I am currently the Director of the Netherlands Refugee Foundation (Stichting Vluchteling). Over the past twenty years, my career has taken me from mental health work in Indonesia to leadership positions in humanitarian organisations, such as MSF and INSO, operating across Asia and the Middle East. In the Netherlands, prior to my current role, I first worked as Operational Manager for MSF and Head of Programmes and Policy with the Netherlands Refugee Foundation.

A common thread throughout my career has been bringing people together around a shared purpose, translating strategy into action, and navigating complex humanitarian environments. Humanitarian action is often messy, but the shared commitment to supporting people in need is what continues to motivate me.

It is in conflict settings such as Afghanistan that the importance of both humanitarian action and bearing witness becomes most apparent. Responding to urgent needs while bearing witness to the circumstances that create them in the first place should be at the core of every humanitarian organisation.

In my current role, I am driven by the question: how do we ensure that humanitarian organisations remain relevant in a world that is changing faster than ever? At Stichting Vluchteling, I work with colleagues to strengthen our impact, adapt to new challenges and keep the needs and rights of refugees and displaced people at the centre of everything we do. For me, this is not only about delivering impact today, but also about helping shape the humanitarian organisations that will be needed tomorrow.

Alongside this, I serve on the Supervisory Board of MSF Belgium, where – next to overall accountability – questions on humanitarian identity, principles  and relevance remain a recurring source of reflection as well.

Buth, P., De Gryse, B., Healy, S., Hoedt, V., Newell, T., Pintaldi, G., del Valle, H., Sheather J.C., and Wong, S (2018), ‘He who helps the guilty, shares the crime’? INGOs, moral narcissism and complicity in wrongdoing’, Journal of Medical Ethics, Volume 44, Issue 5.

Carthaigh, N., De Gryse, B., Van Overloop. C., Fricke, R., Pineda, S., Decroo, T., Bseiso, J., Baker,C. and Philips, M. (2014). ‘Between Rhetoric and Reality – The On-going Struggle to Access Health Care in Afghanistan’, MSF.