EMEA Reporter: Transforming Disaster Response Through eLearning

Combine a truly global background, expertIT design skills, strategic thinking, compassion, and a huge vision for makinghumanitarian aid more successful —meet Atish Gonsalves, director of DisasterReady.org.Atish is adamant that this piece should not be about him, but without thosequalities and his experience it probably would not be happening.

Atish Gonsalves

Now based in California’s “Silicon Beach,” Atishhas first-hand field experiencein the Syrian crisis, working for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosisand Malaria in Switzerland, and for the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in Hungary. Thatonly tells part of the story. Atish grew up in India and was educated andworked initially in Australia. Does that give a picture of someone ideallyequipped to create and direct a venture to uplift the skills of aid workers, providingthem with the means of sharing experience, expertise and needs while actuallyworking in the field?

DisasterReady.org is a newcomer to theglobal aid effort, born out of the need to rapidly train aid workers beingdeployed to the Pakistan floods of 2010. Today, over 40,000 aid workers from 190countries have accessed the DisasterReady.org learning portal to enhance their preparedness for whatever assignment comes next.They learn and are enabled to communicate across organizations, nationalboundaries, and fields of expertise to help one another in the vital task ofhelping swiftly, and with expertise, to alleviate the horrors stemming fromnatural disasters and human conflict, wherever it occurs.

So what is the portal? Hosted on the Cornerstone OnDemand.complatform, DisasterReady.org is a flagship project of the Cornerstone OnDemand Foundation,supported by an impressive community of major players in the humanitariansector and eLearning industry. Its users come from across the spectrum of theworld’s major aid agencies.

The vision behind DisasterReady.org is toleverage the power of technology, making learning accessible to aid workers atwhatever level and wherever they are on a 24/7 basis, regardless of organizationalaffiliation, nationality, or personal expertise. A rapidly developing suite ofcourses, lightweight MOOCs, webinars, and other resources are available toanyone in the aid community, anywhere, free of charge. As the portal developsfrom its initial base in the Cornerstone OnDemand Learning Cloud, furthercapability is being switched on, currently through the Connect Cloud, providingaid workers with the opportunity to deepen learning gained through the sharedexperience of webinars. Increasingly those communities are becomingself-sustaining communities of practice supporting workers in the difficultfield conditions of tented communities and relief camps.

The communication language is currentlymostly English but materials are now also becoming available in French andArabic.

“Where is it leading?” I asked Atish.

Atish said, “Successful aid delivery dependson rapid and accurate needs assessment followed by the application of focusedexpertise, often in situations that are entirely unique. Disasters can happenanywhere and by their nature are unpredictable. Disaster response needs workerswho have technical and soft skills, are emotionally well-prepared, andresponsive to situations they find. It is important that workers have the meansto share, seek advice, and support one another regardless of theiraffiliations. The focus has to be on helping those affected by tragedy.”

“What we are seeing in these early stagesof the platform is a growth in cross-fertilization between disciplines andorganizations. Traditionally this has been a challenge, but, for example, usingwebinar speakers from a range of client organizations, and making the contentavailable to everyone, is breaking down those barriers and encouragingcollaboration and sharing. Cross-training between finance experts and medicalstaff is a good example of a coming together to help those in need get help.”

DisasterReady.org is young and developing rapidly. The immediate future will see a further expansion of the portal,opening up the Cornerstone OnDemand Performance and Recruitment Clouds. Thiswill enable better matching of skills to disaster needs and will simultaneouslygive individual workers the confidence of badges and other certifications forlearning achieved.

Wow! I asked Atish how many people work forDisasterReady.org? “Just three at the moment” was the astonishing reply! “However,we get enormous support from the Cornerstone OnDemand team. There are loads ofvolunteers helping us from the aid agencies themselves. It is an amazingcommunity!”

So here is the challenge for us who readthis exciting story. There is still time in our New Year plans to make a spaceto volunteer our skills to help ensure the next disaster is overcome better.Whether we are SMEs, course designers, IDs, learning managers, or whatever elsein the learning community, Atish would love to hear from you that you can helpin some way.

You can reach Atish Gonsalves at [email protected].