System Builder

Social responsibility always seemed to me to be one of those phrases that gets thrown around to guilt trip those that were not volunteering or something along those lines. Through this experience, I have come to redefine its meaning to be much more productive. Social responsibility is the privilege that each member of a society (country, city, organization) has to improve the group they belong to. This can be seen in common ways like service or volunteering, but it can also be seen by replacing a damaging system with a healthy one.

I spend much of my time focused on my personal growth or development so it was a shift for me to be focusing on others for a change. I have realized that it didn't matter whether or not I personally enjoyed the work or volunteering because I wasn't the focus. The priority became making sure that those I was serving benefited or not. If they did, then (as long as there is healthy boundaries and wisdom used) it was a success, and the inverse is true if it was not.

So much of what I was able to do during this internship seemed so insignificant in light of the issues that these people were facing. However, I was amazed at how much the little that I could do to help them meant to them. Just being able to share their story with someone who was willing to listen was impactful for them. Even just a few minutes out of my time was something that they remembered a few weeks later when they saw me again. Helping others doesn't have to be a big massive organized event. It can happen just through taking a moment and genuinely listening to someone.

I was overwhelmed at the strength of many of the people that I was able to speak to. One man is very prominent in my memory because he was very visibly affected by Parkinson's Disease. This hit me extremely hard as my father currently has the same disease, but to a lesser degree than this man. His strength impressed me deeply because he was able to continue living his life even though he couldn't even walk normally from his nervous system going haywire. The inner strength that humans have access to in difficult situations is astounding.

I disagreed with my manager in the way that he organized the company and its processes. My biggest issue was that there didn't seem to be any organization or handbook for any of my responsibilities. In addition to this, he was pushing for rapid growth and expansion to increase our numbers because of their funding contract. I strongly recommended against this strategy and advised that we focus on improving our systems so that everything became more automated before adding more services. Eventually he decided to do this after I was ending my internship. I learned through this that even for a small company, change takes time. It is important to stick to what you believe to be best, but be open minded about it and willing to listen.

Listening to many of the stories from the homeless, I realized that many of them just ended up living on the streets from a series of unexpected events or expenses. Many of these same people had been struggling for months to years to get off of the streets because of how difficult it was to find a connection with someone who could assist with getting them housing. Coupled with the epidemic of homelessness that has exploded over the past few years in Seattle, I realized how large of a systemic problem it is. Many may not be able to escape it because of how difficult the city council has made it to be.