highs and lows

There are many highs and lows in this job. You never really know what’s going to be coming at you around the corner. That makes for a life that is truly exhilarating, but also one that can be a bit uncertain or stressful at best…and edge-of-your-seat scary at worst. For me, I love this life I have chosen. Seeing lasting change and hope in the eyes of our friends here motivates me to get out of bed every morning and drives me through those really, really rough days…the days when you wish you just would have rolled over and went back to sleep. I had a few of those days last week.

Nuru’s agriculture program is the foundation of Nuru’s model. The main reason for this is that we seek to work in remote rural areas where 70% of the population are smallholder farmers. Revenues generated by the agriculture program position the program as the main economic engine (in combination with the community economic development program) of a Nuru project. The agriculture revenues not only pay for the expenses of the ag program itself, but they are also used to cross-subsidize programs in health, water, and education. Because of this, Nuru’s ag program is the anchor of the whole model.

Nuru’s ag program makes money two ways:
1. Interest from the input (fertilizer and seed) loans we issue to our farmers that increase crop yields and incomes for farmers on average by 300% when combined with Nuru agriculture extension training, and
2. Revenues from our agribusiness side of the program. Nuru acts as a commodities aggregator by purchasing maize from our farmers at a fair price and then selling it to larger external markets. The profits made in this business are then driven back into the program to make it financially self-sustaining.
So as you can see, the maize we buy is a big piece of our revenues equation. We built a granary to store all this maize as we purchase it from our farmers. Some of that maize we sell immediately back into the market, but some we save and speculate with – waiting for prices to go up throughout the season as maize stores in large urban markets begin to be depleted – essentially like a very rudimentary stock market. Sounds like a pretty solid plan, right? Well, in theory it is, and I believe once we get the kinks out, this program will, indeed, generate a significant revenue stream that will enable the project t be self-sustaining. This year, however, external market conditions, the forces of nature, and the conditions in the global economy got in the way. Famine in Kenya last season caused the Kenyan government to import maize from Uganda this season at 15 Shillings/kg…at least 25% lower than the market price in Kenya. Instead of prices naturally increasing as demand increased over the season, prices plummeted as the Ugandan maize and a bumper harvest flooded the market. But that’s not the worst of it for us and our maize.


“They found aflatoxin in a few of the government cereals last week in Central and Eastern,” my colleague said. I had a friend who was visiting our granary to try and help us improve the efficiency of our granary and buying processes in order to increase profits this season. She had over 20 years experience in the Kenyan maize markets. I had been trying to get her to come out for some time now to give us some sound operational advice, but now her words caused my heart to sink. “Are they sure its aflatoxin?” I asked. “100%,” she said. “The government has begun freezing all sales to large millers and exporters to try and contain the crisis.” Aflatoxin is nasty stuff. It is a toxin produced by a naturally occurring fungus that can be found in soil and moist or decaying vegetation. Aflatoxin is one of the most carcinogenic substances out there. In small amounts, it is harmless. But it can grow and spread throughout a stored supply of grain where conditions are ripe for its growth. It can become a problem in maize storage if maize is not dried properly prior to storage. The last outbreak in Kenya killed 125 people before it was contained. This time, the deaths have been fewer as the government has tried to act quickly.

“What will this do to maize prices?” I asked. She shrugged. “Not sure. It may actually increase the value of your maize if you can prove your maize is free of aflatoxin.” I became a bit lost in thought as my friend continued her inspection of the granary. I was trying not to think too much about the possibility of losing the revenues from the 200tons of maize that sat there in front of me if our maize was found to be contaminated. 200tons of maize that our farmers sacrificed so much to produce…200tons of blood, sweat, tears, and new hope invested. And then I got some more great news. “Umm…I think you have a problem,” my friend said from across the granary. “You should come over here.” “This is going to be a long day,” I thought. I walked over to where she was. “Listen,” she said. As I listened, I began to hear a faint snap, crackle and pop noise – like when you pour milk over Rice Crispies. “Weevils,” I said in disgust. “Can this day get any worse?” I lamented. “I don’t understand. We used actellic (dust to kill weevils) in every bag. What could have happened?” “Honestly, I don’t know. Unexplainable things like this just happen sometimes. It’s a tough business,” she said. I looked at the mountains of maize in growing dismay as the crackling sound grew to become a roar in my head, and I thought about those little bugs eating away all that hard work. “I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it looks like your maize is infested with them. If you don’t do something soon, you will lose the whole lot in two weeks,” she said apologetically. Literally in a matter of one hour, my day had gone from reviewing several options for buyers for our maize to trying to brainstorm ways to salvage even a small percentage of it.

