Internal Publication

Orchestrating coordination among humanitarian organizations

Disasters mobilize hundreds of organizations, but coordination among them remains a challenge. This is why the United Nations has formed clusters to facilitate information and resource exchange among humanitarian organizations. Yet, coordination failures in prior disasters raise questions as to the effectiveness of the cluster approach in coordinating relief efforts. To better understand barriers to coordination, we developed a grounded theory and augmented the theory with an agent‐based simulation. Our theory discerns a cluster lead's roles of facilitating coordination, but also investing in its own ground operations. We find that specifically serving such a dual role impairs swift trust and consequent coordination among cluster members. The additional simulation findings generalize the detrimental effect of the cluster lead's dual role versus a pure facilitator role and specify it against various boundary conditions.

Uploaded by: Hassan Montazeri
Author: Ruesch, Lea | ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7344-2403
Co-author: Tarakci, Murat | ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1936-6267
Co-author: Van Quaquebeke, Niels | ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6141-4659
Co-author: Besiou, Maria | ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6401-2738
Institution: Kühne Logistics University | Centre: Sustainable Operations for Resource Management and Food Supply (SCO)
Type: Journal article | English | Peer Reviewed
Subjects: Logistics

Published in: Production and Operations Management, ISSN 1059-1478, EISSN 1937-5956 | Volume 31, Issue 5
Publisher of document: Malden: John Wiley & Sons (2009-2023) ; Newcastle upon Tyne: Sage Publications (2024-)
Date: May 2022 | Pages: pages 1977-1996
https://doi.org/10.1111/poms.13660
Copyright: © 2022 The Authors | License: Creative Commons CC BY-NC 4.0