And that's a wrap

This past week has really flown by and now I find myself in Rio de Janeiro for a few days with the IBM CSC assignment now over. Its been a month full of experiences that's for sure, and its hard to believe that its been that long since I was back in Ireland.

To quickly recap on the final week; we'd our final client presentation on Monday, then on Tuesday and Wednesday we focused on finishing up all our deliverables and handing them over to the client. We also spent considerable time just trying to advance them through the process we've developed and answering any remaining questions they had. Its tough working so closely with a group of people and then having to walk away, but we got some great feedback on all the work we had done together, and I know the team is well able to take what we've worked on and run with it from here. I look forward to keeping in contact with the people we've worked with and seeing how things work out for them.

On Wednesday afternoon we took the opportunity to travel out to one of the other team's clients (Casa do Jardim) for their community day. We'd gotten to meet the driving force behind this organization (Joanne) a number of times in our month in Belo Horizonte and it was great to get a chance to see what they do for the children and community of Jardim Canada. Humbling stuff and it was a really nice experience to finish up our last formal day of work with.

Thursday was a big day as it was our final overall presentation to all of the client groups and their invitees. It took place at a museum auditorium and was a very cool venue. It took about half the day and the team's and presenters all did such a great job, couldn't help but feel proud of everyone and what they had achieved with their projects in 4 short weeks. Its been a real pleasure working with everyone and we've developed great friendships as a group, its been one of the big pluses from this whole experience.

We also had a group night out to celebrate the finish of the assignment, and where was the venue .... an Irish bar! and there was a U2 cover band playing to boot! I personally think the group was worried about my repatriation experience and decided they use this as a way to try and ween me off Brazilian culture a little :o)

On Friday, our last day in BH, we held a kind of debriefing session with Bruno (IBM) and Juliana (CDS), mainly about how the whole month went and what worked well with the program and what could be improved. It was a really open session, and given how close the group has become there was plenty of honest comments about what they'd learned about themselves in this past month and also heartfelt comments from people how difficult it may be to say goodbye, return to their home countries and go back to their day jobs with IBM. Its all part of the process though, and at least with modern technology keeping in touch and maintaining the friendships and networks we've developed should be much easier.

On the CSC program itself:

The program is designed to be win-win for IBM and the client organizations that get involved. After passing through the process, for me its clear to see that the client organizations truly benefit from having external professionals come in and help accelerate change and implement improvements. Its a universal fact that NGO's are always so thinly stretched when it comes to money and resources and any change agent that can get enhance how they work as a unit is a big plus for them in the long run.

Certainly in the case of the organization our team worked with, it was never a fact that they didn't have the capability to do what they needed, but rather that they didn't have the breathing space to get their heads around how to tackle improving the present situation - all we did was shape peoples ideas and suggestions into a framework for a better way to work, and we threw in some tips and tools along the way which we all brought from our backgrounds and past experiences.

On IBM's side, the big pluses are probably in a couple of areas, but it certainly enhances IBM's reputation as a socially responsible organization, and indeed as a leader in this area - having an employer like that is a big factor for me personally. But principally I think it really improves their employees as professionals, and sends them back to their day jobs with such much broader skills and experience. The whole being thrown in the deep end as a consultant and finding out how to get out the other end of it all has been a lot of work but also a lot of fun to experience (in hindsight, I can't say that it was fun at the time!), and I know I've learned a huge amount from it.

Overall this whole 'corporate volunteering' idea really isn't that dissimilar in many ways to your regular types of volunteering - people can invest their time and themselves just as deeply in what they get involved in and that it can certainly change peoples perspectives on many things. Its not as surprising then that its had an affect on all of us and how we see the future and on what's important not just our careers, but also in life in general.

We've had the privilege of working with organizations with amazing passion for what they do and I think we all uncovered that finding passion, in whatever you do, is a key ingredient to enjoying life.


Hope everyone has enjoyed following my blog these past weeks, its been a new and interesting experience to be keeping tabs of how things have progressed from week to week! :o)

Go n-eiri an t-adh leat (good luck)

Paddy

#ibmcsc Brazil

Client Presentation

So on Monday this week we had our final client presentation with the staff of Maos de Minas and Centro Cape.

It was scheduled to begin at 9am (which we realistically knew wouldn't happen, as we're on Brazil time!), but there was a mix up with our collection that morning and we didn't arrive until just after 9.15am - not a ideal start! Then to cut a long story short, after a few postponements and a booking conflict with the projector we eventually got everyone in the same room at the same time by 2.30pm!

