Social Impact

Creating An Ecosystem In Germany To Help Ukrainian War Refugees

Oliver Wyman helped develop a network of aid organizations to enable refugees to build new lives

When war broke out in Ukraine, many NGOs, government organizations and companies stepped forward to help refugees. To coordinate these resources in Germany, ProjectTogether, a social services umbrella group, started Alliance4Ukraine.

An Oliver Wyman team helped develop and structure the education and language aspect of the alliance’s work to build a network of interlocking services that address key needs of Ukrainian refugees in Germany and to develop long-standing solutions to the consequences of the war. The alliance also established a fund to pool financial resources to quickly and efficiently meet acute needs of highly stressed organizations.

The Alliance4Ukraine now consists of over 450 civil society organizations, foundations, governmental institutions and businesses.

I’m proud that Oliver Wyman contributed directly at the beginning of the Alliance4Ukraine endeavor to create a welcoming haven for refugees from Ukraine in Germany. We believe the areas of education and language are key to enable refugees to build new lives and careers for themselves, and to thus give all citizens of Ukraine hope, and a glimpse of a prosperous and peaceful future.
Thilo Grunwald, Principal, Oliver Wyman

Oliver Wyman helped set up Alliance4Ukraine by defining the workstream strategy and key focus topics for education and language services. The team screened existing government and nonprofit aid projects, managed stakeholders, and planned the roll-out of solutions including mapping user journeys of receiving help from the alliance.

Oliver Wyman also sponsored and supported aid organizations applying for Alliance4Ukraine funding, and the Oliver Wyman team worked closely with the ProjectTogether team and other partners handling workstreams for Alliance4Ukraine.

I am impressed by how quickly you have built up this alliance in recent weeks. More than 300 organizations are now working together. They coordinate aid offers, arrange accommodation, provide psychological first aid or translators for visits to doctors and authorities. All of this does not make the trauma of war and flight a thing of the past. But it does help those affected to arrive and find new hope.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, in a video message for the Alliance4Ukraine

During the two-month assignment, Alliance4Ukraine supporters laid the foundations to further develop the network. More than 35 new organizations, foundations and institutions joined the Allaince4Ukraine in the education and language area, and three content workshops for the education and language stakeholders were organized, leading to follow-up meetings with institutions. In addition, the alliance raised EUR800,000 for the Ukrainian Optima School to finish the academic year, and discussions took place to ensure long-term funding through the European Union.

The most amazing aspect of our engagement was to be able to witness first-hand the quick and selfless engagement of companies, institutions, non-profit organizations and even private people working together to build something never seen before for Ukrainian war refugees. It was a privilege to be able to support ProjectTogether in creating this long-lasting ecosystem.
Irene Kögel, Associate, Oliver Wyman