforce of around 2,600 staff in over 60 countries. The funding shortfall means we are looking to regroup to an organization of around 2,100 staff in fewer locations, meaning that we will reduce our overall workforce by 20 per cent. We will handle the staff reductions in a humane, fair, open, and disciplined way to allow as much notice and planning as possible, working with managers and staff representatives throughout, and learning from past exercises. 

I hope that this stronger alignment of teams around core priorities will deliver us improved efficiency; enhanced ability to respond rapidly and effectively to crises; clearer leadership and support to frontline operations; significant cost savings; and alignment with UN80. I have asked the heads of division to report by the end of June on where we will stop and phase out work. 

We will give colleagues who will not be extended/renewed as much advance notice as possible to plan and organize their lives.  And we are committed to supporting staff by providing information, ensuring as much transparency as possible.

In implementing these changes, we will communicate openly with partners the tough choices we are making; and make clear asks of donors. You should be firm with the leadership on what you can no longer do. 

I know that none of this is easy. We believe passionately in what we do, with good reason. But we cannot continue to do it all. We are stopping work that we have invested in, and that we know makes a difference to those in the direst need. It will be heartbreaking, as so many of us are experiencing, as we close programmes and say farewell to colleagues and partners. 

Thank you for your support in this process, and for who we are. We have exceptional talent: experienced, creative, committed, diverse. We have a strong sense of purpose, the courage to persevere in front of daunting odds, and people who are willing to work harder than anyone because we believe in what we do. Hard as it will be, I am asking you to bring to the challenges ahead that spirit; with trust; humility towards each other and those we serve; genuine teamwork; agility. We must show, not tell how we are changing: we are not going to define how we evolve in a soundbite and then fail to match it with action. I want all of you to feel liberated to do your jobs, rewarded for delivering, able to learn, grow, innovate, and speak truth to power, included in decision making. ERCs come and go: this is your organization; this is our organization.

It is understandable that we feel daunted and anxious. Please support colleagues and friends as we go through these challenging times. I count on all of you to help us continue to adapt to ensure that OCHA remains the standard bearer of humanitarian action worldwide. And let’s focus our collective energy - fearlessly and proudly - on saving lives.

Yours,

Tom

*Asterisks indicate that a figure, sentence, or section has been rectified, added, or retracted after the initial publication of this update.