There were no sexy titles, and the role was straightforward yet dangerous.
It was a Peace Keeping role with the United Nations with a dangerous responsibility, perhaps more dangerous than TikTok’s CEO
My job description was simple – Keep The Peace. And Return Home Alive.
+ It was an eight months deployment, entirely away from home.
+ It was a job that everyone tried to talk me out of.
+ Life there is no luxury.
To top it off, you enjoy the following staff benefits:
+ Lived in a wooden bunk built from the ground up.
+ Bathed with water taken from the river bed. Who knows what’s in there?
+ Work for your food by transporting them from a helicopter, or you risk starving yourself.
+ Playing catching with militants who want to mess with you.
+ No online food order, phone reception or Zoom.
What did I learn from this dangerous yet meaningful adventure?
1. Real Teamwork is About Coming Back Alive.
We operate in a dangerous environment, dealing with hazardous threats that we usually see in movies.
They are real, and there is no second take.
And everyone realises the importance of “watching each other’s back” with no rank differentiation.
The end goal is to come back alive. No one is indispensable.
Do we see that often in the corporate space? Only a few.
2. Real Leadership is When You Receive The Water Bottle.
I remember an event where we temporarily rested after hours and days of trekking through the mountainous terrain.
We passed the water bottle around, and my team leader was the first to receive it.
But we did not give it to him because he was the “boss” but because he had earned our respect.
He had earned the Water Bottle.
When you earned the water bottle, you knew you had led well.
3. Real Show-Up Where It Matters Most.
There was a suspicious event happening at the riverbed.
That day, I was the comms guy, and the terrain thwarted our radio signal and vital communication.
I had to be left alone on a hill’s peak in an open space without shelter or cover.
And being in an open space with real threats around you is hazardous because I have nowhere to hide if anything happens.
That day, I had four different teams communicating through me to relay critical messages to one another,
It was a critical role then, and I knew I had to stay through the process because we wanted everyone to return home.
End of the day, Mission Accomplished.
Are you SHOWING UP where it matters most as a leader and individual?
What have you RISEUP for lately?
This is Joseph@RISEUP Signing Off.
May You TRANSFORM, FLOURISH AND PROSPER in the brand new world!
#riseup #riseupglobal #showup #unitednations #motivationalspeaker #motivation #humanleadership
