Episode Details

When Rick Santos became CEO of Church World Service, it was a homecoming. 

He had spent his first 13 years in international development there, left for more than a decade, and returned to succeed the leader he had once worked for. That leader had led the organization for 27 years.

Some of the furniture was the same. So were some of the systems, and so was the CFO. The organization “had been functioning really well for about 20 years, but it hadn’t really changed much in those 20 years,” he says.

He faced the question every new CEO faces: “What do I keep? What do I change?”

He spent six months listening. Then he brought the staff and board a package of strategic priorities: one program team in place of two silos, a more nimble organization, a broader funding base, and transparent collaboration. 

Rick brought in outside consultants so his leaders would share an understanding of the problem, and he gave the leaders facing the biggest changes control over the pace. 

One answer never satisfies him when he asks why something is done a certain way: “'That’s how we’ve always done it.' For me, that’s never the right answer.”

He also talks about the merger he previously led at IMA World Health, why nonprofit mergers are more complicated than corporate ones, why a 1% overhead rate would worry him, and the underrated work of being the bridge between the board and the staff.

Rick Santos is President and CEO of Church World Service, which works in refugee resettlement, disaster relief, and long-term development in the US and overseas. Church World Service reported $279.9 million in revenue in fiscal year 2025.