Bridging The Divide: Strengthening Equity & Trust In The Humanitarian Sector
As the u.lab 2x 2021 journey completes, we had the opportunity to talk to Smruti Patel and Harmen van Dijk, who are part of the core 2x team “Bridging the Divide”, as well as Mihir Bhatt, an extended team member. With a total of 17 people, spread out over 7 countries, these team members all come from the humanitarian and aid sector. In the u.lab 2x journey, they focused specifically on the question of bridging the divide between international and local actors in this sector.
Vision
This u.lab 2x team is interested in both investigating, and bridging, divides in the humanitarian and aid sector. They want to create spaces for deeper dialogue, where equity and trust can be fostered between international and local actors in service of the communities in need during disasters and crises around the world.
Background
Smruti tells us about how she has been working around the question of bridging the divide between international and local organizations for some time now. At one point, Smruti remembers sitting there one afternoon thinking “this is not going anywhere.” In an attempt to overcome this sense of being stuck, Smruti decided to partake in u.lab 1x. After completing that process, and realizing “how many gems there were,” she decided to continue on to u.lab 2x in order to turn these gems into a prototype that would help herself and her team, both deal with and bridge the divide.
By inviting in others who work in similar fields, both on the local and international level, Smruti and her work-and life- partner Koenraad gave the impulse for this team to be formed. “We made ourselves vulnerable just by starting this process,” Smruti remembers. They had no idea where this journey would go, who would be present in it, and what the journey itself would even be! Nonetheless, though they didn’t quite know what was going to emerge from it, they decided to move forward and go through the u.lab journey with a sense of willingness and openness, which then allowed for a deeply impactful process to unfold.
Bridging the Divides…in the Team
Harmen remembers how upon forming the extended u.lab 2x team, some underlying assumptions were at work. The first was the assumption that everyone wanted to change the system, and would be open to such a process. The second assumption was that everyone was already on the same playing field.
A transformative insight was that, though the initial focus was on bridging the divide that we see out there, the most important moments were those where divides within the team were bridged.
Though the team members have all spent their lives working for equity, many players were coming from very different backgrounds, cultures, and worlds. Harmen remembers how some of the strongest moments were those where individuals came back from the break-out room and shared, with the larger group, that “wow, I didn’t know that people “on the other side” also care, and that there are “good guys” on the other side as well.” So, despite focusing on bridging the divide between international and local players ‘out there’, this same process actually took place within the group dialogues and processes themselves. “I love those moments,” Harmen says, “where people meet as people.”
Tools and Practices
This team had the ritual of playing soothing music, at the beginning of their meetings when people were still coming in. Harmen called this the creation of an “oasis of being”, or the opportunity to re-center as one enters the room.
The core team members often got the feedback from the extended team that this space, where one can escape from the fuss and drama that one might experience on a day-to-day, was extremely needed. Or that these spaces, where one can just be oneself and “take off the professional-hats”, are so necessary.
This team also consciously made space for personal check-ins at the openings of their meeting. These check-in spaces really fostered the feelings of safety, security, and trust within the group, and laid the foundation for the listening exercises that were so important for the growth and health of the team.
Another tool which benefited this team were the listening exercises where team members paired up and practiced deep listening with one another. Smruti felt how powerful openings emerged as a result of deep listening; a listening which goes beyond hearing and into the capacity to resonate and really sense into what the other is saying, based on the ‘open mind, open heart, open will’ theory. In one case, for example, two of the extended team members that professionally came from unequal organizations in terms of resources and power, succeeded in listening beyond the traditional ‘cultural and organizational noise’ and experienced that ‘I am merely another You’. This was not only a profound experience for the persons involved. The whole group connected to that deeper layer of recognition and oneness. After noticing the powerful effects of listening, this team tried to incorporate this into every session. This was also an opportunity for the team members to get to know each other.
At some point during the journey, the team members were invited to conduct virtual ‘dialogue walks’ together in pairs. In these dialogue walks the participants listened deeper to each other’s take on key challenges in the sector and past attempts to address these, as well as other approaches they would have taken in hindsight, had they had the courage. In this way some individual and collective blindspots as well as areas for personal and collective growth were identified.
Other tools that this team used included 3D Mapping and other means to visual where the team members were at.
Letting Go and Letting Come
A key learning for this 2x team was that of ‘letting go and letting come’. Smruti shares that, for her, this lesson of letting go of judgements, expectations and desired outcomes takes a “lifetime of practice.” For Harmen, too, this was a key learning. He remembers how he “noticed that, again, I was goal oriented…and I was actually missing the little gems. I did notice them but wasn’t paying sufficient attention to them.” Realizing this, and sharing this realization with the group, shifted how Harmen showed up in the remaining meetings. After this, his attention and presence in the meetings “came from a place of wonder, a place of joy, a place of even more curiosity.”
These “little gems,” Harmen reflects, “are in the little things…really, let go of the outcome.” These places, where a human can be a human beyond their purpose and their mission, are spaces where the really creative elements of our work can emerge.
Each Time, It’s a Unique Process
Looking back, Mihir noticed how there was not one, singular process taking place. He pinpoints two “meta-processes”, namely:
- The process of “bridging the divide”, i.e. the intention of the team.
- The process of working from home, i.e. the situation brought about by COVID-19.
Then, smaller processes would take place within the session or spanning over several sessions or taking place between sessions.
The take-away: there is no point in re-doing the process differently. Each moment and each process is made up of different layers, and is in this way unique. Each process is also made up of both intended and unintended elements that cannot be repeated in the same manner for a second time. “And that,” Mihir reflects, “was the beauty of the process.”
Opening and Closing Exercise with Objects
At the opening of the very first — and at the close of the last — session, each team member brought in an object to share with the rest. The effect of this exercise was very powerful, Smruti remembers. It allowed for each team member to describe themselves, via this object, to the space. Mihir brought a drawing to the closing session, which might serve as a visual metaphor for “Bridging the Divide.” In this drawing, you can see the profiles of the different team members both in unique distinction from one another as well as spilling over and mixing with one another.
Just like how “this process made us think about who we are, as well as how it made us merge with each other in terms of ideas, aspirations, frustrations, etc.,” Mihir tells us.
What’s Next?
One thing that has come out of this journey has been the sparking of new connections and networks within the team itself, which open up the possibility of exciting, new collaborations. On the other hand, the new methods and tools that this team has explored can now be introduced in their work with organizations, especially around the question of the quality of internal relationships within the organization.
Some Video Excerpts from the Team Interview
A very big thank you to Smruti, Harmen and Mihir for the interview & Rachel, Stefan, Randi and Priya for the interview, video & editing!
