“He literally told me once that he preferred not to see any “colour” in the office.”

(IRC Staff Experience)

I was hired for an Emergency Team Response with IRC in 2019. When I arrived at the mission, it became clear from day one that the director [REDACTED] then did not want me there. She did everything to discourage me to stay, not allowing me to talk to other colleagues, not sharing any info, excluding me from absolutely everything and being extremely hostile and intimidating in every chat we had. I reported her behaviour and was about to resign, but eventually they sent someone from HQ and [the director] was forced to leave a couple of weeks later. They replaced her with [REDACTED], who arrived and was very kind initially, a bit too much even to the point it became creepy, but after I put my boundaries he started to have a racist discriminatory behaviour. I should note I am caucasian woman, and I was a minority in the team. He literally told me once that he preferred not to see any “colour” in the office, and also started to exclude me first, shouting at me in an irrational way often, he became extremely hostile, and even more when I tried to report the unacceptable behaviour of a colleague, to the point I left when he was formally appointed as the country director. Although I reported his behaviour, the regional office did never really want to listen to me, as they needed more a country director than anything else after a long gap. He now moved on to a regional post with UNFPA in West-Africa, where he’ll probably just bully other people.