Conflict of Interest

Conflict of interest has long been treated as a necessary safeguard.

A line drawn to protect integrity, a boundary designed to prevent bias and a principle that underpins trust. But in today’s digital, AI driven world, is the concept is starting to show its limits? What once protected organisations could be holding them back.

The Problem with Protection

Conflict of interest assumes that separation creates safety. That distance preserves objectivity and that independence leads to better decisions. In theory, the logic works, but practice, is it creating unnecessary silos. For many commercial organisations that may be needed, but for NGO’s where funds are tight and there working towards a shared objective is it causing duplication?

When Caution Becomes Constraint

Most of the challenges NGOs face are not competitive, they are collective - climate change public health, social inequality and more

These are not problems that can be solved in isolation, and yet, organisations often operate as if they are - holding tightly to knowledge, avoiding collaboration to maintain perceived neutrality and treating proximity as risk rather than opportunity.

Not Everything Needs to Be Shared

This is not an argument for full transparency. Some things should remain protected - intellectual property, design patents and operational blueprints that create real competitive or functional advantage. These are legitimate assets. But should they be the exception — not the rule?

Because outside of these, much of what organisations guard is not truly proprietary -it’s habit, it’s caution and it’s culture.

The Opportunity in Openness

Sharing does not dilute impact, done well, it multiplies it. Shared learning accelerates progress. Shared insight reduces duplication and shared challenges can lead to better solutions.

In a sector built on purpose, the idea that knowledge should be hoarded is increasingly hard to justify; especially when the problems being addressed are bigger than any single organisation.

Rethinking Conflict of Interest

Perhaps the issue is not conflict of interest itself, rather how narrowly we define it.

Conflict of interest should still protect against:

• Undue influence

• Financial bias

• Decisions that compromise integrity

But it should not prevent:

• Collaboration

• Knowledge sharing

• Collective problem solving

There is a difference between compromised judgement and connected thinking.

From Conflict to Contribution

What if we reframed the concept entirely?

From conflict of interest, to contribution of interest.

A model where:

• Organisations are encouraged to share non-sensitive insight

• Collaboration is structured, not avoided

• Transparency strengthens trust, rather than threatens it

This is not about removing safeguards. It is about modernising them.

A Question for the Sector

The NGO sector exists to create change at scale, however, scale is difficult when effort is fragmented. So the question is no longer whether conflict of interest exists. It does. The question is whether we are applying it in a way that serves the mission — or protects the system.

Because in a world that requires collective progress, we may have more to gain from sharing than we do from staying apart.