The First Step to Making an Impact as a Humanitarian and Development Leader
Have you ever found yourself lost in the wilderness, not sure where to go or how to get there, surrounded by the unknown and potential danger?
Just like navigating unfamiliar territory, defining and achieving impactful goals in humanitarian and development work can feel like wandering without direction.
Without a clear vision, leaders risk inefficiency, aimlessness, and missed opportunities for positive change.
Discovering the roadmap to impactful leadership is crucial in today's complex world, where every decision can make a difference in the lives of many.
In this episode, you will learn:
- Insight into the importance of defining personal impact goals as leaders in humanitarian and development work.
- Strategies for identifying strengths, values, and areas of excitement to fuel impactful leadership.
- Techniques for setting clear and measurable goals to track progress and ensure meaningful outcomes.
Ready to chart your course towards impactful leadership?
Tune in now to learn how defining your vision can be the first step in navigating the wilderness of humanitarian and development work.
Full Episode Transcript:
The First Step to Making an Impact as a Humanitarian and Development Leader
[00:00:00] We often have an idea of the impact we want to create through a project or other organizational initiatives because they usually have some kind of monitoring and evaluation involved.
But we rarely think about the impact that we want to create as individual leaders. And this is so important I believe in order to make a bigger impact, you first need to know what is that impact you want to make?
Welcome to the Aid for Aid Workers Leadership Podcast. I'm Torrey Peace, a former aid worker now leadership coach, whose mission is to help you achieve the impact you're seeking while empowering your team and stepping away from the hustle so you can focus on the things you love the most. [00:01:00] Sound good? Let's get started.
Hello, my aid worker friend, I hope you're having a wonderful week. And I wonder too, if you have ever had the experience of not knowing where you're going. And I'm thinking specifically of not knowing where you're going when it comes to a journey like a in a car or traveling somewhere.
And one of the most frightening experiences I've had of this is when my husband and I were in Kenya and we were going camping for the first time. And We had no idea what to expect. When we camp and what I mean is, take a tent and go outside and spend the night in a [00:02:00] national park somewhere. When we do this in the US, we usually have a campground. So in other words, there's usually a bathroom that's nearby. There's usually a fence around the area where you're camping and they're usually some people very close by and there's very clearly defined, places where you camp. They're usually even numbered with signs and they might even have a picnic table.
So it's very clear where you're supposed to camp. But in Kenya, it was pretty much the opposite. So there were no fences. There were no signs. There was no camp here. There was no bathroom. Even a lot of times there were no markers or even indications at all of This is where you're [00:03:00] supposed to camp.
And so the first time we went, I remember we were looking around and I was so surprised that there was no fence between us and all the animals. And this particular park had a lot of rhinos and a lot of hippos because we were going to be camping next to the river. I knew that much. But we could not find the campsite. So we had to go back to the entrance of the park and ask for directions. And once they gave us a more specific idea, they give us a map and they give us very specific directions about passing a certain tree that looked a certain way and so on. We finally found this little patch of ground that had a very small circle of charcoal where someone had previously camped with a campfire and we set up for the night there.
And that night was definitely very harrowing. This particular park had more [00:04:00] predators per hectare than I think any other park in Kenya. And all night we were hearing hyenas and lions roaring and all kinds of things. So you can imagine we would be sleeping in our tent for just a little while and then we get up and we go to the car because we just, it was too much knowing that we also didn't have a fence around us and that we were not anywhere near any other campers.
So at any rate, this was one of the first introductions we had to camping in Kenya. And we also learned that when you camp in a park in Kenya, it's a good idea to say yes to having a ranger with you and some of those parks require it, but this particular one did not. So we always, after that made sure that we had a ranger at least for psychological safety and feeling a little bit better that they were supposedly up all night watching over the [00:05:00] tent.
All this to say that , in the very beginning, when we were setting out to look for this campsite, we really didn't have a clear idea of where we were going. We didn't have an idea because we had never been there before what to look for, or if there would be any signs or anything.
But when we got a clear idea from the Rangers of where to go and where specific area on the map, we were able to find this. And this is the way I think about when it comes to achieving goals, when it comes to making an impact in our work as humanitarian and development leaders, we talk a lot about making an impact, but what does that really mean?
And how do you make an impact? So the first step to making an impact is to define [00:06:00] it. In other words, to know where you're going. To have a vision, a very clear idea of where you want to go. Just like after we got those directions from the ranger and we got a map because we knew our destination, we were way more likely to find it.
And I think this is the same with making an impact. We need to know and define what is the impact that we want to make in order to know
that we are on track and that we are able to achieve it. So in this episode, I'm going to share some ways to determine the impact you as an individual want to create, not for your organization or for your team, but for you as a leader. We often have an idea of the impact we want to create through a project or through [00:07:00] other organizational initiatives because they usually have some kind of monitoring and evaluation involved.
But we rarely think about the impact that we want to create as individual leaders. And this is so important. I believe in order to make a bigger impact, you first need to know what is that impact you want to make. That's the first step. And so I have incorporated this into my coaching course, The Coach Approach Leadership Style, because in order to be productive, and in order to make an impact, we need to define what it is.
So the word impact, according to the Cambridge Dictionary, means to have a strong effect or influence on a person or situation. And in our case, in humanitarian and development world, we want to have a strong positive effect. [00:08:00] So you may even have several ideas or ways that you would like to make an impact.
