The Leadership Conference

I've been missing in action for the last few weeks! I've been working with three others on EWB's first leadership conference in Malawi. I think working with others to help them develop themselves is where my passion lies, so it's been a fun and extremely rewarding (but exhausting) month or so.

We brought together 36 people from many of the organizations that we work with across Malawi and Zambia. We took them all to the stunningly beautiful Cape Maclear (on the shores of Lake Malawi), and we worked intensively for two and half days. We talked and learned about project management, computers skills, managing people, setting goals, dreaming big, and much, much more. We had a speaker from a Malawian capacity development organization, and another speaker who was the former Governor of the Reserve Bank of Malawi and who is currently Group Chief Executive for a group of companies that account for 47% of Malawi’s formal economic production.

People left inspired. I left inspired.

Traditional development tends to tell its recipients what needs to be done and how to do it (without pausing to consider what people actually need and want). As a result, donors can spend a great deal of money with very little impact. My hope is that by inspiring, networking, and building the confidence of an already remarkable group of Malawians and Zambians these leaders will get what they need to become the managers, thoughtful field staff, politicians, and business people that are needed to shape the futures of Malawi and Zambia.