Diversity is one of the most important aspects of growing a great team.
No matter where you are in life or the world, it is almost always pertinent to grow and develop. It may be to advance yourself or the project you are working on, the manufacturing processes that complete widgets or to grow the company as a whole to satisfy shareholders. In order to do this successfully it is important to have input from people with various backgrounds and experiences.
A great example of this was when I was a part of the Apprentice Jaycees and every third Sunday of the month we would purchase food and run a soup kitchen at a local church. One of our new members that we had recently onboarded and attended the soup kitchen offered some insight. He had a heightened awareness of the struggles of homeless people, our target audience of our soup kitchens. He said that one thing he knew from his experiences was that in addition to food and clothes, homeless people also appreciated hair cuts. He said that he had experience cutting hair and would ensure the sanitization of the tools between each use if we were to figure out a way to work something out with the church to offer the service to their customers.
We were able to make it happen and sure enough, the homeless members were so excited to be able to get their hair cut. They were so appreciative and it was such a success and rewarding experience to know that we were growing our purpose in the community to help them become more presentable when interviewing for jobs.
This was a great opportunity to showcase influencing others because our member brought the knowledge and experience and the church had the rest. They were already doing what they could to support the community and we knew that anything we had to offer to progress the state of the homeless was in their best interest for them to obtain independence.
This experience helped me with my future goals because it taught me to hear people out and give people a chance. We don’t know everything individually, but collectively we can make a difference and bring so much more good than if we were alone. This means as a leader, now and in the future, I need to listen to people’s ideas. Even if I don’t appreciate the immediate thought, if I give someone the chance to show what they bring to the table it may be a game changing idea for the team as a whole.