On October 16, 2023, Dr. Rajiv Shah, president of The Rockefeller Foundation and former administrator of USAID, visited Georgetown University to discuss his new book “Big Bets: How Large-Scale Change Really Happens.” In a moderated conversation with Gayle Smith, CEO of the ONE Campaign who served as an administrator of USAID after Shah, the two discussed the importance of big ideas, Shah’s career steps, and USAID projects that both Shah and Smith worked on together. He discussed the process behind vaccinating nearly a billion children and the high-pressure U.S. government response to Ebola in West Africa in 2014. He recounted his steps taken after discovering Congress intended to greatly diminish USAID’s budget and how making the problem personal helped lead to a solution.

Speakers:

Dr. John J. DeGioia (C'79, G'95), President, Georgetown University
Dr. Rajiv Shah, President of The Rockefeller Foundation
Gayle Smith, CEO of the ONE Campaign