Well, the story miraculously has a happy ending. An agent of the UN’s World Food Program tested our maize, and found it to be free of aflatoxin. Because our farmers’ maize is of such high quality (large kernels, clean, dry, and aflatoxin free) the National Cereals Board decided to purchase all of our maize and fumigate it in their own stores after purchase to kill the weevils. What’s even better is that they offered us the government buying price – the best price around in the market right now. So what does all this mean for Nuru? These are the first significant revenues for the project – a total of approximately $75,000! These revenues will be driven straight back into the project now to impact more farmers during this next season as we scale to Mabera and Kehancha Divisions. Nuru Kenya is on track to become truly financially self-sustaining within our five year goal.

So as you can see – hope and excitement to despair and back again…all in a week’s time. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

making solutions last: thoughts on leadership and sustainability

Nuru seeks to empower impoverished communities to become entirely self-sustaining within five years. To make this happen, we focus on two main faces of sustainability in order to pass the walk away test: financial sustainability and leadership sustainability. Both are absolutely critical to enabling our communities to be completely independent of Nuru US within that five year mark.

First, financial sustainability. We are trying to achieve financial sustainability by pursuing revenue generation projects in all five areas of development: agriculture, watsan, health, education, and community economic development. These models include interest income from agriculture loans, agribusiness revenues from maize trading and speculation, a well buy-in program, micro-lending, transaction fees from mobile banking services, etc. I am excited to report that some of these initiatives are already starting to bear fruit in the Kuria project. We measure and track our movement toward financial sustainability of the project by monitoring something we call the sustainability ratio: revenues generated by the project divided by expenses of the project. A sustainability ratio of 100% means that the project is financially sustainable. I have projected that by the by the end of 2010, our sustainability ratio will be close to 35%! I am very excited about these early results, but this blog post isn’t about financial sustainability…I can talk more about that some other day. This post is about something I am even more excited about: the gains we have made toward the leadership sustainability of the project.

I am passionate about leadership. Most of my adult life has been about leadership, and learning to understand its importance in achieving lofty goals/missions/results in any field. I am what I call a life learner in leadership because the more I learn, the more I realize that I have a long, long way to go. I have learned many lessons – most of them the hard way by messing up – about effective leadership, and I have tried to apply these lessons as I have grown as a leader. At Nuru, training and equipping service minded leaders in our partner communities is fundamentally the most important piece of our model, and we are very serious about this task. Recently, we started a project lead by Chelsea Barabas (one of our international program managers) to codify our leadership emphasis by creating the leadership curriculum by which we train all Nuru leaders – international and domestic. This leadership curriculum will include a plan to identify and screen for effective leaders in a project and then train and equip them to own and then grow their programs throughout the five years of the project and beyond. It is an aggressive project that Chelsea will be tackling over the next 9 months that includes in-depth research into other organizations and corporation and a close look at (through research and interviews) effective leaders of all shapes and sizes from all sectors. She will be studying what the best of the best say about how to become and how to train effective leaders. I say all of this as an introduction to the story that follows – the story of a Nuru leader who has me very excited about the future of Nuru Kenya and our progress toward leadership sustainability.

I walked hurriedly through the muddy field trying to keep up. I was doing my weekly field visits with Andrew, two of his Field Managers, and Gugwa, one of his Field Officers. I love these days of trekking through the ten-foot high maize to check in on the progress of the farmers and listen to the challenges they are facing or just happily listen to a farmer gushing with pride as she shows off her maize to us. On this particular day though, as I swept aside the big leafy maize winding our way through shamba (farm) after shamba of tall maize, I was deep in thought and unusually quiet. Normally, I used these days to try and engage Andrew and the Field Officers in conversation in an attempt to learn more Kiswahili or Kikuria from them (they are incredibly patient teachers), but today I had grown silent as I got lost in my own thoughts.

Throughout the previous couple weeks, I had been contemplating a radical new move in strategy for the project – as a test to measure progress in our leadership sustainability. I will be leaving the project in mid-July, and I hadn’t hired an agriculture program manager to replace me. Our typical model is to rotate our western staff out every seven month to prevent dependency from forming in the Nuru Kenya community leaders on individual personalities on the western team. These Program mangers (western staff) act as mentors and advisers to our Nuru Kenya counterparts and guide the overall strategy of the project toward exit at year five. Program managers do a one month turnover with new program mangers coming in to maintain continuity of the project, but the Kenyan team forms the main consistency and face of the project to the community – further empowering them toward a sustainable exit.

