What Should We Look for in the Next USAID Administrator?

With Raj Shah now departed as USAID Administrator, there has been much speculation on who might replace him. It is critical that the Obama administration nominate a new USAID Administrator quickly. But with two remaining years and much development work to do at the Agency, what characteristics should President Obama look for in his new Administrator?

• Knowledge of the Agency and its Missions. 2015 is a big year for USAID, and development writ large. The Agency will be moving to implement its vision to end extreme poverty while two major conferences on financing for development and the post-2015 agenda will set the global development agenda for the next 15 years. The Agency must have leadership in place, and that leadership should be ready to hit the ground running once nominated and confirmed.

  In addition to guiding USAID through the gauntlet of 2015 development conferences, a new Administrator will have much work to do inside the building. USAID Mission staff around the world have reported difficulty in translating multiple new, DC-generated objectives and priorities into action on the ground. It will fall to a new Administrator to better connect priorities out of DC with Missions’ programming on the ground.

• Ability to Prioritize. The incoming Administrator will no doubt have priorities of his or her own, whether in a particular sector or in how the Agency operates. Former Administrator Shah launched 12 new initiatives and reforms during his tenure, all of which have yet to be institutionalized through legislation.  The incoming Administrator will need to combine his or her priorities with the initiatives of the Shah tenure into a prioritized (read: short!) list.

  Two years is sufficient time to see some of the significant advancements over the past five years embedded into the Agency. It’s probably even enough time for a new push, should the incoming Administrator be particularly seized with an issue. But there’s not enough time to get it all done. The new Administrator should pick 2-3 initiatives and fully internalize them into the way the Agency does business. This will entail close engagement with Agency staff in DC and in Missions, changes to internal USAID guidelines, and unending trips to the Hill. The new Administrator need not be a caretaker, but he or she should recognize that there’s a lot to work with right now at the Agency. The real challenge will be deciding which to prioritize.




• Experience with the Hill If this were a wish list, I’d hope for the incoming Administrator to have preexisting relationships with key international affairs’ authorizers and appropriators. Absent that, the most important characteristic of an incoming Administrator is a deep recognition that Congressional members have a major say in how the Agency functions.

  Congress is currently considering legislation that covers Feed the Future, Power Africa, and the Global Development Lab, to name a few, but it has passed none of these bills. The next two years are vital for securing durable bipartisan endorsement of new USAID approaches and initiatives. The incoming Administrator should take advantage of current Congressional champions – and make new ones – to advance the Agency’s agenda.

A new Administrator with these characteristics would hit the ground running, building on and solidifying the prodigious work of the past five years. When CGD asked former Administrator Shah to offer a piece of advice to the next Administrator in a recent podcast, he advised that the incoming person should “listen to everybody with open ears, with a genuine desire to learn [so that] we can build the kind of big tent politics that can elevate USAID.” The Agency has made great strides over the past decade in its self-proclaimed journey to become the world’s premier development agency; a new Administrator should stand willing and ready to continue this march.