The gang’s all here, and we’ve jumped right in!
Wow. Four full days into the assignment, and I’m realizing my ambition of blogging every 2–3 days was, well… ambitious. Both SAP and Pyxera Global prepared us for the intensity of the SAP Social Sabbatical, but until you’re in it, it’s just hard to appreciate.
Sunday was our orientation, and I couldn’t be more excited about the team that’s here in Kunming. While the diversity of the participants is carefully considered in the selection process, it is still impressive to see. We have 3 from the US, but one is Brazilian. One from Peru, who is Colombian. One from Bulgaria. Four from Germany, but one is Argentinian and one is Pakistani. One from Indonesia. One from India. One from South Korea. We are 6 women and 6 men, varying age ranges, and all from different parts of SAP.
After the orientation, we went out for a team dinner to experience the local Yunnan cuisine. The volume and variety of food was overwhelming, but I decided I was all in. I tried every dish on the table, including grubs, worms, and crickets, which were all pretty mild in flavor. The most intense was the “stinky tofu” — a fermented tofu that smells and tastes so incredibly pungent that even my strong stomach was questioning what just happened! For lack of a better example, it smelled like the dirtiest sock you could ever imagine, multiplied by 100, which you smell and then for some reason decide to put in your mouth anyway.
The project officially kicked off on Monday morning, with all 12 of us gathering together with our clients for a kickoff. We’re divided into four sub-teams of 3, with each sub-team working with a different organization here in Kunming. My team consists of JP (the Argentinian living in Germany) and Rosi (from Bulgaria), and we’ve been assigned to work with the College of Economics and Management (CEM) at Yunnan Agricultural University. Before being introduced via the SAP Social Sabbatical, JP, Rosi and I had never met each other before, and did not learn we would be on this specific assignment together until Week 3(of 6) of our pre-work leading up to our arrival in Kunming. I can honestly say that so far, we make a great team.
Some quick background: SAP’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) mission is to provide the world’s youth with the skills they need to tackle society’s problems and thrive in the digital economy. Through the SAP Social Sabbatical program, a pro bono corporate volunteering program, we aim to achieve triple impact: solving concrete strategic challenges for client organizations, developing leadership skills of participants, and advancing SAP as an employer of choice. JP, Rosi, and I are working with CEM to bridge the technology gap with the region’s agriculture-heavy industries.
Not gonna lie, we’ve already faced some pretty significant challenges in just the first few days. The language barrier is an obvious one, but I’m not sure any of us were prepared for just how challenging that would be. We’ve also discovered that the key stakeholders and faculty do not appear to be internally aligned on why we’re there. We’re communicating extremely well as a team through these issues, and I’m confident we’ll figure it out. In one of the first pre-work meetings, I remember the word “scrappy” being used to describe what we’d need to dig into in order to succeed here, and that has already rung true. We’re jumping into our inner scrappiness and adapting on the go.
In short, CEM has requested 2 things from us: 1) Evaluate their current eCommerce and IT curriculum and provide recommendations for improvement; and 2) Design a framework for career planning that incentivizes students to diversify their career choices. This week, we’re trying to figure out the why behind these two objectives. Why do they feel the current curriculum is not effective, and what is missing for students that’s keeping them from pursuing careers in their field of study? We’re conducting interviews and distributing surveys across faculty and students, among other things, to try to understand the why before we dive into the how.
On a more personal note, a challenge we’re dealing with is the restroom situation our building at CEM. I was prepared (well, as prepared as I could be) for the squat toilets and absence of toilet paper (not that it is not used here, just that you bring your own), but what I was not prepared for was a row of these squat toilets with NO DOORS. Let me just say, the Chinese have been using these toilets their whole lives, so it is easy for them to “get into position” and do their business. Imagine a giraffe in high heels and spandex trying to balance on its back two legs while simultaneously bending at the knees *almost* to the ground without holding on to anything for stability with its front two legs… and that’s what it feels like being 5'9 clumsy me in skinny jeans trying to navigate a public squat toilet while maintaining my dignity. I’m trying to jump into this experience, too, but… I’m struggling.
I’ll end this on a positive note, with a few more pictures and another declaration of how thankful I am to be part of this group and to be contributing to SAP’s CSR mission. It’s such an incredible opportunity, and I know that jumping into uncertainty along the way is part of the process. I’m thankful for JP and Rosi, and the rest of the team here for jumping with me!