All program mangers had been identified and hired except for agriculture. The agriculture program here in Kuria is the furthest along of the five programs in our track toward sustainability, so I had decided to try a somewhat risky experiment. I decided that we would “gap” the agriculture program on the western staff side for a period of nine months – leaving a Kenyan fully in charge of strategy, operations, and scaling of the project. This is a very critical time in our project because we are about to go from serving 900 farmers to serving approximately 1,700 farmers in this next rainy season – plus we are scaling to entirely new divisions outside our normal operating area. If we can prove successful in this 9 month experiment during this crucial phase of our development, we will be well on our way toward leadership sustainability of the project. Andrew would be the key to the success or failure of that experiment.

Andrew Sinda is the leader of the agriculture program for Nuru Kenya. He has grown to become a selfless leader respected widely throughout our area of operations. He inspires motivation and hard work in all the farmers he leads. He is a humble, quiet servant leader who is welcomed everywhere he goes. The farmers trust him with everything they have and they trust him with their future hopes and dreams for their families. Why? Because he cares for them and he has earned that trust. Andrew doesn’t sit behind a desk dictating the fate of the 900 farm families he currently leads. He is in the field constantly…leading every day by example. He inspires his farmers and all who work under him to achieve levels of performance they didn’t think previously possible. I have grown to really respect and trust Andrew as well. He teaches me lessons in the field every week, and he doesn’t even know it – not just about Kiswahili – but about leadership.

I was nervous about this new experiment in leadership for the project, but I knew that if anyone could do it, Andrew could. He dropped behind a bit leaving Gugwa to talk with the Field Managers about the shambas we were approaching. “Mr. Jake,” he said. “You are somehow quiet today.” This guy doesn’t miss anything. “I know,” I said as I shook myself out of my contemplative state. I knew it was time to tell him. “Andrew, you know I am leaving in July, right?” “Yes. You have told me. Who will be coming to replace you this time?” he asked. “Well…that’s just it,” I said. “No one is coming. I have been meaning to tell you, Andrew.” I took a deep breath. “You will be the next program manager for the agriculture program. No mzungu (white dude) is coming to lead the ag program with this next team.” I stopped walking and looked at his face to gauge his reaction. “Ahhh, OK,” he said thoughtfully as he looked down. He looked back up at me. “But I am fearing you to go.” My heart sank a bit. “He’s worried that he isn’t ready. It must be an overwhelmingly heavy feeling to know that he will be leading this without any help,” I thought. I began to worry about my decision. Maybe I had been a bit too aggressive in our strategy. “It’s going to be all right Andrew. You are more than capable of handling this project. You have the tools you need, and I know that you will do well. The farmers trust you and you are ready,” I said. Andrew looked at me with his bright smiling eyes that I suddenly noticed were full of confidence. “You are not understanding me,” he said. “In truth, we will be fine. We are ready. You have trained us, and we will not let you down.” He paused. “I am only fearing because you are my family and my friend and I will miss you.” He smiled, turned and disappeared into the maize ahead of us to link up with the others chatting with the next farmer up ahead. “And I you, my friend,” I thought. “And I you.”

waking up

“Habari umeamuka?” Evans said…as he said every morning at 5:45am. I was tired and had just finished the pathetic little workout that I do these days to try and maintain some level of physical fitness. I unlocked the gate and shook Evans’ hand. “Tutaonana jioni,” (see you tonight) I said. He smiled and headed out the gate. Ironically, Evans (our nighttime security guard) knows almost as little Swahili as I do. His mother tongue is Kisii, and he is much more comfortable with that – or sometimes even English. I am always amazed at our friends’ ability here to learn 3 or 4 languages fairly well while I try to understand about 1.3 languages at best – routinely struggling through a conversation by piecing together phrases of languages that I have tried (and failed) to learn. I work on my Swahili with everyone here, but with Evans, sometimes I need to check with Philip for accuracy. “Habari umeamuka…” Evans said these words to me every single morning as I went about the daily “changing of the guard” that involved Evans himself, a trained security guard, turning his post over to Thomas, the next-door neighbor who is one of the leading craftsman in the area for poison-tipped arrows. For whatever reason, Evans’ words stuck with me this morning as I headed back into the house in the dark to carry on with the morning. “Habari umeamuka?” literally means something along the lines of “how was your awakening?” This was Evans’ friendly attempt each morning to greet me and ask me how I had slept. “How was your awakening…” I paused as I started to duck inside. I turned and watched the sun begin coloring the sky and chasing away remaining stars that greeted me each morning as I watched under the spectacular Kenyan sky. For the first time, I began to internalize the words Evans spoke to me every morning and ponder on how they seemed to be so fitting to me of my life and our world here now.

