Some moments don’t lead to answers. They leave a question that stays.

In this episode of Moments that Matter, Armen Grigoryan reflects on an experience that continues to shape how he thinks about disaster response, preparedness, and responsibility.

As a student volunteer during the 1988 earthquake in Armenia, Armen was confronted with two realities at the same time: the human impact of a large-scale disaster, and how unprepared local systems were to respond. What stayed with him was not only the scale of the tragedy, but the distance between the desire to help and the ability to do so effectively.

That experience did not immediately translate into clarity. It took time to understand what it meant and why it mattered. Gradually, it led to deeper questions about how societies prepare for disasters, how response systems are built, and what happens when crises collide with weak institutions, conflict, and changing climate conditions.

In this conversation, Armen reflects on how that early moment shaped the way he approaches disaster risk reduction today. He speaks openly about complexity, uncertainty, and the limits of existing systems. Rather than offering conclusions, he emphasises the importance of commitment, persistence, and taking preparedness seriously long before a crisis unfolds.

This episode is not about a career or a set of achievements. It is about how a single experience can quietly influence how someone understands risk, responsibility, and the long-term work of protecting development gains.

If you work in humanitarian action, development, peacebuilding, or in any field where crises expose what systems can and cannot do, this conversation offers space to pause, reflect, and reconsider what preparedness really demands.

What really makes the difference between a good idea and real impact in a crisis?

In the first episode of Moments that Matter, Jan Thomas Hiemstra reflects on a seemingly ordinary moment early in his career that, in hindsight, fundamentally changed how he understood leadership in fragile and conflict-affected contexts.

The moment itself was not dramatic. It was a meeting.

Working at UNDP’s Crisis Bureau, Jan Thomas began to notice a recurring pattern in crisis programming. Organisations were often very strong at defining what they wanted to achieve: employment programmes, recovery initiatives, large-scale interventions designed to stabilise communities and rebuild livelihoods. But when it came to the next question — how to actually make those ambitions work in practice — the answers were far less clear.

How do you employ large numbers of people in a place like Gaza?

How do you recruit, pay, and manage staff when access is limited and systems are under strain?

And what happens when the organisations meant to deliver are themselves affected by the crisis?

That gap between ambition and operational reality stayed with him.

In this conversation, Jan Thomas describes how that early realisation gradually shifted his focus away from programme design alone and towards the often overlooked work of making things function: operational capacity, systems, people, and speed. Over time, this led him to specialise in what he calls the “how” of crisis response.

With the arrival of new leadership in the Crisis Bureau, he was given the space to turn this insight into practice. He helped develop and deliver initiatives that strengthened country offices under pressure, supported surge capacity, and made it possible to recruit, procure, and act faster in emergencies. What began as a small observation became a defining niche in his career and contributed to broader organisational change within UNDP.

Jan Thomas reflects on how this focus shaped his professional path and why operational thinking became a comparative advantage in crisis contexts such as Afghanistan, Ukraine, and Gaza. He also shares a lesson for future leaders: the importance of developing a niche, however small, that aligns with who you are, what you are good at, and what the context truly requires.

This episode is not about achievements or mandates. It is a reflection on leadership that is practical rather than heroic, patient rather than performative, and grounded in the realities of working in environments where uncertainty is constant and the stakes are high.

If you work in humanitarian action, international development, peacebuilding, or any field where complexity is part of daily life, this conversation offers a thoughtful reminder that impact depends not only on knowing what to do, but on taking responsibility for how it gets done.