A door to a whole new world opened for me
By Alexandra G.
This experience opened a door to a whole new world for me. For someone whose concentration is Operations and Technology Management I found extremely inspiring the work done and created by businesses with a social impact vision and mission.
In my case, our client works with sustainable wood and creating an impact in the Amazon environment in Brazil.
It was disappointing to hear about the cancellation of the trip. We missed the experience of getting to know our client professionally and personally. I missed the experience of “seeing and feeling” the passion which drives each individual in the company and the passion behind the impact they create in the Amazon forest. Our client partners with communities in the Amazon providing them a source of income in exchange for their work.
I am happy to mention that we were able to overcome this challenge as a team and work with our client to understand the goal, and in the end deliver a robust project.
I think it is important for everyone to understand that the challenge of not being “present” did not stop the impact we created as well.
We worked hand to hand to develop a plan that met the client’s needs keeping in mind their mission and work with timber in the Amazon.
Some of us identified with their vision and wished we could even do more for them leveraging our own expertise. I was fortunate to be part of a team with a variety of backgrounds: marketing, finance, operations and education and delivered not only a business plan but a tool that will allow them to become even more successful.
I learned from this experience several things. However, the two more important things I learned are that no matter what sentiment the business drives, and the passion behind it; the business is still a business- working with the mentality of creating a better world is not enough to be able to survive in any industry. Therefore, a clear finance, marketing and operational plan must be developed. In addition to this, this experience taught me much more about resilience and the importance of empathy and flexibility around uncertainty. After all, we don’t know what tomorrow brings; we need to adapt to quick changes and adapt to uncertain times.
It was a pleasure being part of this team and learning about social impact. Furthermore, it was an absolute pleasure to see missions that go beyond profitability by putting people and the environment first.