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Message Donor Engagement For over 30 years, the American Refugee Committee (ARC), an international non-governmental organization (NGO) based in Minneapolis, has provided humanitarian assistance and training to millions of refugees in Africa, Asia, and Europe. In 2009 alone, ARC provided life-saving services such as shelter, clean water and sanitation, health care, and gender-based violence prevention to 2.5 million people in Liberia, Pakistan, Sudan, Darfur, Thailand, Uganda, Rwanda, and Haiti. ARC is launching a new humanitarian aid program in Somalia in 2011. Plagued by civil war and insurgency since 1991, Somalia is often maligned in the mainstream media, which uses words like “terrorists,” “jihadists,” and “pirates” to describe Somalis both here and abroad. Several Minnesotan Somalis, in particular, had been the subject of much negative press in recent years and were under investigation by the FBI, causing the entire community to be on edge. Given these circumstances, ARC saw an opportunity to reframe the story. Minnesota is the home of the largest community of Somalis in the US. These people,  proud to be both Somali and American, were not a threat and would actually be a great asset in responding to the crisis in Somalia. But this would mean truly engaging them in the process and actually committing to a meaningful partnership. The organization engaged IDEO in a quick, four-week project to design human-centered engagement services that would appeal to both mainstream Minnesotans and the Minneapolis Somali community. Additionally, ARC’s CEO Daniel Wordsworth charged IDEO to create donor experiences that were “transformational, not just transactional”: experiences that would truly change the lives of both refugees and donors, not just raise money. ARC had already begun to meet with leaders from the Minneapolis Somali community about the program. The IDEO team augmented ARC’s outreach efforts with in-context interviews with a range of Minneapolis Somalis including Imams (Muslim religious leaders), mothers, elders, teenagers, business owners, and other community leaders. In order to fully immerse themselves in Somali-American culture, the team visited mosques, talked with shop-owners in a Somali mall, hung out with Somali teenagers at a local community center, and took part in an Iftar dinner (an evening meal marking the end of day-long fasting during the holy month of Ramadan). The team also met with a number of non-Somali Minnesotans to determine what would motivate them to become involved with ARC’s Somalia program. It soon became clear the Minneapolis Somali community was insular and isolated, and not just geographically (a majority live in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood). In addition to the challenges most new immigrant populations face—language barriers, poverty, violence—Somalis Americans’ religious and cultural beliefs were also foreign to mainstream Minnesotans: most are Muslim and adhere to a clan- and elder-based social structure. As one young Somali man put it: “We have three strikes against us: we’re black, we’re Somali, and we’re Muslim.” Years of civil war in their country had also left Somalis distrustful of charitable institutions such as ARC. Somalis prefer giving money directly to friends and family in Somali via remittances, instead of going through organizations or NGOs. For mainstream Minnesotans, years of negative media about Somalia made them wary donations would help fund terrorist activities. On a positive note, the team discovered that Somalis were proud of their entrepreneurial skills, their pursuit of higher education, and their identity as Americans and Minnesotans. They were also encouraged by ARC’s outreach efforts to their community—a sign of hope and partnership. To try to overcome the hurdles and build on the positives, IDEO created a portfolio of concepts designed to instill trust and bring the two neighboring communities, and the plight of refugees half a world away, a little closer. The entire portfolio, branded “Neighbors for Nations: Uniting Communities to Help Somalia,” includes a spectrum of donor experiences from light-touch to high-involvement. A lighthearted, awareness-building ad campaign concept called “Minnesotan? You Betcha!” features Somali-Americans enjoying everyday Minnesotan activities such as biking, ice fishing, or cheering on the Vikings, while a Somali Food Truck—owned and operated by Somalis—brings East African cuisine and culture to the masses. To encourage transparency and ongoing donor engagement with ARC, the concepts My Field Officer and Somali Young Scholars Program offer donors real-time reporting from ARC camps via social media outlets; the You Choose online voting platform seeks community input on projects ARC is pursuing internally and in-country; and the Creative Council, IDEO-like multidisciplinary teams of volunteers, brings local creatives together to bring to life discrete ARC projects. Addressing the need for alternative revenue streams to fund their Somalia program, the ARC Venture Fund concept provides Somali-American entrepreneurs with business mentors and start-up funds from ARC in exchange for an equity share in the new businesses. Likewise, the Change for a Dollar concept is a network of independent Minneapolis businesses that donate $1 to ARC every time a donor “checks in” to their business via the foursquare mobile gaming app. ARC is planning to start field operations in Somalia in early 2011, and is hoping to launch the new Neighbors for Nations website, and “Minnesotan? You Betcha!” ad campaign, later that summer. http://www.ideo.com/work/donor-engagement