The UN needs a new mission: get stuff done

On 22 September, delegates at the United Nations General Assembly in New York City applauded after approving the Pact for the Future. Comprising 56 promises — on issues such as peace and security, sustainable development, climate change and human rights — the pact would more aptly be named the Laundry List for the Future. Rather than clapping at a plan, it would be better if the delegates had been able to celebrate results.
On display was what is wrong, in my view, with the UN: a failure to execute what is already agreed. In 2015, member countries signed up to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), comprising 231 unique indicators and 169 targets to be achieved by 2030. Only 17% of targets are on track.

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On the basis of my experience as a special adviser for six years to Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO), I think the UN’s plans need another acronym: GSD, for Get Stuff Done.
The UN suffers from planning disease. A successful body should have 10% planning and 90% execution. In the UN, it’s the other way around. Plans should evolve on the basis of the results. Achieving the SDGs demands action, not more planning. And that doesn’t happen by consensus declaration. Unless the UN refocuses on execution, it will lag on results. And only results — tangible and measurable improvements to peoples’ lives — will build trust in the UN system.
I worked with the WHO to help turn it into a results-based organization. We established a philosophy of measurable impact and allocated extra money to national offices. We combined 34 health-related SDG indicators to create three ‘triple billion’ targets, each directed at improving the health and well-being of more than one billion people by 2025. And we developed an approach for measuring and managing progress. However, these reforms have yet to be incorporated fully into the WHO’s budget and governance.
Indeed, governance by member states is the first and most essential element of GSD. It is the source of incentives and accountability in the UN system. Until member states demand a more results-based UN, it won’t happen.

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But imagine if meetings of each UN agency’s governing body were to start with an honest look at progress on the SDGs relevant to that organization. Agencies could identify countries that are doing well and those that are not, and how the latter could improve their performance. It could examine what the agency is doing to support nations, what it could do better and how well it is working with other organizations to support countries.
This does not happen in UN agency meetings today. There’s no culture of results. Why? Because talk is fun, results are hard and people hate accountability.
Data are the second crucial element. Only by honest stocktaking using data — and by developing ways to translate those into results — can the UN system improve how it helps countries to deliver on the SDGs.
Innovation is the third. The UN is uniquely positioned to help nations to scale innovations up from reaching millions of people to tens, or even hundreds, of millions of people.
What are the main objections to this approach? First, most people think of the UN as a political organization focused on peace and security — and it is. But it’s also about achieving economic and social results, as set out in the SDGs.
Second, many people like to focus on ‘easy wins’ in areas such as migration, artificial intelligence and financing, where it might be possible to achieve something even in the face of UN bureaucracy and terrible geopolitics. There is something to be said for this approach, but it will not get the SDGs back on track.
Third, results require country leadership. One example is David Sengeh, the chief minister of Sierra Leone. He holds a PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge and has worked to foster innovation, including on prosthetic limbs, his thesis topic. His mantra and social-media hashtag are #WeWillDeliver. More of this please!

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The UN can control what its agencies do. There are good practices to draw on. The Pact for the Future has an initiative called UN 2.0, which is about data and innovation, but it isn’t linked to governance.
One way the UN can start achieving results is by holding its agencies accountable. It could develop a scorecard that rates agencies on how well each supports countries on reaching SDGs. The WHO already has one: the global delivery dashboard, which could be adapted to the UN (see go.nature.com/4djs5ed).
This scorecard could be developed to assess how well agencies work together. The WHO and 12 health-related multilateral agencies piloted a survey in which public officials rated organizations on how well they worked together and how well they followed countries’ priorities (see go.nature.com/4ecmtaw).
The measure could be enhanced using the assessments of the Multilateral Organisation Performance Assessment Network, which already evaluates individual multilateral agencies. These should be expanded to compare agencies.
Then, the UN can use the scorecard to allocate resources among and within agencies based on performance. And to check on progress and barriers in meetings of agencies’ governing bodies.
That’s how to get stuff done.