For example, when I was a Country Manager, I remember I wanted to make an impact on my team by creating a place to work that people loved and where there was a low turnover and high performance. I also wanted to create an impact in a different way by making our organization perceived as innovative and performing high quality work so that we could easily attract donor funding.
And then I also wanted to make an impact on our implementing partners. Helping them become more independent so that they could find their own funding. So these are different ways, when I was a Country Manager, that I had envisioned making an impact. And because I was clear on that vision, I was able to work [00:09:00] towards those things.
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And like me, you might want to make an impact in several ways, but for the sake of today's episode, let's focus on the impact that you want to make as a [00:10:00] leader for your team.
So, once again, the first step in making an impact is defining the impact you want. And I'm going to share now a few questions that you can use to do this. So first think about your strengths and your values as a leader and what makes you excited when it comes to supervising your team? Does it excite you to help them come up with new ideas or innovations?
Or maybe it excites you to help them build trust and better relationships with each other or in the team, the broader team? Or maybe it excites you to help them grow and develop professionally? Or maybe it excites you to help them be more visible to senior leaders or donors? Or maybe there are several of these that excite you, but I want [00:11:00] you to choose one, the main one that you want to achieve by the end of your time leading your team.
And the reason I use the word excite, and we look at the emotion of excitement or brings you joy or happiness to think about is because when we tap into our positive emotion when we envision our team getting along better, having better trust or being more developed, having more opportunities, maybe even doing temporary duties abroad, whatever it is.
If that thing excites us to think about, then we're going to be motivated to work toward that. I'd like to think of our emotion of excitement or happiness or joy as also being a type of compass that allows us to know where we as a leader can make the [00:12:00] most impact by following those positive emotions.
So that's why it's so important when you think about what you want to achieve, the impact you want to create on your team, really thinking about what would excite you or make you feel like your time as a leader with your team has been worth it? And also looking at your strengths and your values as a leader as well, because usually when we're looking at what we do well, naturally, or our values as a leader, then we can also tap into things that motivate us, that fuel us, that encourage us to achieve more and make a greater impact.
And we want our fuel for doing these things to be these positive emotions. So [00:13:00] that's why it's so important to really tap into that feeling when you're thinking about what you want to achieve from this. And once you have an idea of your values as a leader and what excites you to think about achieving, then you can make it more clear and measurable.
So in order to have the vision, you know, we can have an idea of where we're going on the map, but the more clear you can be to pinpoint and know, yes, I've arrived at this particular latitude and longitude or this particular place, this particular campsite, then the more likely you will get there and that you will know when you are there.
So what might be two or three ways that you can know that you have achieved this impact? The more measurable, the better. It's the same with our monitoring and evaluation for [00:14:00] projects. We monitor and evaluate projects, we'd like to know how will we measure when we've reached this?
We want the same thing in this as well.
So I'll give you an example for the impact that I wanted to make on my team of it being a great place to work. And when I say my team, I don't mean the people I just supervised. As a Country Manager I also oversaw 50 people. So for the entire team, I had this vision of making my organization in the country where I was working the best place to work.
And how I knew that I was going to achieve that was through the engagement surveys that we did annually. So I had an idea of what score that I would like to achieve. As well as through the level of turnover, so having a very low turnover meant that [00:15:00] we were retaining staff, which meant that people liked working with us.
They liked working with our team. And at the end of my time with that team, I, I was able to lower turnover and increase engagement. And I think that part of the reason I was able to do that was because I had a very specific goal that I wanted to achieve and was able to communicate that goal, not only to myself, but also with my team. Because it was clear to me where we were going and where I wanted us to go
I was able to let everyone know, and we all were able to go together on this journey. And if I hadn't had that clear destination, I'm not sure that we would have ended up there. Maybe I would not have made or put in the same amount of effort toward it you know, consciously [00:16:00] as when I had this specific idea of the impact I wanted to create and how I knew I could measure that we had created it.
Once again, the first step to making an impact as a humanitarian and development leader is defining what that impact is. You need to know where you're going. You need to have a clear vision. Otherwise, you will just drive in circles like my husband and I did before we knew exactly where our campground was.
And believe me, when you're in Kenya, in the middle of a park with rhinos and hippos and lions and hyenas, you don't want to be just driving aimlessly. And I know as leaders, it's likely that you're not in as risky a situation as that. However, [00:17:00] if we don't take some time and really think about the impact we want to create and where we're going, then we're going to just be driving in circles in terms of what we're doing and our productivity and the use of our time.
And this brings me to what we are going to cover in our next episode, which is how to efficiently manage your time and tasks so that you make an impact. So today we talked about what's the first step to making an impact as a humanitarian development leader. And next week, we're going to talk about how to efficiently manage your time and tasks so that you make an impact.
All right. So now that you know what your impact is until next week, keep broadening it. Bye for now.
[00:18:00] Hey, if you are ready to step up your leadership game, I want to invite you to join my coaching course for aid worker leaders, where you're going to learn. How to master coaching skills in order to empower your team to become more proactive, confident, and motivated at what they do, which of course will help you achieve more impact for them.
And for you just head over to www. aidforaidworkers. com and click on the coaching course waiting list. So you'll be the first to know when doors open for the next enrollment. Can't wait to see you there.