The Challenges of Leadership: Part I

What does it mean to be a really great leader?
When you think of a great leader, who do you think of? Do you think of someone famous, an important Head of State, an influential author, an intellectual philosopher, a social change maker, a religious icon? Or do you think of someone you know, a family member, a friend, a colleague, a mentor? If you’re like me, you think of both!

If I think of some of the greatest leaders of all time, I immediately conjure up names like Winston Churchill, Indira Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Aristotle, Mohandas Gandhi, and Martin Luther King Jr. I also think of more familiar people like my favorite authors, Zora Neale Hurston and F. Scott Fitzgerald, and singers, Nina Simone and Janis Joplin. These people stood for social justice, questioned the status quo, and thought beyond the barriers of conventional society.

However, if I think of the most influential leader in my life, I would immediately say my father. A man who embodies a lot of what I consider necessary characteristics to be a great leader – patience, kindness, generosity, empathy, honesty, strength, perseverance, commitment and integrity. But most importantly, he is a cautious risk-taker.

I never completely realized this until recently. I was traveling home to visit my parents before leaving for India, and as I turned the corner to my parent’s street I was completely blinded by the reflection of the sun. I strained to see what was causing it, and as I got closer I saw it was my parent’s house. The entire roof was covered with solar panels.

I was a bit amazed, surprised, stunned and impressed. As I walked inside, I immediately questioned “What’s up with the roof?”. My dad grinned proudly and said “Yeah, you like it! 36 solar panels!”. I was still in shock gazing at him, as my brother peered from behind. We exchanged smirks…we were both amused!

I questioned again “But what have the neighbors said? They can’t be very happy!”. He sternly replied, “No, but what can they say. Listen, this is a good investment. We’re the first in town to have them, you know!” My mother chimed in, “We’re the first in the entire area!”.

The house in South Jersey with all the solar panels!

Try to discover
The road to success
And you'll seek but never find.
But blaze your own path
And the road to success
Will trail right behind.
~Robert Brault

"Unsung WaterHeroes"

Behind every brilliant market based solution is a team of unsung heroes, working to help the idea permeate on the ground. I had the privilege of meeting a couple of these individuals during a series of site visits to WaterHealth Centers (WHCs) in Andhra Pradesh, India.

In my current position with WaterHealth International (WHI), where I am working as an Acumen Fund Fellow, I am closely aligned with the Marketing Department to lead a Market Research Study on Consumer Segmentation; WHI wishes to understand the purchase behaviors of consumers and to understand how they can better serve the end-user, and more of them!

WHI has operations worldwide in Ghana, Phillipines, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and India. As a result over one million people in over 500 locations across 5 countries worldwide live healthier lives through access to pure, safe water provided by WHCs. In India alone, WHIN operates approximately 300 WaterHealth Centers, and is rapidly expanding to double its numbers in the coming year. These sites are proving that rural consumers are willing to pay for access to lifesaving, clean water.

With a population of more than one billion people, India is the second most populous nation in the world and fourth largest world economy. Despite recent economic prosperity, approximately 70% of India's citizens live in rural communities with limited, if any, access to treated water. In 2005 alone there were 10 million reported cases of diarrhea in rural India. Over 75% of the affected population are children under the age of five.

The Water Problem
* Every 20 seconds a child dies from a water-related disease.
* The water and sanitation crisis claims more lives with disease than any war claims with guns.
* Diarrhea kills more young people globally than AIDS, malaria and measles combined.

* At any given time, half of the world's hospital beds are occupied by patients suffering from diseases associated with lack of access to safe drinking water and inadequate sanitation.

* More than 80% of sewage in developing countries is discharged untreated, polluting rivers, lakes, and coastal areas.

* Almost two in every three people who need safe drinking water survive on less than $2 a day, and one in three on less than $1 a day.

Illnesses and deaths due to water-borne diseases are completely preventable!

My first week on the job, I traveled to several rural villages and met with consumers to understand what access to clean drinking water meant to them and their families. One consumer in particular was a school teacher in the village of Nitthaki, who purchases 40 liters of treated water everyday for her home and classroom. She provides the water to her students because she knows the impact that clean drinking water has on their daily life. She educates the students about the benefits of safe drinking water and diseases related to drinking contaminated water: dysentery, diarrhea, and micro-organisms.

She has seen many of her students, a few pictured here at the WaterHealth Center, fall sick with diarrhea quite frequently due to the unclean water they drink at home. Since providing clean water in her classroom, she has seen attendance increase and performance improve. Students now have less issues with gastric intestinal problems, intestinal parasites and diarrhea.

Another example is Gvenkateswararao, a physiotherapist and health educator in his community of Gannavaram village. Since the WaterHealth Center was built in his town four years ago, he has been purchaseing 40 liters everyday for himself and his family. They use the purified water for both drinking and cooking purposes as well. He understands the importance of educating the community about healthy drinking water and advocates for government programs that teach water health and the ills of water-borne diseases in the schools and the community at large.

These consumers are some of the foot soldiers helping WHI's model penetrate deep into markets here in Andhra Pradesh, India. I am looking forward to meeting many more of their kind throughout the coming year and marching alongside with them, telling their stories...

"Find the smaller stories that tell the larger story of your movement, and always begin with them!" (advice from Bill Ayers, Professor at the University of Illinois in Chicago) -- Acts of Faith by Eboo Patel