I’d love to have written this, but credit goes to Seth Godin, one of my favourite bloggers:

There is never enough time – you just have to decide.

This week we released a video with the aim of helping people to explain what we do, and why we do it.

I am delighted with the results that Jem Patel and JSP Media have come up with.

When we filmed the video in November, I remember having to really focus my thoughts on what we do and the way that we do it.

Now that the production is finished – I’m glad that it comes across loud and clear:

There’s a big problem – people are in pain – if you want to make a difference, you can – but for goodness sake TRAIN people, empower people, build capacity. Otherwise your efforts will be shortlived and have a limited effect. Ultimately, sadly, they may well be a waste of your time, and inadvertently, you will dis-empower the very people you are trying to help.

The video is in the About Us – Movie link above.

It’s 15 minutes long (so grab a coffee before you watch it). Enjoy.

If you followed our ’12 days of Christmas’ on Facebook, you’ll know that last year was an incredible one for Bridge2Aid.

Together with our donors and volunteers, a huge amount was achieved right across the organisation.

We trained 47 Clinical Officers in emergency dentistry, completed refurbishment works at Bukumbi, and ran a very successful dental clinic. We also delivered a very high standard of administration in the UK, with record high satisfaction scores from our volunteers, and a huge amount raised and donated by our supporters.

On the surface – it looks great. And it is.

But it came at a cost – we had to work REALLY hard to make it happen!

Like a duck moving across a pond, it’s all smooth on the surface, but in order to make progress, the duck is paddling furiously under the surface.

One of the things I am most proud of in our team is the work ethic they embody. There is a lot of paddling going on every day!

They also work with a great deal of creativity – if there’s a way to make something work, we’ll find it! This is so important, particularly in Tanzania where things frequently go wrong or get delayed – like the 2 DVP sites that we lost 1 week and 3 weeks before the programme was due to start, the constant delays to flights, transportation or severe weather, last minute changes in government personnel, or an official who decides that today is the day he is going to be less than co-operative…

So as you read the 12 days, and it all looks to have gone really well (and it has!), please remember that every achievement has been more than paid for with sweat and (in some cases) tears, (but thankfully no blood), by the B2A team, our volunteers, and fantastic fundraisers.

If you were part of the story this year – thank you, and well done. If you would like to be part of the 2012 story – please have a look around the site, and if you see something you would like to help with, get in touch. We have lots of ways for you to become part of making a big difference in the lives of many, many people in the year ahead.

Happy New Year!

This week’s blog is a V-Log with some thoughts on the year ahead.

For a while now we’ve been putting together little movies with testimonials from our returning volunteers. If you haven’t seen one yet, I recommend having a look.

By the way it wasn’t my rubbish camera work or editing that inspired me – it was that one of the most consistent comments made was that the volunteers found Bridge2Aid DVP to be a professional and well organised programme.

That’s great to hear, because professionalism is one of our core values.

There are a large number of people who help to deliver each DVP, some more involved than others, but each one works hard to ensure that the programme is a success – that the clinical training is effective, that the volunteers are well looked after and that every possible detail is covered.

Results like this I think are the outcome of 4 key things:

• Who are we – the team are all people that are passionate and skilled – giving everything to achieve a great result
• How we work – as a team we work systematically, yes (I like systems!), but we also work creatively. Things go wrong – fact. How we respond to them is what I believe makes the difference.
• Why we do it – each one of the B2A team believes that people shouldn’t have to suffer in pain for days, weeks and months.
• What we believe about our work. For me it’s about being the best version of myself that I can be – using my unique skills, abilities and personality, and doing the best work I can – finding that extra 10%…

It has been great to see this in action over the programmes that we have run during this past year, and the same things are also evident from the tremendous work the UK team are doing – many of them work remotely from each other. To do this and still get results is not easy.

With more expansion on the horizon for 2012, and a larger group of people in both hemispheres engaged in the work, we’re determined to keep building. With the team’s commitment and our volunteers’ fabulous contributions, we’re going to help a lot more people.

One of the important things that I do regularly is meeting with the Tanzania advisors. I’ve made it a priority since I first became CEO. I feel it’s crucial to regularly chat through where the organisation is heading, update them and generally spend some time with them.

It has been a great experience.  The  advisors are a fantastic bunch, and I learned a huge amount from the hours I have spent with each one. One thing that struck me again and again from the meetings is that you just don’t know what you don’t know. Read it again, it will make sense I promise!

I meet people from time to time who will tell you with great authority just how thing are. Unfortunately, there are often blind spots in their knowledge which become obvious – they aren’t aware that their lack of knowledge, sometimes combined with a lack of humility, are making themselves look, well, a bit stupid…

I’m hope that as a team we don’t operate that way. We want to be an organisation that has the humility to acknowledge that we don’t know what we don’t know, and are open to the opinions of others, whether they be inside or outside Bridge2Aid. I want to sit with people who have experience or knowledge that I don’t have, ask questions, have an open mind, learn from them, have the ‘pennies drop’ in my understanding.

It can only make me a richer person, and able to do what I do better.

What about you – when was the last time you realised you didn’t know what you didn’t know?

I am frequently amazed by the resourcefulness of the people here. Among the many lessons that I have learned during the past 6 years is one about how my Western ‘throw away’ culture is more to do with habit than it is to do with the real necessity to throw things away. People here just seem to make things last longer.

This of course has both its positive and negative sides…

On the negative side, it seems that the involvement of a vehicle in a road traffic accident, causing irreparable damage to the chassis does not necessarily mean that the vehicle will be written off. Anyone who has visited a developing country can testify to this – the site of a bus/oil tanker/truck coming down the road towards you at an angle (or crabbing as it is called here) is somewhat disconcerting. The solution to damage in an accident seems to be just weld it back together and hope for the best!

But on the positive side there are many examples of people being resourceful and recycling things to extend their life. The reality of course is that this is borne out of necessity with people not being able to afford to replace things just because they have some damage.

A great example of this came about as a result of a poor purchasing decision I made a few months ago. In my rush to get a notice board on the office wall I bought a cheap Chinese import. On closer inspection it became clear it was constructed with cardboard, loosely covered with felt fabric material and bound together by a flimsy aluminium frame.

When the frame fell to the ground (as a result of some poor drilling – again on my part) the frame fractured and the cardboard inner came away from the felt. In frustration I ‘placed’ the offending items outside of the office as rubbish, to be taken away.

Said notice board disappeared and I thought nothing more of it.

Until about one week later said notice board reappeared in my office with the following repairs made to the back.

Once I’d got over my embarrassment I was immensely impressed by the resourcefulness of the guys who work for Bridge2Aid. Rather than follow through on my petulant reaction by throwing something out, they just took it away and got it it fixed.

It makes you think – how much is my response in throwing things like this away down to necessity, and how much of it is down to habit?

Suffice to say that I’m a bit more careful nowadays, more appreciative of the things that I do have, and more determined to make them last as long as possible.

Another lesson learned.