Development Work; A Wild Ride

I have been working with EWB Canada in Ghana, partnered with the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA) since August 2009.. A short while, compared to some, but when I look back on the past 20 months, it's been quite the ride.

People ask me what I do, and I still hesitate and take a deep breath before trying to explain. Being a "Development Worker" is not as easy to explain as a teacher, a lawyer, an engineer, a nurse. Maybe because we (are privileged to) have less first hand experience with "Development Workers" in Canada. It seems to be an elusive job to many, and when I look back its hard for me to concisely articulate what I've been doing onto a compelling CV… it seems like I've had 3 or 4 different jobs.

As I looked through random childhood pictures from my mom, I fell upon a picture of me on a rocking horse (don't I look happy?) and it struck me that much of what I'm doing in development can be compared riding a horse..

It can be a lot of fun. But it can also be pretty scary. Sometimes you fall down, and if you're like me; you cry. But hopefully you get back up again. I think about "successes and failures" in the past 20 months and can confidently say I've been on a rocky journey.

Sometimes I've felt in control of the horse I was riding; like I knew where I was going and how to get there. Working as Human Resources Director for EWB in Ghana has been like that, at times. I've gotten used to training new staff, to organizing retreats and team meetings and am feeling like I finally have the hang of it. This is fun. I can do this.

But other times, you're riding this horse and no matter what you do, nothing seems to be working. You're kicking the horse with your heel for it to stop, please let it stop; I've had enough, but you find you are still moving. You are pulling the reins back, the pace is too much to bear and you feel if you don't slow down you might have to jump off. A difficult part of my job is the goodbyes. In this work, there is incredibly high turnover, and yet a strong family culture. Staff can be here for just 3 months, a year, 2 years… at almost every point new staff are being integrated and old staff are departing.. In the past 20 mths I have said goodbye to over 30 (incredible) staff. This is hard.

Most of our staff, thankfully, leave Ghana but don't get off the development horse, per se; they continue this type of work somewhere else, still contributing to creating positive change. But many others in development can't take the turbulent path. They overdose on cynicism and pessimism. They can be frustrated for different reasons; the horse is just moving too slow, the pace of change is far too slow and too frustrating; does this horse even want to move? Are we standing still? If this horse doesn't want to move, I'll get off and ride a different one; one that is more willing and ready to move. Others ride so long, so far, continue to jump hurdle after hurdle after hurdle until they realize they are out of steam and can't take the pressure any longer. They give up riding the horse and move to something more stable, less demanding, more predictable.

Truly I look back and see that at times I really was running; working in MoFA's Agricultural Colleges has been a great source of motivation for me, and I feel great about how far we've come with promoting Entrepreneurship and equipping the youth for greater success post graduation- though I still smile more as I face forward, where we are going, than where we have come from.

Other times I look back and I was just trotting, maybe even trotting in circles, finding myself back where I started from. Working in a MoFA district office, trying to institutionalize the Agriculture As A Business Program was trying- and after so much effort, the field staff still ended up being pulled in far too many directions for the program to impact farmers in the way I hoped for; they were pulled by projects and in directions with more incentives than ours. The pace of change was frustrating. Maybe that’s why I was so happy to jump on the College horse, of course its to be expected that the younger, more motivated people will be easier to work with and create change through. And I get more energy trotting down the "invest in the youth" path.

In development, I've also seen that sometimes its hard to teach old dogs, or old horses, new tricks; maybe it’s a special gift that some people have, or particular types of tricks. Maybe we have to keep pressing on to work on some of those bigger, deeper challenges. Maybe we can't always hop off when things are difficult and every other avenue looks more expedient. Maybe we don't always see accurately all that is left in our wakes. Or we don't take the time to look back before planning the way forward.

My overall feeling is that I'm still happy to be riding the horse; I'm still looking forward, and though I can't see very far ahead, with what I can see I am excited, and with what we've already overcome, I am assured that every success and failure ahead is a necessary part of this journey.