Bridges and Communities

Earlier this week I took a solo day away.  I intended to walk from our house to Forest Park, a very large park in N/NW Portland with many hiking trails.  It's about 2.5 miles' walk just to get to the park, including crossing the St Johns Bridge (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Johns_Bridge), a tall suspension bridge over the Willamette River.

As I walked through the neighborhoods on my way to the bridge, it occurred to me that I didn't know the people who lived in most of the housing units.  Over the past year plus I've been heavily involved in doing community organizing work, yet I still don't know most of the people in my community.  This sparked several reflections:

• I noted the size of most of the homes I was passing. Recently it has been bothering me that we all live in such large houses, and I've been attributing quite a bit of it to our attachment to stuff.  We can't think of moving to someplace smaller because we can't bear the thought of parting with our big-screen TVs, couches, and other furniture and gadgets and toys.  (Been recognizing my own attachments in slowly moving toward 100 personal possessions.)  This time, though, something deeper occurred to me.  We hold on to our big houses and possessions because by them we believe we can be independent. We have everything we need unto ourselves.  I get to choose with whom I interact ... which means I choose what they see and know about me ... which means I can hide from real relationship and even from being forced to confront my own self and its issues
• How can we pretend to help a community if we don't really know that community, and know it honestly?  I think most programs and individuals fail in their endeavors because they don't truly know the community -- the people, the culture, the customs, needs, and wants -- in which they are operating.  This could be because they keep too much distance (bullet #1) or because they are too close and unable to see what the truth is.  In my local context, there are a lot of people who have been in the community so long that when they want to "make the community better" they usually mean take it back to the way it used to be.  We need to recognize the warts and challenge the community to be all it really can be.  And if the makeup of the community changes, then our definition of who we are needs to change rather than just trying to make the new pieces fit into "our" community
• This becomes exponentially more important -- and difficult -- when you're talking about bridging (yep, the bridge got in there) between cultures.  That's what I typically end up doing: serving as a bridge between generations, races, nationalities, income levels, genders.  But to speak with credibility and sense the connection that can be made between those distinct groups, do I spend enough time listening to each that I understand?  Or do I simply "do the work" that I or others want to accomplish?  Do I skimp on the listening and relationship to get 'er done, or do I recognize that the real "work" is the relationship? Does the world really need another policy, process, structure, or similar?  When will we realize that those things don't heal the world; they simply provide us with the illusion that we are "solving" things, which mainly just serves to insulate us from what is really happening.

Next blog post will cover what happened when I reached the bridge.  (teaser alert)

Leadership is love

I spent several hours yesterday and today in my 3rd grade son's class.  Yesterday I was volunteering, helping students with some grammar assignments and helping them finish a craft project (papier-mache masks).  Today was the end-of-the-year picnic so I came to play games and be an extra adult (mostly) helping the teacher.

I've been volunteering all year and have grown very fond of the kids; the reverse is also true.  Many of the kids call me Uncle David, or Dad.  I've shrugged off most of the banter but today realized there might be more underlying it than I thought.

I learned today that one kid's mom divorced her dad this year, and that another has one parent here and the other in a different country.  I learned that the grandmother of one lives in a garage -- finished and very nice, the kid hastened to add, but a garage nonetheless.  I know of several other family and housing issues as well.

It's certainly true that our public school teachers have great potential to make a lasting difference not just on an individual child but on a family and a community.  The corollary is also true: parents have a tremendous opportunity to make a difference in the lives of the kids at their local school.  I guarantee you that the love I have poured out on the kids in my son's class has made a difference, already, in their education and their quality of life.

It is here where I have such difficulty with homeschooling.  My wife and I are fully committed to having our children in public school, and to walking with our children through that sometimes unpleasant journey.  We know they may not get the best academic situations ... but that's not our number one priority.  We are determined to live in our community, to partake of the life of the people who surround us.

Our senior pastor last week spoke about how holiness is not a boundary, a barrier that keeps things out, but how it comes from the center, as a means of influence.  This is our philosophy, too: we believe in the power of God and in our ability as his children to influence those around us.  We believe our children can do that as well, and that our children seeing us involved in their lives and those of their classmates will make a lasting impression on them and inspire them to make a difference also.