Awakening. Nuru has been a journey of awakening in my life. For many people, the understanding of the absolute crisis that our friends here and millions of others around the world suffer under every single day isn’t that difficult to reach. Once they see a glimpse of it, they see that the injustice of another human being just like them suffering horribly from completely preventable, unnecessary causes just isn’t right. Not only is it not right, but they feel compelled to DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. Not me. I would classify myself as a hard-headed, world-class idiot. I had been exposed to the issues of extreme poverty most of my life, but I would consistently turn a blind eye and say, “That’s somebody else’s problem. Those people aren’t like me.” I was so wrong. Heaven and earth would have to move to awaken me from my indifference and heartless apathy…and they did.

Combat changes things in an individual and writes stories in your heart that cannot be unwritten. The stories I lived and witnessed revealed a whole new world to me that I had refused to look at up to that point in my life. Stories of desperation born out of a basic lack of choice and opportunity…two words I had taken for granted every day. I saw mothers, fathers, and yes, children – making decisions to end life (usually their own) in the hopes that they could somehow save or give hope to the lives of those they loved so dearly. Desperation colliding with indifference breeds violent, irrational decisions. A haze in my head began to clear as I began to see a disturbing connection between the actions taken by those we were fighting and the motivation behind those actions. This reality was beaten into me time and time again until finally, I came to realize that perhaps one way to fight the enemy we waged war against was to attack the foundation of the movement. Take away the desperation, and you take away the mass recruiting population and army of individuals desperately seeking choice. Extreme poverty did not create terrorism and insurgency, but it was certainly the fuel that was enabling the movement of hatred to grow in numbers and power at such an alarming rate. This awakening propelled me to leave my old life and attempt to begin eroding that foundation that I saw just beneath the surface of the “enemy.”

Now let me tell you about a much braver awakening than the awakening that happened within me. An awakening of a potential and fire within some of the most incredible human beings I have ever encountered…the extreme poor. I have learned so many lessons these last 7 years of my life – from the day I crossed the Kuwait/Iraq border in March 2003 up until today – lessons that have taught me about bravery, selfless compassion, and perseverance in the face of absolutely insurmountable odds. Lessons that taught me what the faces of love, courage and sacrifice really look like. Who were my teachers? The extremely poor. I have been so humbled to learn from and come alongside this incredible class of individuals. These guys are braver, more resourceful, and in most cases more intelligent than I will ever be. They have survived through experiences and conditions in life that I would have completely folded under. It is these lessons that have shaped Nuru’s work and the way we view the extreme poor. The poor are not helpless children that must be coddled and pampered or led along by the hand toward a better life because they are just too ignorant or incapable to get there on their own. No. In contrast, the poor possess an incredible mountain of untapped potential and fire that, if realized, will revolutionize the way we interact as global citizens in our world today. Suddenly, there would be 1 billion new customers in the global marketplace. Imagine millions of educated, trained individuals searching for the cure for malaria or the cure for cancer; designing better public transit systems in overcrowded cities; becoming the entrepreneurs that will act as competitors for the West in the global marketplace – pushing innovation and design to the next level; and forming a whole new class of brilliant young leaders to create political systems and governance that push toward peace and global collaboration. We are so quick to discount the poor, but within their ranks lies the next Jonas Salk, Albert Einstein, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Nelson Mandela, Mother Theresa, John F. Kennedy, Mahatma Gandhi, Benazir Bhutto, MLK , and Kofi Annan. Why do we think they are so different?

I have seen this awakening here in Kuria, Kenya. I have seen the power that can result when one person regains his sense of dignity and self worth and really begins to see that there is hope and that the world does not have to be a helpless string of pathetic choices…who will eat tonight – my oldest 14 year old son or my youngest 2 year old daughter? Do I spend the money I have saved for tomorrow’s meal on transport to get my infant dying of malaria to the nearest clinic or watch the other children crying of hunger all night for another night. These are not fun pictures. These are not fun choices to make. In fact, these are not choices at all. Things are different here now, though. I have seen a woman go from this desperate situation of no choices to now feeding her children every night of the week and paying for her oldest to go to secondary school. I have seen leaders rise up in their community and bring hope and a clear path to a better life to thousands of their own people. I have seen a people owning the solutions to their own problems and gaining speed and vision to grow those solutions to impact an entire nation.

Awakenings are powerful. Awakenings can change individuals. Awakenings can change communities. Awakenings can change countries. Awakenings can change our world – but they don’t just happen. Individuals from all walks of life – people like me, you, and my brave friends here like Philip and Milika and Eliza and Chacha – must allow ourselves to take a step in that direction. The first step of any awakening for all of us – no matter where we start from – is just to open our eyes…and see.

times they are a changin'

Yesterday was one of the best days I’ve had in a while. I slot a few days every week to go around and visit the farmers and check up on them to see if they are practicing the farming techniques that we have taught them and just to say hi and see how their families are doing overall. Yesterday I went around with Andrew and Josephat – Field Manager and Field Officer from Nyangiti sub-location.

