What’s behind DFC’s new strategy — will it help or hinder growth?

The U.S. development finance agency is restructuring its operations, a move experts say could boost its development impact and help meet the ambitious goals that spurred its creation. But some staff fear the rollout is sowing confusion and may actually put a damper on the agency’s growth.

The U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, which finances private sector development solutions, is growing fast and needs to better meet the needs of an expanding workforce as well as the broader development mission that lawmakers gave it when it was created three years ago, Andy Herscowitz, DFC’s chief development officer, and some development experts told Devex.

“For the long-term health of the organization, we need to move in this direction,” Herscowitz said. “Our mandate is to advance development and foreign policy. To do that, to tackle development issues or foreign policy issues at a sectoral level you need to focus on achieving the goals by sector.”