Blog - Page 26 of 46 - Rowan Spazzoli

The Friday Shoutout: The Bulungula Incubator

In February I attended the first Bertha Centre collective at the UCT GSB. The guest speaker was Réjane Woodroffe, the founder of the Bulungula incubator. She spoke about her personal journey and how she went on to found the incubator (you can listen to the audio from the session here)

Réjane’s story is really interesting. She grew up in the cape flats and studied a Business Science degree at UCT. After this she spent a few years in investment banking before founding the incubator.

On the website the incubator is described as follows:

WE ARE a non-profit organisation established in 2007 although our work in the area began in 2004 with the establishment of the eco-sustainable and award winning community owned, Bulungula Lodge (www.bulungula.com). We are located in a remote rural area known as the Xhora Mouth Administrative Area which is based in the Mbhashe municipality on the Wild Coast of the Eastern Cape. The Mbhashe municipality is one of the poorest in the country.

And their mission is as follows:

OUR MISSION is to be a catalyst in the creation of vibrant and sustainable rural communities. We work with our community members from CONCEPTION to CAREER with an integrated development strategy in education, health and nutrition and sustainable livelihoods. All projects are designed, prioritised, implemented and managed in partnership with our community and through traditional and elected leadership structures.

What makes Bulungula different

Apart from being an incredible, award winning social enterprise, there are a few things that really stand out for me that make this organisation different:

The founders live in the area with the community.
Every 5 years, the founders leave the project entirely on its own to function for a few months. The reason for this is that they want it to be as sustainable as possible and not depend on them.
The community is involved in the decision making and running of the project
The organisation is owned by the community through a trust. All the profits are fed back in to the community directly
The incubator focuses on all aspects of development. They look at everything from education to employment and health.

If you’d like to find out more about this organisation, check out this video (it’s only 4min and really amazing) or visit their website.

I’m really inspired by the work done at the Bulungula Incubator and can’t wait to see it continue to grow 🙂

Image is of the Storms River canyon in the Eastern Cape, taken when I visited the area in 2016 🙂

Song of the day: Roses - Chainsmokers

Blog 152/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

Published by rspazzoli on April 13, 2018 | Permalink

Ignoring the evidence

After speaking to various stakeholders on my current consulting project, we realised that the existing plans have major flaws. Essentially, the client is spending a huge amount of money unnecessarily. The product they want to build already exists. But they have chosen to ignore the evidence

It may be one of the most frustrating things I’ve encountered in my work. They commissioned us to make a recommendation but, in essence, have already decided what they want to do.

In theory, once you come up with a superior strategy it should be easy to implement. But in reality this depends on a myriad of political and social forces.

The sad truth is that you can get as much help as you want. But if you ignore the evidence, you are no better off than when you began.

Image was taken this morning from our apartment 🙂

Song of the day: Peter Cincotti - Goodbye Philadelphia

Blog 151/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

Published by rspazzoli on April 12, 2018 | Permalink

Seeing students graduate

One of the things I love most about teaching/lecturing is seeing my students graduate. This past week I was able to witness this with two different groups of students. My MTIP students graduated with their PGDip in Management and my Strategic Thinking students B.Bus.Sci degrees.

It’s a great feeling to know that in some way, however small it might have been, you contributed to their learning. And now they’re going to use those skills out in the real world.

Image is of a tutorial that one of my students handed in in 2014. They had given it to a friend to hand in, and left them with a few post it notes. The friend submitted it without removing these post it notes. One of the notes (in Orange) says “I’m drunk” :’). I never let her live it down.

Song of the day: Able - Plush

Blog 151/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

Published by rspazzoli on April 11, 2018 | Permalink

Nostalgia

I experienced multiple waves of nostalgia over the course of today. The morning was spent packing up my childhood room, which involved the rediscovery of many old artefacts, and much time reliving old memories. It took way longer than it should have but I was enjoying the experience so much.

This afternoon I walked around my old school and saw the changes that have taken place since I’ve been gone. I bumped into teachers that taught me geography, life orientation, history, guitar, and biology. I told them about all the work I’m doing and they told me about how different the students are from when I was around. (On a really cool note, I found out my geography teacher occasionally reads this blog!)

Finally, this evening I played garden football with my little brother, finished off with a swim. We used to do this frequently when I was in matric, and it felt like things hadn’t changed a bit (except that he’s bigger than me now, and he’s 13!).

Because of this I’ve been thinking about the value of nostalgia. And there are two realisations I’ve had.

Nostalgia as safety

One element to nostalgia is that of it being a protective mental space. If things aren’t going well in life, we use it as a safe space we can retreat to in our heads. A way of escaping from our present existence.

The problem with this is that we are often selective when it comes to what we are nostalgic about. We polish up the memories, ignore the bad bits and use this “clean” memory as a retreat. In reality, that memory might not have been as good as we remember.

