These podcasts let you eavesdrop in on informal conversations taking place on the phone or in the coffeeshop, In every chat, we are exploring the motivations and behaviours behind key decisions - with curious people who have trusted their instinct to make change in the world. In this podcast Richard Freeman has a conversation with Paul Hutchings about the middle-East refugee crisis in Europe and why he quit his job to try and rethink the way aid was distributed in the chaotic makeshift camps in France and Greece. Richard asks Paul about who these refugees are and what future they are seeking - and why a comfortable, but modest middle class market researcher with a family and mortgage, decided that he could bring dignity to some of the world’s most vulnerable people where others had failed. How does Paul handle the emotional toll? What does success look like in a situation so desperate? Does his work get hindered by an increasingly loud and hostile populist politics? Richard Freeman is Chief Executive of always possible. Paul Hutchings has had a 25 year career in market research and customer analytics, working with some of the largest IT, telecoms and marketing agencies in the world before setting up Kindle Research in 2005. In 2016, during the height of the Syrian civil war and the development of the so-called Jungle refugee camp in Calais and others in Greece, Italy and Turkey - Paul decided to help in the small way he could and pack a van full of coats and drop them off to those who needed them. Within 12 months, everything had changed - and Paul had established the charity Refugee Support Europe, raised quarter of a million pounds and mobilised over 400 volunteers. As a result of Paul and his team, these camps have been able to create community-led shops, kitchens, letter-writing schemes, children’s playgrounds and cafes - all rooted in the principle that people, always and in every circumstance, deserve dignity. --- Useful links: http://www.refugeesupport.eu/ --- If you enjoyed the conversation, please like, subscribe and review - and share with colleagues. always possible supports business, community, cultural and education leaders to make critical decisions, test ideas, create impact and to tell their story to new audiences. To join in, visit www.alwayspossible.co.uk
