We Have Passed One Test, The Second One Is Still Ahead

Responding to Shock

“Naomi Klein published The Shock Doctrine, a book about how modern capitalism exploits the condition in which countries and nations find themselves. We were in such a shock, but that shock was amplified exponentially”, says Tomasz Misiak, co-founder of Work Service. “It was a shock overshadowed by the unpleasant feeling that the world as we know it is falling apart. It is the 21st century, there is the EU, NATO, and yet just across our border a bloody war breaks out, tanks roll in, thousands of troops march in. This made us realise anew that these people are just like us and the same could happen to us. The shock caused a positive response, and selfless actions quickly became strongly integrated, because everyone felt the need to do something”.

The campaign was rolled out by business people, previously absorbed by transactions and contracts. They used their contacts, their ability to act quickly and decision-making skills. 250 people who joined a WhatsApp group collected and distributed tens of millions of euros in cash and services with the participation of such organisations as the Employers of Poland, Corporate Connections and later the Polish Business Roundtable and the Lewiatan Confederation.

“The command centre consisted of several people under my guidance, not management. There were no leaders from the very beginning and people rotated depending on their fatigue but above all on the matters to be dealt with. We quickly developed a system of delegating tasks just like in business management. Someone reports a problem, and it is my job to get to the person who knows what to do”, says Misiak. For instance, a rabbi from Warsaw calls. A bus will arrive at 23:25 with children and women from the Jewish community of Kharkiv, which was under artillery fire at the time. Elderly people had remained in Kharkiv in need of medicine and hygiene products. Those need to be shipped when the bus returns to Ukraine. We have until 6 a.m. “I remember that Rafał Sonik, among other people, was closely involved in this initiative. He made phone calls to wholesalers during the night. He got everything at prices below production costs. And there were other initiatives: food for children, beds...”

Tomasz Misiak shares further examples. For instance, thanks to the commitment of Artur Kozienko (Kazar’s boss), it was possible to set up a large reception centre in Przemyśl within a few days. It was located in a former Tesco and was supplied with medicines and hygiene products thanks to companies such as Adamed, Aflofarm and Polpharma.

“Today the group is no longer active, but at that time, everyone did their bit, when the central government and local governments were often helpless, and when there were no decisions yet on the allocation of funds, no regulations, no laws”, says Misiak. He insists that it was an extraordinary effort of Polish business and society. It won the time necessary to unroll systemic assistance. Today the situation is different. There is public funding, international support, EU aid. And there are regulations.

Misiak points out that while at the time it was selfless help, a human reflex, today business benefits from the support provided. “As an economy, we are not in recession in large part thanks to workers from Ukraine. The most valuable asset for a country is a human being, a young and healthy one, precisely such as Ukrainian women and other newcomers, including men, who can be a factor in economic growth. There will be a politically difficult period after the war. There is already a strong trend of reshoring, that is, relocating activities that were carried out in another country to the home country. For example, logistics operations are brought closer to where the markets are. Poland can benefit by becoming a location of significant investment. The lesson from the pandemic and now the war is: you need to maintain self-sufficiency in the region instead of worrying about supply chains”.

Tomasz Misiak says that the campaign launched a year ago represents a huge asset, a potential to be used in other cases as well. “We got to know ourselves from a different angle, which strengthens relationships. There is more mutual trust between us built on recognition”, he adds.

Krzysztof Inglot, an expert on the labour market and founder of Personnel Service, also says that the decision to help was immediate. “We started with 50 beds in our staff hotels. We worked with the Embassy of Ukraine, helping to find logistics centres. Today, thanks to the commitment of our clients but also of other employment agencies that joined the campaign, we have 50 centres. We sent our recruiter bus to the Polish-Ukrainian border, which was a kind of haven for refugees: they could charge their phones, have a rest, get a hot meal. We also provided the Workport app, which we have been developing for several years, free of charge for Ukrainians. After the war broke out, all they had to do was choose between the ‘I will help’ and ‘I need help’ options. This made it easy for those looking for support to find it, and for companies and individuals to post their ads,” says Inglot.

From the beginning, the idea was to provide long-term assistance. “We know recruitment best, which is why we continued with recruitment efforts. It was mainly women with children who came to Poland, and we focused on their needs. We worked with the City of Wrocław to place kids in crèches and kindergartens. Around 1,000 Ukrainian women took part in our forklift training, and more than 90 percent have been employed by our clients. As a result, they can earn more than entry-level positions in services or tourism. 1,815 employees are currently in training across our organisation to improve or upgrade their professional qualifications so that they can find good jobs. We recruited 1,200 people in Jeleśnia who were looking for work in Poland. Some of them were workers relocated from a client’s factories in Ukraine. We also issued a request to employers to make more positions available for women. As many as 80 percent of the clients reviewed their needs, leading to a change in the proportions of employment: while men predominated previously (around 55 percent), now 60 percent of those employed are women.”