Josephat took us to several of his farmers’ shambas and then we finished at his compound. I was a little shocked by what I saw. I entered his compound (two mud huts with tree branches acting as a fence) and there in the center of the compound were around twenty new timber posts sticking out of the ground with several new sheets of metal roofing next to them. “What is this?” I asked in surprise. He looked up and grinned ear to ear. “I am building a house for my family,” he said in broken English. Then he gave me a sideways, knowing look and chuckled…”Nuru maize,” he said with pride.

Things are changing in the Kuria District of Kenya. Last year during this time, Josephat was trying to hire himself out to make enough money to feed his family. Some days there was no work, and his family had no food those days. He had harvested only 3 sacks of maize on his one acre farm that season, and his family needed at least 5 to make it through until harvest the next season. This year was different, though…Josephat harvested 24 sacks of maize from his one acre of land. He paid off his Nuru loan with 6 sacks, set aside another 6 sacks to feed his family, and sold the remaining 12 sacks in the market. He took the extra money and opened a Nuru savings account in the newly created Jamii Development Fund (village bank). Then he took out some of that money, bought materials and started construction of a modest house of timber, brick, and iron sheets for his family.

I have shared a lot of statistics with all of you about the incredible progress here on the ground, but today, I want to give you four powerful anecdotes from the community that demonstrate the unbelievable change that has begun in the Kuria West District:
• Everywhere (in all 23 villages where we work) permanent houses like Josephat’s are going up in the community. Farmers who have always lived in mud huts with cow dung coated walls now have enough money from their Nuru maize yields this last season to construct a real house for their families.
• Secondary school teachers in Isibania and Migori are reporting a remarkable decrease in dropout rates among students from Nyametaburo and Nyangiti. They say that parents are able to pay the school fees for the first time - allowing their children to actually stay in school for the entire term.
• Every couple of months, the government hands out free food aid to the very poorest starving people in the District. It is normally a huge event. 100-150 starving people from each sub-location usually line up to receive the free food. This season was no different - with one exception...while other sub-locations continued to see 100-150 of their people queue up, Nyametaburo and Nyangiti sub-locations (the area Nuru is working) had only 8 people total show up for both sub-locations.
• For years the tobacco industry has destroyed the lives of farmers in Nyametaburo and Nyangiti. It destroys their soil, causes their families to contract respiratory tract infections, causes mass deforestation that leads to soil erosion (because of the required curing process), and fools the farmers into thinking that they actually make money growing the tobacco. Nuru's goal was to get farmers to switch from tobacco to maize (their staple food) to prevent these problems and to fight chronic hunger and severe malnutrition. Alliance Tobacco Company just held an emergency meeting a month ago to discuss how they could "win back their farmers." You see, after seeing the maize results from Nuru's first season, 90% of their farmers decided to grow maize with Nuru this season instead of tobacco.

We said goodbye to the family, and I got a little choked up as I turned to walk out of the compound…knowing that soon, for the first time in his life, Josephat will not be waking up in a mud hut with cow dung coating the walls. “it’s about time,” I thought. “It’s about time.”

to lead is to serve...

So, the wells are finished, the maize is harvested, the farmers have repaid their loans, and the first phase healthcare construction is complete. I have had a bit of a chance to sit back and breathe for a second this past week…kind of a calm before the storm. We have been driving really hard here of late, so I was thankful that I was able to do some badly needed debriefing and reflection of our methods and model – trying to examine the results that have materialized in the community of Kuria, Kenya this past year.

This past year has produced some very humbling – almost shocking – results of empowerment and success metrics that I honestly did not think would be possible in this first year. On my daily walk to work this week, I was able to do a good bit of thinking about why it is that we have seen such tremendous success. What is the “special sauce” in the Nuru model that has enabled hundreds of farmers to realize very concrete steps forward in lifting themselves and their families out of extreme poverty? This is an extraordinarily important question for me to be able to answer. You see, we are about to start an exciting new phase in the Kuria Pilot project…organic scaling. Over the next year, we will be working with our local team to duplicate the model we implemented in the eighteen villages of Nyametaburo and Nyangiti sub-locations in numerous neighboring sub-locations, divisions, and eventually districts – in a sustainable, effective manner. So whatever the special sauce was that we used here in the first villages and sub-locations must be identified and replicated as we scale the project.

I shook my head and laughed on my way to the field Monday as I thought to myself, “Well, I know I can rule one cause of success out – myself.” Success has come to the Nuru pilot project in spite of a series of fumbles and foibles that I have managed to commit this year…in spite of ignorant (at times arrogant) assumptions I made…in spite of thinking that “I know best” when in fact I had no idea what I was doing. Yes…one thing is for certain – Nuru’s early success had very little to do with the helmet leading the charge. Success had come to our project in spite of my many weaknesses and shortcomings.