And this makes it more painful. Because you remember it only as having being a better time. For example, high school was a lot less complex than my life is now, and it’s easy to retreat into thinking about those days. But I also experience some really bad downs, particularly in grade 9, and so the memory isn’t all rosy.

So, nostalgia can be used as a safety mechanism and a peaceful reflection, but this needs to be done with the awareness that the past wasn’t all perfect.

Nostalgia as a yardstick

Another use of nostalgia is as a benchmark, which to me is a much more productive exercise. You can reflect on where you were in the past, and how much you have grown since then. This allows you to visualise and unpack your path, and often makes you realise you’ve developed far more than you previously thought.

An example of this was looking through my old matric dance photos. I remembered that at the dances I went to, I was incredibly nervous. Large events like that terrified me, and so did the afterparties. Nowadays, though, I thrive in those sort of environments.

A little more nostalgia

Tomorrow I’ll be doing some more packing and visiting my matric maths teacher. I’ll be served a little more nostalgia, but I’ll aim to put it to use as a yardstick more than using it as safety.

In either case, the reflecting has been a great journey. And it’s so cool to see how far I’ve come.

PS: today is blog number 150!

Image was taken at my old school this afternoon 🙂

Song of the day: Ten feet tall- Afrojack

Blog 150/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

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Published by rspazzoli on April 10, 2018 | Permalink

Internalising

The project that I’ve been working on for the last few months has gone wrong a number of times. There have been delays by the clients, the stakeholders and us as the consultants.

This is understandable. The project was complex and there were a number of unexpected hurdles that we came across.

The problem is that I began internalising a lot of this. I began to convince myself that this was my fault. That I had messed up. And that I had been bad at my work.

In reality, there were a number of people that were equally responsible. A portion of the blame could be allocated to me, within reason. But I was not responsible for the entire project. So the delays weren’t my fault.

Re-externalising

This process of internalising the failures may take place on it’s own. We may be conditioned to do this for various reasons.

But it’s important to re-externalise it. To understand that there is a network of responsibility and you are only a single actor in it. And it is outside of your control.

By doing this, we don’t get left feeling like the failure is our own. And we slowly unlearn the impostor syndrome that many of us have grown accustomed to.

Image was taken while we were on the Gautrain this afternoon 🙂

Song of the day: Indiana Jones Theme Song

Blog 149/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

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Published by rspazzoli on April 9, 2018 | Permalink

Tell someone when you miss them

The Headspace app that I use sends out notifications during the day with some great quotes and suggestions. There was one the other day that said something along the lines of “If you miss someone, give them a call.”

This struck quite a cord with me. I often find myself drifting off and getting nostalgic about a past event or an old friend.

So yesterday I was thinking about a friend I made in Switzerland. And how I missed her. And how I hadn’t heard from her in a while.

I then fired off a quick voice note, and woke up to a wonderful reply from her.

So if you miss someone, get in contact with them. Even if it’s a quick call, voice note or message. It’s a great way to bring you back in from the nostalgia and connect with someone in the present.

Image was taken at the wine farm where we had brunch this morning 🙂

Song of the day: Boston- Augustana

Blog 148/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

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Published by rspazzoli on April 8, 2018 | Permalink

Camp talks

There’s something special that happens when a group of people go camping (or, generally, when they’re away together on holiday). There comes a point at night when the conversation always seems to go further than it would under any other circumstances.

The evenings will start with general small talk. But at some point the conversation will turn towards taboo topics. And everyone begins to open up.

I’m not sure why this is the case. I do know that it is in these rare moments and conversations that I’ve learnt an incredible amount about myself and others.

I don’t think these conversions should ever be planned or forced. But it is possible to create the environment for them, and the opportunity for people to open up .

They’re a special little pocket that allow for people to be vulnerable. And, more importantly, it allows them to develop their friendship in a way that might not have been possible before.

Image was taken at the farm we’re staying on tonight 🙂 (image isn’t loading as the signal on the farm is bad but I’ll upload it soon)

Song of the day: Adele- Someone like you

Blog 147/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

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Published by rspazzoli on April 7, 2018 | Permalink

The Friday Shoutout: GreenCape

Over the past few weeks I’ve been given the opportunity to learn a little about an organisation called Green Cape. So who are they? As per their website:

GreenCape support businesses and investors in the green economy to remove barriers to establishment and growth. We also support local, provincial and national government to build a resilient green economy.

So basically, GreenCape is an agency that pulls together all the actors in the green economy and catalyses green growth in the Western Cape. Their work spans a wide range of things, from waste management and renewable energy to green finance and water management.

If you’re interested in this kind of work I’d highly recommend checking out their website. Their market intelligence reports are fascinating and they’ve got really interesting news and career opportunities.

Looking forward to everything that comes from them in the future!

Image was taken at in Franschoek this week 🙂

Song of the day: Seinabo Sey - Younger (Kygo Remix)

Blog 146/365. Read more about my #365of25 journey here

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Published by rspazzoli on April 6, 2018 | Permalink