According to Inglot, the willingness to help has not diminished. However, the image of the war has changed. Today it is primarily a military struggle and massive efforts go in that direction. “Consequently, the most appropriate kind of aid is weapons, which ordinary people cannot supply. It is in the hands of governments and states”, he says curtly.

Aleksandra Wierzba, CSR specialist at PepsiCo Consulting Poland, remembers the morning when she learned of the attack on Ukraine. “Before noon, groups of employees were mobilising on internal communication channels, looking for ways to help the Ukrainians, both individually and as an organisation. Above all, we were looking for ways to help our colleagues at PepsiCo Ukraine, with whom we worked on a daily basis”, she says. She emphasises that the company quickly set up a support system. At first, the idea was to take people over the border and find them accommodation, but the needs grew quickly. “The beginning of March was when we had just sold our main office in Warsaw. The building on Zamoyskiego Street was equipped with bathrooms with showers, kitchens and separate offices. After slight alterations, it was ideal to accommodate people for whom the company had not yet rented flats. At the time, demand for rentals in Warsaw was so high that it was impossible to find any, and in many cases mothers and children who knew one another wanted to live together. Thanks to the commitment of the management and the new property owner, we set up a ‘PepsiCo Hotel’ where the refugees could stay for a longer period of time”, says Wierzba.

Before the first families arrived, they divided up the work. There was a team setting up field beds and making the bedding, another team helping to install small household appliances, preparing a signage system in Ukrainian, sorting food, hygiene products and clothing. “Family guardians” helped with administrative matters all those who chose to stay in Poland as well as locals who hosted those in need at home.

This type of aid, ad hoc and volunteer-based, prevailed for the first three months of the war. Over time, it was phased out. Thanks to the company’s cooperation with the Polish Red Cross, it was possible to open integration and education points in Puławy, Ciechanów, Białousy and Nowa Sól. “The chaos of the first few days of the war made everyone feel they needed to help. There is no good word to describe the situation we are in now. It is not at all ‘stable’ or ‘normal’ as the war continues. However, large organisations have the know-how and resources to work faster and more efficiently. Runners say that you complete long distances with your head”, says Wierzba. Indeed, the efforts in the first few weeks were spectacular, but if the will and empathy are to last, stability and experience have to come in.

Who Is Poland For?

Inessa has lived in Poland for more than six years. She is from Odessa. She is completing a degree in Polish studies at the University of Warsaw. In Ukraine, she studied five languages. She did so well in Polish that she took part in the School Olympiad, which was her ticket to university. Her father worked in Sosnowiec, then in Wrocław. Today he is in Canada. Her mum is in Odessa, in their family home. If she does move, it will be to Kyiv or Lviv at the most. She has no intention of going any further. Recently, the air defence brought down 13 missiles, but some of them hit infrastructure so the power the authorities had promised for a few hours a day is not coming. “My mother heats the flat with gas, which is still available. She also cooks for herself and feeds the animals”, says Inessa. “The war has shown that you Poles have big hearts, but there are some people among you who are susceptible to disinformation. Even very intelligent people get influenced by the media, especially social media”, she says.

What unnerved her, and still does? The modern version of the slogan “Poland for Poles”, meaning: “If you’re in Poland, you have to fit in, and if it doesn’t suit you, goodbye”. This is compounded by the stereotype of war refugees, which nicely dressed young women with make-up do not fit. “I know some women who have been told more than once by ‘well-wishers’ to go back home”, says Inessa. But on the other end of the spectrum is a story from early March. She was in Nowy Dwór Mazowiecki, translating for a group from Ukraine while at the same time dealing with tons of aid, clothes, cosmetics. She came across a young woman from Kharkiv who clearly needed to unwind. The next day, she posted on her profile a story of how she was driving in expensive cars with Poles she had just met on Tinder. “This left me with a dilemma. I’m here and they’re fighting over there. My mother’s brother cured me of thinking about what was appropriate and what was not”, says Inessa. “Before he left, he convinced me not to waste a moment. He is ready to give his life so that I can sit in a café, go with my son for a walk in the park. He fights for normality for us.”