So what was it? How did this miraculous progress come about? I started sifting through the various parts of the Nuru model trying to pinpoint the answer to my question. Was it our holistic approach to community solutions? Was it our design thinking approach to need finding and solution building? Our focus on rigorous, unforgiving measurement of our results and impact? Perhaps it was our aggressive partnership strategy – taking the best orgs out there and collaborating with them to prevent wasteful duplication of effort. Or maybe it was the fact that we worked so hard to recruit the best of the best out there to be part of the Nuru team? Certainly all of these things did play a part in the early success we have seen, but none of them seemed to hit the nail on the head.

As I neared the end of my walk, I looked up to see Philip Mohochi, the Chairman of our Community Development Committee (CDC), walking toward me to greet me before our morning meeting. Then it hit me all at once. The success of our model did not depend on the latest and greatest poverty reduction theory or specific application of our business model that had been researched and developed at the “hallowed halls of Stanford.” The special sauce directly enabling the success of the Nuru model was embodied in this man walking toward me…humble servant leadership.

Few things in this world can inspire people to overcome tremendous odds like a good leader can. There are many, many different types of leaders and even more theories on successful philosophies of leadership. I have had the good fortune in my life of serving under numerous leaders of all shapes and sizes, and I have been thrust into several positions of leadership myself as well. After learning my lesson the hard way (a seemingly common theme on my life), I have come to believe that the most effective leadership model out there is the servant leader model. What is a servant leader? Servant…leader…seemingly a bad fit in the same sentence. The word “servant” connotes weakness, vulnerability, humility, and lowliness of position. The word “leader,” on the other hand, conjures images of power, authority, strength, and greatness. “Servant leader”…seems like a bit of an oxymoron, but I propose that it is the most powerful model of leadership in the world today, and it represents the special sauce that the Nuru model hinges upon.

In order to inspire people toward a common goal against insurmountable odds, one must build a solid foundation of mutual respect and trust. This cannot be done where the leader assumes the entitlement philosophy of “with rank comes privilege.” This cannot be done by a leader who removes himself from those he leads to maintain a “healthy separation.” People are inspired by leaders they trust…leaders who are willing to “get dirty” with them. They are inspired by a leader who puts his people first ahead of himself every single time – especially when there is a sacrifice to be made. They begin to trust and respect a leader whom they know genuinely cares for them and does not think too highly of himself to do menial tasks that the team is assigned to do. It is a leader’s willingness to humbly assume a lowly position – to become weak – to be vulnerable – to sacrifice all for his people and mission – that inspires a team to accomplish the impossible.

Philip Mohochi is a model servant leader. He embodies the type of leader that we work very hard to train and equip as part of the Nuru model. Servant leadership is teachable. It is replicable. It is scalable. We are working with Philip and his team to teach it, to replicate it, and to scale it. Servant leadership is the special sauce that I believe will empower an army of determined individuals equipped with the Nuru model to move the world and accomplish the impossible.

east of Eden...

“Isire has just killed his brother.
-nelly”

David Carreon (Nuru Healthcare Program Manger) stared in disbelief at the text he had just received from Nelly, the Kenyan Field Manager for all Nuru’s healthcare programs. He looked up at me with a bewildered look on his face, and just handed me the phone without saying a word. I took the phone and read the message. A sickening, familiar feeling began to grow in the pit of my stomach as I read the SMS.

Isire Fanuel is one of the best Field Officers working for Nuru right now here in the project. He is a dedicated, humble servant leader who has been absolutely committed to improving the lives of his fellow Kurians. As a Nuru Health Field Officer, he is personally responsible for mobilizing, training, and implementing Nuru health solutions to improve the lives of about 90 families in the Kuria District.

That morning, Isire had gone to his shamba (farm) very early to plow in preparation for planting his short rains maize crop. As he worked, Isire’s older brother came charging up behind him and attacked him with a panga (machete). His brother swung the panga wildly – slashing Isire across the face and then across the forehead in attempt to kill him. Isire struggled with his brother, wrestled away the panga, and in desperate anger and fear, slashed back at him – cutting him across the face and neck. The blow proved fatal, and Isire watched helplessly as his brother bled out on the ground…his brother.

Why on earth had Isire’s brother attacked him to try and kill him? What could drive him to do such a desperate thing?

Land…Isire’s brother was desperate to have his land. Here, land can mean the difference between abject starvation, poverty or death of one’s children and a promising future for the family.

This sad act that occurred here in our community was an event that is all-too common in areas of the world like Kuria, Kenya. The death of Isire’s brother was yet another sobering reminder to me of why I am here. A reminder about why I feel so strongly that we, as citizens of the developed world, must engage in the war that is being waged all around us in order to stop the unnecessary injustice and insanity in our world today.