It may not happen ... but it strikes me that leadership is really all about love.  I'm grateful that a group of 9-year-olds can teach me great leadership lessons even as I try to teach them some.

Hope and Expectations

I've been combing through my old papers and files recently and coming across some real gems.  There's a lot of dross in there, too, of course, but it's amazing the things we learn that we forget we learned.

Just now I read this:

"Jesus dared to raise people's expectations, to give them hope.  And when he didn't fulfill it, in the way they expected, they were not willing to wait, to give him the benefit of the doubt, even for those two days [between Good Friday and Easter].  That is why they had shouted for him to be crucified.

"Our problem is that we don't want to disappoint people, so we don't raise expectations.  We don't give hope for fear of failing them."

That really is pretty profound, isn't it?  We all recognize that we fail at times, that none of us can perfectly fulfill anyone else's expectations.  So we're left with a choice.

We can, on the one hand, live our lives lowering people's expectations (think Calvin of Calvin & Hobbes here) so we don't disappoint them.  That absolves us, so we think, of being the cause of anyone's depression or spite or envy.  The problem with this approach, of course, is there is no least common denominator of expectations.  You'll have to keep going lower and lower in this cycle, until at some point you become who you have tried to project yourself to be: not worth expecting from.

On the other hand, we can live our lives the way we know we should and take the risk of disappointing people.  And we will.  But this provides me opportunities, certainly, to engage people in relationship and dialogue about their expectations, and mine, and how those interrelate.

Will there be hurt with this latter approach?  You bet.  But can I really afford to live my life doing all I can simply to avoid hurt?  And if I do, will I ever accomplish anything worth doing?

Leadership and Garage Sales

Today has been our family's sale (with contributions from a few others).  We weren't very prepared for it: we didn't do the go-through-each-room-in-the-house and get-rid-of-everything-we-can routine.  Maybe we'll do that next year.

But yesterday my wife and I went through a lot of stuff, and last night I set up, indoor at our church.  We were going to do the parking lot and have multiple families participate, but the weather forecast was chancy and we haven't been organized enough lately to really pull the latter together.  (I need not point out that after about 11.30 a.m. it's been a beautiful, sunny day, but there is no way I'm moving everything outside.)

Sales like this are interesting.  You see a whole different side of people.  I often say that I love helping people move, because when you start helping them pack or move or unpack you get to know what they are really like: you see that they have kept their elementary school claywork (which usually can't truthfully be called pottery) or their mug collection from all 50 states or their book and CD collection.

Hosting a sale gives you similar insights.  You can watch people's eyes as they scan the mounds of items, looking for just that one item that will jump out at them.  For one woman it's a book with buggy frog eyes, for one man it's playing with the toy lawnmower and smiling at the thought of playing with it with his son, for a kid it's grabbing a toy -- any toy -- and loudly proclaiming that she wants it.

I had two favorite customers today, so I'll share briefly about them.

The first was a former coworker of mine.  She, her husband, and their two kids drove about 30ish minutes to come visit, with the sale as the excuse.  And they found a lot of things they liked, I'm glad to report.  But Dannie used something going on in my life as a connection point, a chance to share an experience with me.  And next time I go to her house, you better believe I'll be looking to spot the things she and Bryan bought today.  :)

The second was a woman who came in with her three daughters, ages 8-14 maybe.  They looked around for a bit and didn't seem interested, but then she spotted some picture frames and started sorting through them.  Meanwhile her girls had opened one of the games (Whoonu) and were looking it over.  "What are you looking at?" she said, somewhat sharply.  Then her tone changed. "Oh, look, it's Chutes and Ladders! I used to play that all the time."  After she was done shopping, I said, "How would you like to have Chutes and Ladders for free, too?"  She and her girls were very excited, and she said thanks several times.

