The Humanitarian Emergency Response Operations and Stabilisation (HEROS) programme provides capacity, advisory, and operational support to the UK’s global humanitarian emergency response and stabilisation efforts. The current iteration of the HEROS programme runs from November 2017 to October 2024, following a two-year extension. It is managed by the Humanitarian Response Group (HRG) and the Office for Conflict, Mediation and Stabilisation (OCSM) within the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), and primarily delivered by Palladium International’s Humanitarian Operations and Stabilisation Team (HSOT).
HEROS aims to support four outcomes: (1) providing effective and timely responses to at least six new crises each year, including one large-scale response and support to protracted crises; (2) increasing the FCDO’s ability to provide a bespoke, flexible response to rapid-onset disasters, and protracted and chronic crises; (3) building a robust humanitarian supply chain and operational capability that improves the FCDO’s ability to prepare for and respond to the full range of humanitarian crises; and (4) providing the OCSM with proportionate and scalable operational capacity to effectively contribute towards achieving National Security Council (NSC) objectives to address conflict and instability overseas.
The evaluation aimed to assess the institutional set-up and processes, as well as the respective roles and responsibilities of different stakeholders, in HEROS delivery, as well as the performance of HSOT as a supplier, working with Office for Conflict, Mediation and Stabilisation (OCSM)/Humanitarian Response Group (HRG) clients, on achieving outcome-level HEROS objectives. This section summarises the high-level findings against the four broad learning questions that comprised the primary objective of the independent evaluation.