The audience was about 50/50 in terms of their command of English, so we had the slides in Portuguese and then one of the staff, Malu, kindly translated the spoken part of the presentation as we went along. Myself and Karin split the responsibilities of presenting and it went pretty well overall I think.

It was actually a little difficult to sum up 3 weeks work for a collection of people who've had varying degrees of involvement in all the work we've done together during that time, but ultimately it did prompt some lively discussion at the end of the whole thing and it was really positive to see the teams talking, interacting and trying to figure out how they can best proceed with the plan and tools we've developed together with them.

They've such a strong team of people in the organization, I know they can run with it from here onwards. Like every NGO, the challenge of doing more with already stretched resources is a tough one, but they see the value in our ideas, tools, processes and recommendations and know that if they invest the time in it, then their workload on their website development and maintenance processes (for all of their partner org's and project's websites) will reduce over time and allow them to do more in other important areas.

We're still wrapping up a few small things, handing over all our files and trying to invest our time in working as closely on next steps with some key people in the organisation, but today sadly is our final day with the client team :o(

Its been a really great working experience, and its such a pity we can't keep going with the project for longer - I think we'd be open to the idea of staying in Belo Horizonte for a few more weeks!

We've still one big overall presentation to give tomorrow (Thursday) for all the NGO's, their partners, IBMers etc so still a lot going on this week on the work front!

#ibmcsc Brazil

Random Things

Things I've learned:

- Working in a team can be tough work at times! Working on a project without a single leader was a very strange experience for all of us and was not always the easiest process to get through. Learning how different people think, act and articulate themselves is a vital part of working in a team, and in making the team productive as a unit! Every day had its ups and downs as a team, but we worked through it all, ultimately got consensus on things and all gained from the experience as individuals.

 - "If you say no, you must say why". A great quote from my teammate Carolyn - I'm stealing it!


- "A camel is a horse designed by committee ...." - firstly I'm not saying we delivered a camel!! But one key thing we learnt along the way was that you constantly need to remember to revisit your scope of work for the project, and you also need to keep asking the question - is this what the client wants, and will they understand and use it! It was a good lesson to learn and constantly keep in mind.

- Be aware of the stereotyping trap. At the end of the day every person is an individual and although there may be certain things that tick a box in stereotypical profile, you have to be opened minded and invest your time in getting to know and learn about another person from another country to truly figure them out. (Although I still love the fact that I'd pictured Andrea (our Italian colleague) as a driver of an Alfa Romeo, and it turns out he has a Guilietta! The man knows his cars! :o) )

- If your going to live / work / holiday in another country, then try and invest time in learning the language. You can get a lot more out of an experience in another country with even some basics in their language.

- "We're here for a good time not a long time" is a quote we use in Ireland all the time. When you get the chance to try new things, you should do them! Capoeira and Samba dancing were so much fun, I gotta try more things like them when I get the opportunity.


Things I regret:

- A minute on the lips, a lifetime on the hips! Eating everything around you is so easy to do in Brazil, if I hadn't been going running a few times a week god knows what size I'd be by now! There's more of me to love now though, which is a positive I suppose :o)

- Not getting to spend more time with people individually. We had a team of 15 so it was really tough to get around and get to talk to everyone as much as I'd like to have, but the good thing is that we've all gotten to know each other much better and have become great pals.


Things I'll miss:

- The people of Brazil, so fun, kind and warm, particularly the staff at our client organizations Maos de Minas and Centro Cape.

- The food, although I think I'll go vegetarian for a while when I get home, I've had my quota of meat for the entire year!

 - Running through the city in the morning with Nada, Carolyn (in the pic) and Maureen and Sunghwan also.

- My Brazil 13 teammates and our IBM and CDC colleagues - it was a genuine pleasure getting to know each and every person. So many fond memories of the month we've all spent working together.

Things I won't miss!:

- My LG 'Frustrator' phone! will be happy to give this back to CDC :o) Although I really appreciate the time Julianna spent programming in the team's phone numbers into each and every one - you deserve to be made a saint for getting through that process without smashing them off a wall!

..... and that's about all :o)

This IBM CSC assignment has been a great challenge and a great opportunity for me both professionally and personally - enjoyed every bit of it, even the toughest days!

Will post some more about our final week here later and on how we have been wrapping up our assignment in Belo Horizonte.

Later, Paddy

#ibmcsc Brazil

A week of cultural experiences

So the CSC assignment is not just all about work (as some people may have gathered from my facebook photos!) its also about learning about a new culture, gaining an understanding of how the country your in is growing and changing as it develops, and educating yourself as an individual about how different people think, work and live.

