30 Days in Bangkok
“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes your heart come alive, and go do it because what the world needs is people who have come alive”.
Purposeful mission. Servant Leadership. Adventure. IBM Corporate Service Corps (CSC) has provided me an opportunity to live out the deep seeded dreams of giving my heart to something for 30 days to impact our society and world.
Dear friends,
Exactly 1 month ago today, I completed the IBM’s CSC program in Bangkok, Thailand. I experienced a bit of “reentry shock” coming back to my normal life so I decided to try this whole blogging thing (yes, it was my intention to blog during my experiences abroad, but better late than never, right?).
What is Corporate Service Corps?
Each year, IBM selects employees to deploy on philanthropic mission to serve communities, solve problems and further develop as a global leader. Lucky for me, I was selected for Thailand — somewhere I’ve always dreamed of going! In short, I was part of a team that was sent to Bangkok to address critical challenges for Thai citizens through innovation and technology. No big deal, right? :) While a month is a rather short period, the impact of this month has opened up my eyes to so much from an international career perspective. CSC is hands down was the best global leadership training and development I have ever received. I’d even be bold enough to say that it was hands down the best experience of my career, and top 5 experiences of my life!
If you know me at all, you’ll soon find out that it has always been my dream to work internationally. Ever since studying abroad in France in college, I’ve always had a spirit of adventure and the thought of mixing culture, an incredible mission and travel all in one? Pinch me — is this real life? Pretty much sums up my CSC experience y’all.
The 3 top desires in a career? 1) Purposeful mission. 2) Servant Leadership. 3) Adventure. How on earth would it be possible to find all three? Through lots of hard work from many different levels, from an organization and individual perspective, the IBM CSC experience really does allow for a mix of these values to become a reality. While it’s no easy feat and it is no-kidding, jet-lagged-exhausted-laughing-because-I’m-so-tired-intense, the benefits and life experience you gain as part of CSC makes it all worth it.
Abandoning fear on the shores of adventure:
The open lyrics to this poem from Jonathan David Helser seem to capture the rush of excitement and thoughts I began this journey:
“Standing on the shore of decision. Looking into the face of adventure. Desire to abandon all I know. What pushes me is rooted somewhere between understanding and knowing. Knowing that what I want to understand is not within my reach. So I ponder my escape. Not knowing what lies ahead. Adventure and fury is full of excitement and bleeds with passion for life. But adventure in reality is full of breathless moments, silent nights, and wounds that leave scars and memory on our heart. Can I go the distance?”
Purposeful Mission:
I joined IBM 6 years ago because I wanted to part of something with a mission greater than myself. This company offers global opportunities to build a smarter planet. While at times it seems less than exciting when in the daily grind of our 9–5s, I know that I was blessed to have had the opportunity to be part of the philanthropic mission consulting through CSC. It forces us to break past our ceilings of “what is possible”, not only for the clients that we serve, but for our own careers as we have 30 days to explore new skills sets and challenge ourselves to reach greater capacities than we ever realized. Stepping into this experience forced me to put my doubts about myself and what I have to offer to rest. We were all selected for a reason (only 12–15% of all IBM applicants get accepted to CSC). I told myself to embrace the unknown and take this time to learn something new! This assignment not offered me opportunities to speak in public which is typically not my strength, but I found that I actually liked it and was good at it! This example, with countless other moments of “wow, i didn’t realize I could do that!” made the CSC experience really sweet and left me more encouraged about what I could do with my future career.
The beauty of connecting real need with a team of consultants who can focus primarily on helping meet that need is quite exhilarating. I had the pleasure of working with the National Innovation Agency (NIA), along with my amazing sub-team colleagues from Costa Rica, Kenya and Romania. NIA is a public service agency of Thailand under the Ministry of Science and Technology on the Thailand Innovative Districts’ initiative, focusing on creating and strengthening the next generation workforce for the economy. When first arriving on the scene, I heard the theme song to “mission-impossible” playing in my head, wondering how our greater IBM CSC team of 15 IBMers from 12 different countries, all from different lines of business, will solve the critical needs of Thailand. Not an easy feat, but together, we decided we could conquer anything. It was one of those moments, deciding reject fear #doitafraid — so I closed my eyes, walked to edge and jumped. I was ALL IN. Ready or not, Thailand here I come!
#CSCThailand3 # IBMCSC
Read the next post: Meeting the Community Challenges in Bangkok, Thailand
