Digital Transformation of Humanitarian Aid: Norwegian Refugee Council's Global Contact Centers

The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) is an independent humanitarian organization that provides emergency and long-term assistance to millions of people every year. The organization operates in the Middle East, Central America, Asia, and Africa. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic and the ongoing global refugee crisis, the NRC faced the challenge of continuing to deliver its services while adhering to safety measures such as social distancing. The organization needed to pivot to digital services to continue providing healthcare, education, housing, legal assistance, counseling, food, and employment resources to displaced people. The NRC's mission is to provide help to those displaced by conflict, even in the hardest to reach communities.

The year 2020 brought unprecedented challenges for humanitarian organizations worldwide. The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), an independent humanitarian organization, was no exception. The NRC provides emergency and long-term assistance to millions of people annually in the Middle East, Central America, Asia, and Africa. However, the COVID-19 pandemic compounded the already tenuous situation for over 80 million people displaced due to violence and persecution. Global travel restrictions, shelter-in-place ordinances, and other safety measures such as social distancing prevented organizations from delivering aid in the traditional face-to-face format. These crises carried into 2021, necessitating a pivot to more digital services to continue providing healthcare, education, housing, legal assistance, counseling, food, and employment resources.

In response to these challenges, the NRC partnered with Twilio and cloud-first professional services company Zing to digitally transform its services. They developed the Digital Community Hub (DCH), an innovative omni-channel community engagement solution. Using Flex, they built more than 10 contact centers over the course of 12 months. This allowed them to scale operations rapidly and centrally manage communications across WhatsApp and webchat channels, expanding the reach of humanitarian response beyond in-person contact. As of now, NRC has contact centers in 11 countries, with plans to expand to more countries by the fiscal year-end. The contact centers have enabled NRC to reestablish communication and assistance services to displaced people in countries whose difficulties were further exacerbated by the pandemic.

• The implementation of cloud-based communications has had a significant impact on NRC's operations. It has allowed the organization to deliver on its mission to provide help to those displaced by conflict in some of the hardest to reach communities. The results exceeded NRC’s initial expectations, with the newly built contact center in Libya receiving more than 20,000 calls in its first two weeks of operation. The contact center in Lebanon is supporting 30,000 interactions each week. NRC is now able to reach more people faster and with greater efficiency through the digital transformation of humanitarian services. The organization continues to scale and add features to its platforms, like multilingual IVR and message recording, to enhance its program with a range of social, legal, and educational services.

• 27 countries reached
• 3 million projected monthly interactions
• 10+ contact centers built in one year