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The third area is that we have envisioned and created a true
worldwide organization and that we embrace the idea and the
responsibility that the youngest children in China are just as
important as the youngest children in America. I’m very proud
that we’ve created an organization and we value human life equally
no matter where that person lives.
CC: Do you feel that the original spirit of the
organization remains unchanged?
BG: What’s really interesting about that question is that the
transformation we’re going through and the strategies that we’re
employing are almost identical to when the organization was
created. It’s going back to defining our mission as community
impact, instead of defining our mission as fundraising.
CC: How often do you get to spend time in the
field seeing lives changed?
BG: I spend half of my time on the road. On almost every trip
that I make, I ask to be exposed to working communities that
the local United Way is involved in. The work of United Way
Worldwide is really important, but when you’re at the United
Way in Columbus, Ohio, or Seattle, or at the United Way in
the UK, you’re working with families. You’re working with local
officials. You’re working with local donors. I miss that. So when
I travel, I get in the field all the time.
The impact that we’re having is happening on a worldwide
scale. And there are some days that I need to remind myself of that.
The most challenging part of my job is United Way the business.
The hard decisions we have to make in terms of where we allocate
our resources. How do we attract new donors? Millennials see the
world in a very different way, so we’re mindful of how to approach
them. The challenge is making sure that the business stays
relevant. How do you take a ;;;-year-old organization and be
relevant and important in a global digital economy? Seeing the
impact we make in others is what keeps me going. C
UNITED WAY is the largest
privately funded nonprofit in
the world. It focuses its efforts
on improving health, education
and financial stability in communities all over the world by
connecting volunteers and a
network of about 1,800 locally
autonomous nonprofit organizations it partners with.
In each case, United Way
works with local businesses,
nonprofits, governments,
civic and faith-based organizations and individuals from all
walks of life who care about
the community.
Together they take a hard
look at the problems facing
each community, inviting everyone to be a part of the solution.
Depending on the solutions
that local United Ways indentify
in their communities, there is
often a United Way grant process to fund the needed work.
The organization allows
those who donate to designate
IN 2016, BRIAN GALLAGHER, president
and chief executive officer of United Way
Worldwide, was in Vancouver, British Columbia,
at a United Way conference. At the time, the
organization was working to improve its
response to the many refugee crises taking
place around the world. It had created a pro-
gram to help with the education, income and
health needs of hundreds of thousands of peo-
ple who are forced to leave their homes. “I was
wondering what kinds of stories we should be
telling volunteers and professionals from all
over the world about how we are dealing with
this glaring need,” says Gallagher.
His answer came shortly afterward
when he met Zeynab Muhamed, a refugee
who fled Kenya in 2008 with five of her
children and was resettled in Canada.
Muhamed was receiving support at
Options Community Services, a nonprofit
and United Way partner that supports
refugee resettlement. During a visit to
the agency, Gallagher learned from
Muhamed that, due to a clerical error,
Kenya had refused to let Nasteha, her
then-infant daughter, leave the country with the
rest of the family. Muhamed was forced to make
the gut-wrenching decision to leave the baby in
the care of her sister, while she and the rest of
her family settled in Canada.
When Ruth Beardsley, then executive direc-
tor of Options Community Services, found out
about Muhamed’s story, she personally trav-
eled to Africa, went through all the paperwork,
got Nasteha and brought her back to Canada
to be reunited with her family.
“Here we were, listening to this unbeliev-
ably compelling story,” Gallagher explains. “And
while we’re chatting with other women and
their kids in this center, one of the women said
to the director, ‘I left one of my children back
as well.’ Then another mother said, ‘So did I.’
Muhamed thought her story was an isolated
case, but we found out that families were
being separated regularly through chaos,
violence and bureaucracy. Her story emerged
while I was there at the community center,
and this is just the kind of help we work
so hard to provide.”
Not only did Gallagher walk away
with a great story about real people
whose lives are being healed after
they endured devastating circum-
stances, but he was inspired by
seeing how the work done by him-
self and all United Way employees
and volunteers makes the world a
better place. He says that United
Way is helping families and individ-
uals in need all over the world.—WF
A helping hand to families in need
which charity their money
will support, giving them a
voice as well.
Volunteers play a critical
role in helping United Way
identify and solve community
problems. To get involved as
a volunteer, reach out to
your local United Way. You
can find it on unitedway.org,
or learn about local volun-
teering opportunities at
unitedway.org/get-involved/
volunteer.
Costco has supported
United Way since 1984,
contributing more than $300
million in that time through
the company’s charitable
contributions and its annual
campaigns in the U.S. and
abroad.—WF
Zeynab Muhamed with her
daughters Nasteha
(foreground) and Sa;ya.
HOW IT
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