Given this was our third week out of the four we'll spend in Belo Horizonte, we decided to immerse ourselves in some experiences that Brazil is noted for. The final week here is going to be pretty hectic so it was really our last chance to do some group activities in the evenings after our day's work.

Tuesday: Capoeira

One of the other team's clients is a Capoeira instructor so they very kinda agreed to give us a 90 minute session in it. Its a sort of martial art / dance and its origins date back to the times of slavery here in Brazil. It was incredibly physical even though its non contact and takes great skill and strength to do the moves well. It was so much fun though, something I'd never even think of trying at home and really glad I got the opportunity to give it a go. We also got to give some of the traditional instruments a try which was pretty fun too.

Here's a video of how its meant to be done, which obviously bears very little similarity with what we managed to do! But we tried our best and really enjoyed it (and sure felt it the next day too!).

Wednesday: Watch a football match (unfortunately on tv rather than live in a stadium)

Its true what they say about football in Brazil, its like a religion, and boy do they take it seriously! We went to a local bar to watch one of the big local sides play - Athetico. Their mascot is the Rooster (Galo), and Ronaldinho is the main man for them. Whenever they score the whole city seems to erupt into cries of GAAALOOOOO! its something else to experience. Both men and women equally seem to take the support of their team so passionately and when a goal gets scored they sure let their emotions show!

I'd also gotten to watch the Classico (local derby) between Athlethico and Cruzeiro on the previous Sunday, which was frankly crazy! Three sendings off, a 15 minute stoppage for missiles being thrown on the pitch, 4 goals (2-2 final score) - the last of which was scored in the final minute. There were people up on chairs in the bar, shirts taken off and lots of shouting - was a lot of fun to witness.

Thursday: Samba

Like most Irish men, dancing is something you usually have to be seriously coerced or blackmailed into doing - but heh I'm in Brazil and if I was going to samba anywhere then it'd be here. We had a local instructor that we'd met come to the hotel for a 90 minute session.

The first thing we did was stretch - that had me worried for a start, how tough was this going to be! Then we went through various basic moves over and over again until we finally could put it into a short sequence/routine. It was such a good laugh, you couldn't help but enjoy it no matter how bad or good you were.

I discovered two main things (1) like Zoolander, I'm not an ambi-turner! my hips were designed to move in a clockwise direction only and (2) that I don't quite have 2 left feet as I originally thought, its more like 1.8 or maybe 1.7 perhaps :o)

Will throw a picture or two in here once I get hold of them.

It was really good to take the opportunities to do these activities in the evening, unfortunately it made the week just fly by! We did complete a number of things on the work front too this week and have our final client presentation scheduled for Monday morning 9am! We still have some work to get finished up after it, but I think we're in pretty good shape overall.

Will let you know how Monday goes for us - Paddy

#ibmcsc Brazil

Time is flying by!

We're almost in the middle of the 3rd week here in Brazil - time flies when you're having fun :o)

Really been enjoying the whole experience here in BH, both professionally and personally. The CSC program really is one of the best organized and executed programs I've been involved in, and the fact that its purpose is to serve organizations that need assistance is the really cool part for me. The amount I've learnt and the people I've met along the way have been some of the best parts - and the amount I'll take away from it is huge!

Last week finished up pretty good on the work front, a decent few things achieved within the week all in all. The most productive parts of the week for me were probably the two workshops which we set up with our client team. Its been a while since I've been involved in such a format but we said we might as well try the approach out and see how it goes - nothing ventured, nothing gained !

We did one on web design best practices and one on mapping the end to end development cycle - and they both went really well I think. Lots of discussion, debate and sticking stuff on our giant notice board ! Importantly a lot on consensus reached was between the participants on what was the right / ideal approach.

I'm constantly impressed by the capabilities of the organization we've been working with, and the fact of the matter is these guys have the knowledge and skill to do great things, all we're doing is helping out in forging all the ideas into a framework that hopefully will assist them in following through on them.

Like any NGO, resources are over burdened and trying their best, so somebody coming in for a short period to essentially lend an extra pair of hands can help push small but important things forward a little faster than would happen otherwise - I'm hoping that's what we are doing anyway !!

This week is all about completing our deliverables and making sure that what we produce is truly of use to the client. Assumptions are always dangerous, and coming to this assignment out of my regular job, which I know inside out, I constantly have to check myself and ask - are we going the right direction for the client ? The proof will be whether what we've produced and recommended sticks when we walk away in approx 10 day's time!!

