2016 has seen the launch of what are rightly named Sustainable Development Goals (SDG's) because they will focus on a sustainable, equitable future for not just everyone on the planet, but the planet itself. Sustainable growth means a world where the livelihoods of the worlds poorest grows, where that growth is fair for everyone not just some, and in a way that the planet can support for the long arc of human history.
All of these SDG's will produce thousands of projects to make them a reality. All of these projects will have one thing in common -- people. The critical success factor is people. Obvious, but worth thinking through. We know that there is no sustainable change in any area of life -- personal, relational, families, groups, communities, institutions....all of the dimensions necessary to make the SDGs happen -- without leadership.....and leadership is a people issue.
Emerging Leaders has spent the past decade working out how to bring leadership development into the most vulnerable, grassroots communities, starting in East and South Africa, piloting in the UK and launching this year into West Africa. What we do is to generate prosperity by bringing leadership development into vulnerable communities to awaken self-belief and liberate potential in order to transform livelihoods, wellbeing and security.
So, here's a snap shot of the exciting impact of some of Emerging Leaders work
•84 percent reported that their health had improved. They were facing the truth about health issues; they were waking up to bad and unhealthy habits. They realized where some of their money was going in smoking and drinking. They felt ready to act on previous training about health and hygiene skills, but had felt unable to adopt before the training
•33 percent reported starting to give an hour or more to community volunteering
•Increased community security
•85 percent reported taking action to improve their families' education. They realised they didn't need to wait around, but could be proactive and take themselves back to school.
•Family relationships improved in all directions
•161 percent increase in household savings. They could now see what it means to budget and they discovered the courage to talk to their partners about money and they were able to be honest about where the family money was going.
•Self esteem increased
•75 percent reported signing up for training at work because they now believed in their own potential and had new hope for their future
•Greater motivation to improve themselves because they now saw themselves as leaders of their own lives
•65 percent set up community projects and 57 percent of these were environmental and health projects. They could now see where the issues were in their communities and not wait for someone else to come and fix them
•82 percent started income generating projects
These are some of the things that happen when people see themselves as leaders, see their own potential, confront their own poverty mindsets, develop new mindsets and skills to start leading themselves, their relationships, small groups of people or the larger community.
When people learn how to lead themselves everything changes because they are changed and they are now equipped to change their parts of the world.
To date we have reached nearly 25,000 people with our training and given that the data shows that on average one person who receives our training impacts another 20 people, then that's half a million people influenced.
But in the end it always comes down to changing one life at a time. A life like Davids'.
Enjoy his story and think what this would look like multiplied under each of the 17 SDG's.
Trevor Waldock
CEO Emerging Leaders www.emerging-leaders.net