German Red Cross
At the beginning of 2003, Clemens Graf von Waldburg-Zeil took over the post of secretary-general of the German Red Cross (GRC). He assumed strategic responsibility over more than 5000 legally independent divisions of the GRC, which comprised over 400.000 volunteers, 150.000 employees and seven billion euros in annual turnover.
Prior to his tenure, the GRC faced financial and organisational challenges, owed largely to its federalist structure. Waldburg-Zeil was able to implement a set of process improvements and innovations. As a result, the capital reserves of the GRC Federal Associan could build up to 53 million euros, following years of losses prior to Waldburg-Zeil's tenure. His overall legacy to the GRC was one of transformation – towards a more uniform and integrated association capable of initiating far-reaching improvement processes.
Waldburg-Zeil's efforts culminated in a strategic initiative which he coined 2010plus. It was designed to solve further financial and operational challenges through newly created processes, while overcoming federal barriers. The 2010plus initiative was presented as a best practice template for large-scale change management projects in external non-profit organizations – such as the Protestant Church of Germany, and the Bertelmann foundation.
Under the leadership of Waldburg-Zeil, the GRC achieved an agreement on structured funding with the Ministry of Development, which reduced the GRC's dependency on obtaining funds in large scale emergency cases and helped establish long-term relationships with regions at risk.
After a reorganization of the GRC, Waldburg-Zeil was appointed chairman of the board in 2009.
In addition to achieving financial security, another major objective was to reestablish user rights to the names and symbols of the Red Cross. Under the initiative of the GRC, the Red Cross Act, which dates back to the Second World War, was completely modernized by the Ministry of Justice and approved by the Bundestag. All trademark rights to names and signs have been filed with the Trademark Court and all unlawful use of names and signs under trademark law have been prosecuted.
On top of this, he was instrumental in integrating the ambulance and disaster relief services, providing them with easier access to funding. In the course of modernizing the German civil service and disaster protection act, Waldburg-Zeil became involved with the Bundestag's forum for future public safety, which eventually became a standalone association.
