Monday, February 23, 2009

Relfection: The importance of adaptability

This is an essay that I wrote in a recent application. I thought it might shed some light into some of the things we had to go through and how we reacted. - Chris


This summer I had the privilege of being the team leader of the Messiah College Micoreconomic Development (MED) Group’s trip to Zambia. The trip taught me a lot about African culture and about the importance of being adaptable.

During the organizational phase of the trip, two objectives emerged. The first objective was to assist the art department with the development of a papermaking and tie-dying cooperative by providing business training and consulting services. The second objective was to do research and perform a feasibility study on the implementation of a microfinance program for the summer of 2009. This would involve visiting with a variety of Microfinance Institutions (MFI’s), it’s loan officers, and its clients.

Months of preparation and weekly team meetings allowed us to quickly the importance of cultural understanding. We consulted books, articles, and aid workers from the region.

Once we arrived in country, our new cultural understanding was immediately tested. The organization we had come to assist had failed to inform us that a week was to be allocated to business training in rural villages. We we’re completely unprepared and already had a full schedule.

Our group got together to see how we could still meet our original objectives and while fulfilling the promises that our partner organization had given to these farmers. The most effective way to do this would be to spend two three day stints in the village. The first would be spent meeting with the elders to get their approval and blessing, talking with the villagers, and eating nshima, a cooked porridge made from ground maize, with local farmers.

Before returning, we developed a three day curriculum based on what we had learned from the people. The curriculum covered some basic ideas that could help the farmers move beyond substance. This included better trading strategies, basic record keeping, marketing ideas, crop diversification, and the concept of profit. The whole time we were developing the curriculum we focused on supplementing it with examples from their local community.

While we were able to provide the farmers and merchants of Simiabou with some basic business principles, I firmly believe that we were the true students. In those few days I learned invaluable lessons about farming, community, leadership, and sacrifice that will stay with me for a lifetime.

Our time with these people was a huge blessing for both parties involved. I don’t think that it would have been possible if we hadn’t been aware of the culture and been willing to adapt and make ourselves uncomfortable.