Inessa is certain that she will not go back to Ukraine. She has a husband in Poland, her child was born here two years ago. Although she could go to Canada, she does not want to. She is convinced that just as the Poles were able to make great efforts at the beginning of the war, they will find a common path with the Ukrainians in times of peace. “Maybe that’s because I grew up in Odessa, a city of many nationalities. Clearly, I still have a sense of being hosted. I see it most strongly at Christmas. I don’t have my family home here, my roots. I don’t have stories to tell about my grandmother who used to go to that one store before the war. I am just building a new family from scratch. But I also know that my son will no longer have such dilemmas. He is bilingual, bicultural. He is Polish”, insists Inessa. And what about herself? “This war has said something about everyone”, she replies diplomatically. Not long ago she was at a playground. She was explaining something to her son. Suddenly a teenage Ukrainian girl came up to her and told her off for speaking Russian to her child. “I hadn’t even thought about it before, I had always been a Russian speaker. I told her angrily not to judge me. But then I realised that this child had already lost a lot in her life. You’re right, I told her, Ukrainians should speak Ukrainian”.

Lessons in Tolerance Continue

Dr Agnieszka Bukowska, sociologist, educationalist and therapist, talks about impulses. “It was clear for the vast majority of the population that help was needed. We acted in emergency mode. The time to breathe in came later”, she explains. When the first shock was over, the machinery of the large aid and state institutions was finally working, the issuing of PESEL numbers began, some Ukrainian children went to school, then there was an opportunity to finally look around more calmly. And not everyone liked what they saw. We had one image of a war refugee in our minds. We had forgotten that bombs fall as much on huts as they do on palaces. The fear for life is always the same. No wonder that expensive cars with Ukrainian plates appeared on our streets and expensive boutiques were frequented by Ukrainian customers. Of course, it is a different question what you should or shouldn’t do abroad when a barbaric war is going on at home, says Dr Bukowska. However, she draws attention to two issues. First, those who need help outnumber those whose wealth makes people envious. Second, it is always good to ask yourself how our compatriots would behave in a similar situation and try to answer the question honestly.

Bukowska says that however much we may pretend otherwise, we are getting used to the war. “It has nothing to do with acceptance, but we are constantly exposed to images and messages, so we treat them as part of our reality. We are bombarded with bad news daily. Against this backdrop, another tragedy is unfortunately just part of everyday life. And we react by donning a thicker armour, creating a distance”, says Dr Bukowska. “We have an important test ahead of us: what to do next”, she adds.

She insists that it has been a long time since we last faced such a national challenge. “Nothing is certain. We thought there would never be war in Europe again. Public security programmes at universities were phased out. We were taught that if there was a war, it would be a cyber-attack, certainly not conventional weapons and tanks. Meanwhile, the Red Army has entered Ukraine and is doing what it did in 1939. I teach Risk in the Social Sciences at the university. I estimate all sorts of risks with students. There was a pandemic, there is war. What else can we expect? Anything. The predictable world is over.

A year ago we also talked to Dr Anna Gutowska from the Academic Support Centre of the University of Łódź and the Faculty of Education Sciences. At that time, her university’s dormitories became a shelter for refugees, and she was a member of the team that managed the operation, organising material aid, psychological assistance and support for volunteers. “That initiative, especially in the beginning, was based on emotions. Today, there is more reason and less emotion in aid initiatives”, she says. There is nothing unusual about that. She insists that the motivation to help is always based on something. We help out of love, out of gratitude, in anticipation and hope for something, out of fear. “Back then, the words once said by Lech Kaczyński resonated strongly: ‘Today it is Georgia, tomorrow Ukraine, the day after tomorrow the Baltic States, and then maybe it will be time for my country’”.

When helping the Ukrainians, we had certain ideas and expectations, which were then confronted with reality. Not everyone lived up to them. “It turned out that we were not identical. Hence, doubts or even animosities started to arise. But they are also natural”, says Dr Gutowska. She remembers how she was a social worker and learned that you have to help someone in such a way that they... can help themselves. You can’t stifle people’s responsibility for themselves. That is why people who lived on campus were given information on where schools were for children, where to apply for residence and for a job. However, they did everything themselves. With time, they were encouraged to look for accommodation and go independent. “This is the best way to help while nipping in the bud any comments that someone is getting something for nothing. There is in us Poles a certain propensity to generalise, make judgements. If a Ukrainian commits a crime under the influence of alcohol or is a perpetrator of domestic violence, this is enough for some people to extend their opinion to all refugees. We forget that these kinds of reports also concern our fellow countrymen”.

“What new challenges await us?” wonders Anna Gutowska. It seems the challenge is how to adapt to the new situation: living in a much more multicultural country than a year ago, with a Ukrainian minority especially visible in the largest cities. It will be easier for young people, who speak languages and know that the world is diverse and open. But what about seniors? They should remember the Poles who went to Germany in the 1980s. They were not fleeing the war, they wanted a different life, a better income. How were they treated? Well, Polish jokes still hurt. ©℗

The spontaneous efforts of Polish people bought the time necessary for systemic assistance to take place. Today the situation is different. There is public funding, international aid, there are regulations