Both these stories illustrate what I think is one of the things that separates good leaders from not-so-good is this individuation: the ability to see each person as a person, and to understand, respect and honor them as an individual.  It's too easy -- and never works -- to see any group (employees, team members, family, etc) as monolithic, as the same.  Treating people equally does not mean treating people the same: I must adjust the words I use and the feeling I put into those words, the actions I take, to best show I'm on their side, that I am with them.

Go with the flow

I've just taken a few minutes to read through some blogs that I've fallen behind on reading.  Which prompts me to wonder how I can "fall behind" on reading blogs ... never mind.

Of course, that tells you something about me.  I am a very list-oriented person.  If something doesn't make it on my list, it's very likely to not get done (though of course many things on my list don't get done either; that's a different post).

So yesterday was my wife's birthday.  She's very spontaneous.  For those into Myers-Briggs, I'm an INTJ and she's an ENFP -- the J(udging) referring to my love of structure (and I'm a very strong J) and her P(erceiving) referring to her love of spontaneity.

So for her birthday I gave her a P gift: I just went along for the ride all day.  Literally.  We rode Portland's light-rail train from about 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.  We went from our home to the central transit station, then transferred to a line that took us to the airport; back on, we went as far east as we could go.  Then we got back on and went as far west as we could go.

We got off once to walk through IKEA, getting ideas for the international microenterprise ministry we co-direct, again for lunch at a nice little Thai place (Thai is her favorite ethnic cuisine) on the east end of town, and again at the far western end for a short walk (where we popped into a Mexican grocery and she bought a coffee and a wonderful taco).  Then it was back to central station and to pick up our kids.

We both have so many things going on, and I'd been thinking about "what to do" for her birthday ... but it turns out the best thing to do for both of us was just to be spontaneous, to go with the flow.

Maybe we don't need our whole life to be structured, after all.  Maybe sometimes leadership is not all about planning but is also sometimes about simply being with others.

Doctor who?

To finish the background sketching here so we can move on to the things that strike and profoundly affect me, today's subject is the PhD in Organizational Leadership.

I have completed my three years of coursework at Eastern University, have passed comprehensive exams, and am now officially A Candidate For The PhD.  Somehow that sounds better when I put every word in caps.

As an INTJ personality, writing a dissertation is especially challenging.  Why? Well ...

• the I means I don't share what I'm thinking with other people often enough to get constructive feedback before I get too far down a road
• the N means everything is interesting and I have trouble sticking to one topic/concept long enough to research and write 200 pages on it
• the T means I live in my brain, which would seem perfect for a scholarly pursuit such as the PhD ... but I'm in a program dedicated to the practitioner-scholar, so I have to live it and not just think it
• the J means I crave and thrive in structure.  And as anyone who has pursued the PhD can tell you, once your coursework is done, you have no structure other than what you impose yourself.  (See: N for my difficulties with self-imposed structure.)

My topic started as a brand new theory of leadership: the interaction between leader, follower, and organization as a Venn diagram, recognizing that even a subtle and slight change in one results in significant changes to the way the three interact.  And that means that any theory that only discusses the interaction of two of those three components is missing the boat; and it also means that the Bolman-Deal human resources frame is probably the most important of all (hard for an INTJ to say) is because an organization is mostly the sum of the relationships involved.

What did my advisor say when I shared this with him?  Two comments.  "That's a brand-new theory, and very interesting."  "Don't do that for your dissertation; the best dissertation is a done dissertation.  Do one small piece of that theory and save the rest for the book."

Good advice, I think.

So I've settled in on trying to help small community nonprofits (SCNPs) be more effective organizations, specifically in the areas of recruitment, selection, and socialization of employees.  In essence, when the local homeless shelter needs an employee, what are some tools and practices they can employ to make sure they locate, hire, and orient that employee so that both individual and organization are most effective?

In ways only God could figure out, somehow this has dovetailed with AllOne and our service survey (see http://leadingandfollowing.blogspot.com/2011/01/what-is-this-all-about.html) as well as SEED and our need to build an organization (see http://leadingandfollowing.blogspot.com/2011/02/our-next-adventure.html).

So beginning tomorrow, the dialogue begins: I'll be posting reflections, thoughts, and questions for our exchange.  I look forward to your input.