Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
I had the misfortune of working for AFS-USA for a very short period of time and my opinion of that time is: You simply cannot run a business as if it’s a hippie commune in Haight Asbury during the “Summer of Love”.
A business needs constant waves of new ideas, goal settings, critical thinking and subtle and not-so-subtle changes to keep growing and expanding.
AFS-USA is run by people doing the same thing in the same way year after year. They are not bad people - just burnt out people. Some have been there over 25 years. Doing their jobs in the same style, at the same place, with the same folks. They not only have no interest or desire to change things, they are actively encouraged not too.
I could never understand the panic that would happen when they needed to make “goal” or the inability to comprehend when things went wrong. In an any major business , if a style becomes out of date , you change it, tweak it, fix it or remove it. You don’t just keep plugging away. At AFS-USA, they live for doing things exactly as they were taught some 35 years ago.
Hello? We have penicillin now. We have the Internet? HELLO?? This is not World War 1.
Also, while being a “non-profit”, I was shocked at the level of very “corporate” perks awarded certain individuals. This is a company that despises all things “Big Business” and applauds all things liberal and democratic. That’s great! Fly economy, then. Cut down on the amount of travel being done by staff to begin with. Is it really necessary to send a staff member to Paris to bring a “troubled teen” back to the States? That staff member gets free air-fare, a hotel and a decent semi-vacation…..for free..
From what the staff still there (they have laid off hundreds of people in a cost cutting scheme that again, sounds very “corporate” to me) says, it’s just a complete disaster and running on fumes.
Do yourself a favor. Send your kid around the world for his high school graduation present. Avoid this place.