Extreme poverty leads to desperation. Extreme poverty strips a person of his dignity, his opportunities in life, and worst of all…his choice. Those stripped of all choice are left with desperation. Desperate situations cause people to commit desperate acts – good people who love people and love life. I have seen it in the eyes of the extreme poor time and again.

…in the eyes of peaceful cowherders turned warriors crossing the Tanzanian border with bows and poison-tipped arrows hunting the bandits who stole their cattle – the one hope for future income and food for their starving families. And when they find them, they intend to burn the bandits alive.

…in the eyes of a desperately poor Iraqi farmer picking up a weapon he has never even seen before or strapping a vest laden with explosives to his body and running headlong into an American position. Why? Is it out of some misplaced/ignorant sense of hatred for the West and all it stands for? No. It is out of love. Love for his 5 year old daughter and 3 year old son at home who are starving to death. A love that compelled him to say yes to the jihadist that darkened his door that day. The jihadist who promised food and education for his children if he would only sacrifice his life by attacking these men from across the ocean he knew nothing about.

The good news is that there is hope for those without choice. Their plight is not “just the way the world is.” The world DOES NOT have to be this way. Their plight is a rally cry. It’s time to rise up and answer the cry – to give a voice to the voiceless – to give choice to noble men and women who have been struggling for so long.

Join a revolution that has begun…a revolution to give choices to those like Isire’s desperate brother…to the poor Iraqi farmer…to the 14 year old cowherder. The time has come to get in the fight. Join us and give choice back to those who have been crying out in weary desperation for too long.

Be hope. Be light. Be Nuru…

words for The White House

I was recently encouraged by a close friend of mine (my brother-in-law) to do something that seemed at face value to be a little ridiculous in today's world...to write a letter to the President of the United States. I laughed for a while at the notion when I first read his email, but over the next week as I walked through the fields with the farmers here in Kuria, his email nagged at me relentlessly.

No matter what side of American partisan politics you have planted yourself on, you have to admit that the election of Barack Obama to The White House has brought new hope to many people...both Americans and millions of global citizens. Nowhere is this more true than in Kenya. I have fielded many interesting questions from our farmers here - everything from, "Will you greet your President for us when you return to America?" to "Do you think that Kenya will become a superpower now that Obama is President of America?" So, in an exercise of blind faith and the belief in the power of a few small voices, I actually did write a letter to President Obama. I am sure that the letter will probably never make it past the third clerk from the left of the water cooler in the basement of The White House, but the eternal optimist in me told me to just give it a shot anyway. I thought I'd share the words that I wrote to him with you as a commentary on America's position in the world as seen through the humble lens of an American in the middle-of-nowhere, Kenya. Here are the words that I sent to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20500, USA. Please take them with a grain of salt.

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1 February 2009

Dear President Obama,

I write this letter to you from a remote corner of Kenya called the Kuria District. I write this letter, as I have so many other letters in my life, from the front lines. This time, though, my letter comes from the front lines of a very different war than I am used to fighting…the war on extreme poverty.

As you read this, I realize that you face more challenges than any President in recent history: a war on two fronts, a global community that has been disenchanted by the once benevolent global partner turned bully that is the United States, and an economic crisis at home that has many Americans looking to the horizon with a great deal of uncertainty and fear. I know that even now, the hopeful expectations of our great nation – and in fact the entire world – must weigh heavily on your heart. I know all of this, but I want to ask you, sir, to pause for fifteen minutes this day to read the humble words of one of the citizens of the nation that you now lead. You taught me to believe again in the power of one voice…a power that you restored to the American people when you were sworn into office eleven days ago, so I ask you now to give audience to one of those voices.

I had the privilege of serving as an infantry and special operations platoon commander in the Marine Corps for seven and a half years from 1998 to 2005. During that time, I led Marines on four operational deployments including two combat tours in Iraq – one as a part of one of the leading Marine Corps units during the invasion in March 2003 and again in 2005 leading my guys in direct action and reconnaissance and surveillance missions just south of Baghdad. My eyes were opened to a lot of things during my days in combat. War is a horrible thing. It destroys lives and does things to people that can’t simply be taken back. I learned the very definition of evil on the battlefield. One of the greatest lessons that I learned on the battlefield, though, is that the war on terror will not be won on that battlefield alone. In order to win the war on terror, we must attack the enemy at the source. I had several very personal, deeply emotional experiences in combat that I feel revealed that source to me…extreme poverty. The job assigned to my men and I was to take out high level terrorist leaders. However, when we did that, someone from the ranks would always step up quickly to take their place. The strength in terrorist organizations lies in the foot soldiers. Foot soldiers are driven into these groups because they have no real choices in life and because of the growing disparity between the haves and the have-nots in this world – fueling a steadily growing hatred. Extreme poverty drives sane, compassionate people to do desperate, horrific things. I was so moved by the lives I encountered that I decided to leave my old job and wage the war against terror from a different angle…by fighting extreme poverty. I left that old life to found an organization called Nuru International that develops innovative, sustainable solutions to extreme poverty in impoverished communities around the world.