Aside from work we'd a trip to some waterfalls at Serra de Cipo on the weekend and tonight we did a class in Capoeira - that was incredibly good fun! Here's a few pics from both for you to take a look at.

Take er handy, Paddy

#ibmcsc Brazil

 

Forming, Storming, Storming, Storming ... Norming, Performing!

Seems that blogging after I go for a morning run is a good strategy ... as my fingers and brain are about the only parts of my body that aren't exhausted !!

This week so far has been a case of ups and downs and ups. We started the week trying to map out our schedule for the remaining 3 weeks of the assignment so we'd have something to march to. It was a good exercise even tough it took a lot of time, discussion and debate, but we got there in the end and nobody fell out with each other :o)

One of the main things we noticed was that we had to build in a lot of buffer! The Brazilian pace of doing things is far more relaxed so things like meetings sliding a day or so is very common, it will be tough to try and stick to the plan, but as the saying goes - fail to plan, plan to fail!

Tuesday began with a television interview with the Redes Minas station. They wanted to show us working in our client location and to find out our impressions of Brazil and working with our client. It was a bit of fun as we had to luck all animated, so I said I'd borrow some habits of our good Italian colleague Andrea :o) It was shown the following day, and if we can get a clip I'll throw it up in my next post.

Overall though Tuesday was a tough day for everyone I think, we had to really get into the meat of what were our concrete deliverables that we needed to produce in the time available. We basically had a day of debating which was so tiring and mentally draining. To be honest it felt like we were never going to get out of the 'storming' phase of team development.

As luck would have it Bruno, our IBM CSC focal point was with us for some of the day and he helped us get to the conclusion that in fact despite all our different approaches, phrases and definitions of things we were largely talking about doing the same things! We weren't so sure, but we called it a day all hoping that we'd have a hallelujah moment the following day :o)

Wednesday arrived and funnily enough, after a nights sleep and some reflection we all agreed that we should sit down with a few of the local team members are just chat about some of their processes. As we walked through things we all gradually came to the same conclusion of what we really needed to do and produce. It was a really positive group moment, one we needed to be honest.

So now we're all rowing in the same direction and have a much better idea of how we all think and articulate our thoughts and opinions. Even though we hit some rough patches along the way we learned a lot from it and are the better for it. Looking forward to a productive remainder of the week !


Last weekend we did two day trips, one to Ouro Preto - a really cool town, and one to Jardim Canada to the home of Joanne, the head of Casa de Jardim, which is one of the other team's client. Both were really good days, so here's a few pictures.

Later, Paddy
#ibmcsc Brazil

1 Week In Already

Its hard to believe but we're already a week into the assignment! I almost can't believe it, and there's been so much packed into the past 7 days its been tough to even get time to blog about it all.

So anyway the early part of our week was a real voyage of discovery on the work front. We have gotten to meet so many really great people who work in the client organisation and their passion for what they do to support the local artisans is clear to see.

We're starting to better understand how the organisation is structured and also how we can play a role in helping them in some areas which is certainly helping me feel reassured that we can deliver something of value within the time we have available - time that seems to be flying by way too fast!

Wednesday turned out to be a state holiday and one of the client team members - Lucas - very kindly offered to take us to the central market and show us around. It was yet another example of the welcoming nature of the Brazilians and we really appreciated him giving up his day off to spend with us. Also two of his good friends came along too which was great. We got see lots of examples of artisan products that would be typical of the region and of our clients associates, some really interesting and creative work.

I also learned that in Brazil they do not call Brazil Nuts, Brazil Nuts ! the translation of the name means nuts from the region of Para, which is in the north of the country. A nice bit of trivia I thought :o)

We also got to attend a community street party and sampled the local sense of community and togetherness - the main purpose seemed to really be to unite the neighbourhood and create an excuse to get everyone in one place to meet and socialise, it was a really fun idea and I personally thought it was such a great way to get to know who lives around you - something I'd love to see happen more in Ireland.

I also heard a new Brazilian saying which is 'you never make friends drinking milk', which basically means that you really get to know someone and become their friend over an alcoholic drink - obviously as an Irishman I'm really struggling to grasp this concept .... lol

Thursday was very much a back to business day, which unfortunately started late due to our lift breaking down! but it was no major drama. We had a really good day as a team working through all our thoughts, ideas and approaches. We seem to be getting places and want to get to refining our scope of work by end of day today, so its our first major deadline that we'd like to meet. I'm really enjoying the process and experience I'm gaining from the whole thing and what I'm learning from the other team members.

And now today is Friday and I'm running late so I better go !!

Paddy

#ibmcsc Brazil