I believe I am able to serve but I do not have faith I make a difference

My ambition is to combine 

my avocation and my vocation 

for a life of service, purpose and growth of self and others. 

Recently I was asked to address the following query: What role do you believe you can have in addressing this service issue given your personal mission statement? Belief is trust, faith, or confidence in someone or something whereas ambition is a strong desire to do or to achieve something. To some, the derivations of belief and ambition may be negligible but to me there is a vast chasm between the two. Belief means that I can/will make a difference and that I trust in myself to produce some movement within the context of an issue. This is not a truism. My truism is my personal mission statement: My ambition is to combine my avocation and my vocation  for a life of service, purpose and growth of self and others. 

  

The third year of the PhD program is the year of service. Some of the overarching questions we are exploring are: How are you going to create transformation with in self, community and organization? How are you going to be different? What are you going to do to be different? How do you want to get further involved in the issues? It is our task to develop a service project and essentially tackle all the aspects of said issue.

This type of project would fall under a blending of the aspects Human Resource and Symbolic of the Four Frame Model. There are aspects of each of these frames that operate within the context of a service project. From a human resource perspective: family, empowerment, caring, love and alignment of organizational and human needs. Within the frame of symbolic the following traits: culture, meaning, metaphor, stories, heroes, inspiration, creating faith, beauty and meaning as well as implementing significance. In order to serve an organization and/or a cause one needs to understand the subtleties/culture of the issues. If there is no research into the organization and/or issue the project may fail. Not for lack of trying to implement change but because change may not be warranted.

The focus of my service project is to develop an educational tool that fosters cultural understanding for international humanitarian workers. My ambition is to use my skills to foster understanding. I cannot make a difference until I understand the extent of the issue and learn if humanitarian workers understand the need for cultural competence. Leaning on the Servant Leader trait of foresight I have no idea if there is a need for this type of training, if the people who need the training are amenable to said training and/or if said training will accomplish the goal of cultural competence. 

Is it possible that I am able to further an academic understanding of the issue of cultural competence in humanitarian work; yes. Is it probable that my research will make a difference in the field of humanitarian work: no. The truism of service goes back to the idea of understanding the culture one is working in. If the cultural of international humanitarians is one that does wish to address this aspect of their work, then perhaps, it is my lack of cultural understanding of the field that may cause my efforts to faultier. 

I believe I am able to serve but I do not have faith I make a difference. 

Director of Humanitarian Relations, Open World Cause, Kenya 2017

Fulbright Study, Rwanda 2009