I am not naive enough to believe that there is no place in the war on terror for military action. On the contrary, military action is necessary to cut off the leadership and resources of the terrorist movement; however, the true fuel of this movement of hatred is the young men and women driven into these groups out of desperation – like the desperation of parents too poor to send their children to any school other than the nearby madras where they learn very little about the disciplines of reading, mathematics, and the sciences, and a lot about the discipline of hatred. A strategy involving an attack on both flanks is the only way we can win this war. Military intervention without a genuine effort to combat extreme poverty in partnership with our global neighbors is only fuel to further ignite hatred and empower the movement of terror in our world today.

I believe in America. I believe in the idea of a nation where all men and women genuinely do have equal opportunity in life; a nation where freedom is not seen as a precursor to anarchy or just a token catch phrase on a political platform but a founding pillar that breathes life into the people. And I believe that freedom is worth fighting for…even dying for. That is why I chose to be on the front lines in that war. At the end of the day, my Marines – my brothers – and I did not fight for Republicans or Democrats. We did not fight for oil, and we did not fight for a man in a White House. At the end of the day, we fought and risked our lives first for the man on our right and left and to ensure that our families, our friends, and our children would live to experience the bold idea that is America. We fought to give hope and a voice to a people who had none. I have had so many of my friends sacrifice so much…some sacrificing all…defending the idea that all of us human beings – not just American citizens – are created equal and have a right to be free of oppression and injustice. The idea of America is so great – a pillar of light, hope, and strength to the world. Our great country is in a position to do more good and bring more hope in our world today than any other nation.

Sadly, we find ourselves in a situation today where America is not that shining light we were founded to be. Instead, we are seen by the greater global community as a condescending nation concerned solely with our own interests and agendas. America is a global leader, but as I learned in the Marine Corps, leadership is more about serving than anything else. It is the servant leader who, in the end, wins the hearts and minds of those around him and can move people and nations toward a better world. America needs to become a servant leader again. Sir, there are those who will tell you that service and humility are synonymous with weakness. On the contrary, I learned on the battlefield that humility is a fundamental source of strength and influence. In humility, a leader gains the confidence of those around him – inspiring them to follow him anywhere. Why? Because they know he is listening. Because they know that he cares about someone other than himself and that his compassion is not a cloak disguising hidden agendas and ulterior motives.

Mr. President, we need to become a servant leader nation again. You are indeed the leader of the free world now. I write these words to you because I know that in your heart of hearts, you are a man of compassion, humility, integrity, and hope. Hope sir. Hope is no longer a campaign slogan. Hope is now the fuel that we need you to use to restore our great nation. I bring no agenda to this letter. I am not lobbying or appealing to you for any favor of any kind. I write these words for one purpose and one purpose only…to encourage you, Mr. President. I write these words to ask you to remember who you are and why you first sought to take the office you have now assumed. You, more than anyone in recent American history, have been able to unite and move this nation. It will take a very special person and a very unique time to enable America to become a light again. You, sir, are that person, and this is that time. Over the next few months and years, you will encounter events and situations that will bring you and our nation to the breaking point. It is during those times, that we the people need you to stand in the gap and remember the ideals and the hope that got you where you are today, and be the servant leader our generation has dreamed of for so long.

Just last week, we issued a sustainable farm loan to 450 farmers in one of the most impoverished areas of Kenya in Nuru’s pilot project. The loan will change the lives of over 2,500 people in the next year by dramatically increasing their crop yields as much as 500%. The loan will give them hope. Hope and choices. The resources to make that loan happen came from our great nation. It came from Americans who heard about the injustices of extreme poverty…Americans who looked across the dinner table at their children doing their homework dreaming of their futures…Americans who realized that it was time to empower the children of global brothers and sisters to be able to dream dreams too. As I sit here writing this letter to you from the front lines in this war on extreme poverty, I think of the incredible potential that the United States of America has to bring hope to so many like the farmers here in Kuria, Kenya. Your campaign slogan brought us all hope – “Yes we can.” Now sir, it is my turn to encourage you – now is the time for the servant leader to step up and lead our nation to once again be a beacon of light, and Mr. President…yes you can. May God bless you and give you wisdom and grace to lead us.

Best Regards,

Jake Harriman