I counted the spigots in my home the other day and found a
total of 8. Each spigot brings clean water quickly and efficiently to my family
and me.
It was an uncomplicated exercise and seemingly unremarkable
result. But last week I received a reminder that for many people access to
clean water is often complicated and efforts to bring it to those who need it is
remarkable and extremely important.
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| Doc in Peru, 2009 |
The message came to me through Doc Hendley, the founder of
the non-profit aid organization Wine to Water, which is dedicated to bringing
clean water to those who need it around the world. To date, the 11-year-old
organization has reached over 400,000 people in 25 countries.
Doc calls these numbers “a drop in the bucket.” Sadly, it’s
true. Globally, some 800 million people lack access to clean water. Another 2.5
billion people lack access to proper, improved sanitation. The results are
predictable. Each year, approximately 840,000 people (about the population of
San Francisco) die from water-related diseases.
Doc came up with the idea of Wine to Water in 2003 while
bartending and playing music in nightclubs around Raleigh, North Carolina. He
tells the story of waking up in the middle of the night with the phrase “wine
to water” in his head and reaching to his bedside to scribble down his thoughts
in a notebook.
At first he thought the strange epiphany would result in him
writing a hit country song, but it has actually led to founding a
world-changing organization. After throwing a small local fundraiser, Doc used
the money to travel to Darfur, Sudan where he began installing water systems
for victims of government-supported genocide. Since then he’s continued to
travel and bring clean water to people desperately in need.
I met Doc in July 2011, the first year we invited him to
speak at a new hire program at Deloitte. For each year since then, Doc has
returned to speak at the same new hire program. Every time Doc receives a
well-deserved standing ovation.
His message is about his personal journey to find meaning in
his life. It’s an inspirational call for all of us to seek out what we’re
passionate about in life. It’s a message about finding ways to contribute to
our world in some positive way.
He chronicles some of the many places he and his teams have traveled
and continue to work. He describes how they work with the local people to
figure out the problem at hand and determine the best way possible to bring
clean water to the community.
Despite hearing Doc’s message 9 times, each time he leaves
me both moved and inspired. Doc is a
Doc has an uncomfortable relationship with the term “hero.”
Many see his work and the efforts of his teams as heroic. CNN agreed, naming
him a CNN hero in 2009. But when I had lunch with Doc last Friday in Dallas, he
talked specifically how his teams are set up and how they operate. Hearing this
underscored for me why they have managed to be so successful.
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| Paulo Freire in 1991 |
Doc said that unlike other aide organizations, Wine to Water
goes out of their way to blend in. They don’t, for example, all wear matching shirts with Wine to Water logos. They work
closely with locals. By design, their teams are heavily made up of locals – the
people who live the problem, know the land, know the language and the customs, and
have a direct stake in solving the problem.
By operating this way, the local teams take on full
ownership. Instead of seeing themselves as passive receivers of instructions
from visitors, locals see themselves as active players – agents of change in
their communities.
The inspiring and insightful Brazilian educator Paulo Freire
wrote passionately about this subject. Freire wrote about how people must be
“subjects” who know and act and not “objects” who are known
and acted upon. Freire believed that dialogue is essential in all
contexts – including education or any situation which the goal is knowledge and
change.
He believed that to alienate people from their own
decision-making is oppression and preventing people from engaging in the process
of inquiry equates to violence.
When I returned home to Chicago last Friday, I found my copy
of Freire’s influential 1970 book, “Pedagogy of the Oppressed.” In it, I found
the quote:
“One cannot expect positive results from an educational or
political action program which fails to respect the particular view of the
world held by the people. Such a program constitutes cultural invasion, good
intentions notwithstanding.”
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| Me and Doc in Dallas |
Doc Hendley and his team bring people together. They help people
learn. They work with them to
collectively solve a very real problem by
figuring out the best way to access clean water. The solution is different in
each location – Honduras, Ethiopia, Nepal, Cambodia, Philippines, Dominican
Republic. When locals drive the effort, they will believe in it, improve it and
sustain it.
Yes, Doc and Wine to Water acts with urgency, compassion and
care. They are intelligent and resourceful people. They want to create a better
world. But I believe the reason they succeed is they understand they must
respect the locals, their voice, their views, their cultures and their ideas.
Doc understands that creating this bond with the locals and
pulling them together under the cause of clean water is what needs to happen. A
humble and passionate leader, Doc may shrink from the word “hero,” but I think
he’d agree that his techniques and methods have effectively created bands of
local heroes around the world that are making a big difference in people’s
lives.
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