Recently, a friend of mine asked me what a community builder needs to do in order to be effective. The short answer . . . respect. We must respect those we seek to serve.

Respecting others opens their hearts to what you have to offer.

Building a thriving community begins with respect

While consulting with a new group of community builders, one of their leaders was troubled. She wanted a detailed plan for how to achieve building a thriving community and she wanted it now and expected me to provide it. While a cookie-cutter approach could be employed, it would likely crumble when it came under pressure. The truth is, resilient communities are built with people, not for them.

My role was to guide them in building one as part of a holistic approach that begins with discovery. A plan would come only after we understood those we seek to serve. It would require a deeper dive into the population of existing community members to see what makes them feel like they belong.

“Belonging is about shared values and responsibility, and the desire to participate in making your community better. It’s about taking pride, showing up and offering your unique gifts to others. You can’t belong if you only take.”

~ Belong | Radha Agrawal

How long will it take to understand your people?

Years ago, I learned a valuable lesson about what it takes to become an effective community builder. It occurred while I was serving in the United States Peace Corps in Senegal West Africa.

As a volunteer, I received 3 months of in-country training (language and technical) before my 2-year commitment started. During my training period, I lived with a host family. After the first week, we had to practice full language immersion while at the training center. Our families did not speak English either. I did not speak a foreign language so this was a big challenge for me. I would learn more every day, but it didn’t go as fast as I needed. Many times, I felt my brain was going to explode.

After 3 months, I was sent to my assigned city. In my village, a number of languages were spoken. I would have to get by with the ones I was most acquainted with from my training (French, Wolof, and Mandinka). My quarterly reports had to be written in French. I was the only white person in my village and surrounding area. I lived 33 km away from the next volunteer. Most of the local people called me the name for foreigner wherever I went.

Like all those that lived there, my house was a hut and didn’t have running water or electricity. Each night I would hear termites eating my thatched roof and many times I could hear mice or rats eating my paperback books. To get water, I had to pay someone to fetch it for me or go carry it myself.

I experienced the people living the village life as the embodiment of an authentic community; they couldn’t survive well without sharing and caring for one another. For a long time, I didn’t feel part of it even though I lived there.

Early on, I met a young Mandinka man who worked with metal. His name was Moussa Denko. He was kind to me and during my two years, I would stop by and see him and admire what he could build in service to his family and community.

Coming from America and full of pride, I thought I had a lot of the answers that could help make things better. During my first year, I felt I was the expert, sent to help using my American education and years of working in business to help improve the conditions in my village and those in the surrounding area. Officially, I was assigned to the Department of the Interior for the Republic du Senegal as a small business enterprise agent.

I’ll be honest. It was hard. It was also exhilarating. Many groups and business owners wanted me to do something for them, but with my poor language skills and as a volunteer myself — I didn’t have much in the form of resources to work with. I also didn’t realize yet that I would need to change my attitude and perspective before I would be effective. Instead of thinking about what I wanted to do and accomplish, I would need to become the leader they needed if we were to do something together.

In my second year, I humbled myself and admitted I didn’t have the answers to make things better, but the people that lived there did. Plus, they were far more motivated to get to work than I ever would be as it was their home.

Respect for the people living there transformed me into a good partner. It opened my eyes to the truth. I realized that going into the Peace Corps was not about me, it never was, instead, it was about the Senegalese I was choosing to serve.

As my community partners came to learn more about me, they also realized I was living my values. They saw I cared for them enough to leave my family, and friends, and opportunities to be with them. I was sharing part of my life with them, listening, and understanding their perspective. When it came down to it, to be an effective community builder, we need to love those we are serving enough to lay down our own agenda.

Effective community builders need to love those they serve enough to lay down their own agenda.

Together, we tried a lot of different ideas (today I call those experiments) and some worked; others didn’t. But we learned together and enjoyed doing it.

Last thoughts

So when a new community builder is looking for a plan, I give them an assignment. Go live in the midst of the people you want to help. Find out what is truly important to them. Then, build a plan with them, not for them.

Book Referenced