Expanding our family through an international adoption has
shaped our last three years. The
journey began in December 2009 and in March of 2012 we brought two sisters, Meskerem
and Tarikua, to Austin from Ethiopia and into our home. The adventure continues and the
expedition has provided poignant lessons; some of them even apply to leadership.
Judge Not:
On November 29th, 2011 we left dinner at the Habesha Cultural Restaurant
and headed back to the Yebsabi Guest House
for our first full night sleep in Addis Ababa.
The dinner was great, although I felt my alligator
arms sprout as I parted with 400 Ethiopian Birr (ETB). Seemed expensive until I did a quick
calculation, it was only about $25 at home. I was congratulating myself on the dining bargain when the
reality of what we just spent hit me.
According to the World Bank,
the average wage in Ethiopia is $30/Month.
As I am contemplating the reality of spending a month’s
income on dinner I got hit with a profound one-two punch. Our route back to the guesthouse took
us through the red-light district of Addis. After meeting our daughters for the first time that morning,
the sight of girls standing on the corner waiting to get into a car wrecked me. What kind of terror must that be for a
girl that age? Why are they doing
this? Did they volunteer? Is someone making them?
The life expectancy in Ethiopia is about 60 years, which
puts it at 150th or so in the world. The top
two causes of death are influenza/pneumonia and diarrheal diseases. For perspective those are number nine
and thirty-eight in the United States.
This means a lot of young adults die and leave widows and orphans behind. Add to that a 47% literacy rate for
women and you being to see the challenges in just making it to tomorrow.
Who has the right to judge other people? Whom should I judge? To judge is to form an opinion or
estimate. But to observe is to
see, watch, perceive, or notice, especially so as to learn something. Judge
= subjective. Observe = objective. When I judge someone by default I am
putting myself above him or her. Is
it possible to observe the facts of what they have done without placing them in
a lesser position then me? Can we
hold someone to a standard of performance without judging?
When we were at the orphanage meeting our girls we saw a mom
arrive with a baby and wait for a couple of hours. We did not know what was going on. Then we saw her walk in and leave with empty arms;
sobbing. She had dropped her baby
off, likely to never see the child again.
Ripped my heart out watching her make a choice for the child to be
somewhere else. Who am I to
judge? I have never tried to raise
a child on less than a dollar a day.
Judge Not. Many
things at work drive me nuts.
Stupidity, laziness, lack of ethics, lack of motivation, sloppiness,
sloth, poor treatment of a customer…the list goes on. But if I call you lazy, I have judged you. The leadership lesson to me is to navigate
the tension between observing, having expectations, holding people accountable,
calling them out when they don’t get something done AND not judging. For that is what I want to do: Judge
Not
Deepak
Chopra, “If you want to reach a state
of bliss, then go beyond your ego and the internal dialogue. Make a decision to
relinquish the need to control, the need to be approved, and the need to judge.
Those are the three things the ego is doing all the time. It's very important
to be aware of them every time they come up.” - Ah Deepak, without these
three, what would I do all day long?
Lead?
