About one month ago, my family and I moved to a new apartment. At first, I couldn’t be happier. I had gotten the biggest room from my other two sisters, I could wake up later because we were near my school and we were able to convince my dad to bring my dog. Everything was going great. As time went by, I started noticing that something was missing but I couldn’t tell what it was precisely. I thought my mom threw some of my things away or that I had lost a pair of shoes. I have been looking around for many days now, and nothing. What I didn’t know was that it was all about to change. Ring-ring, I looked at my phone’s screen and instantly understood what was missing. “I found it, that’s what’s missing!” I screamed at my phone, while my brother kept an ongoing awkward silence, trying to understand what was happening.
This is how I came to realize how one person can have a huge impact on a group and its daily routine. Since the day my brother left to college, the culture in my house hasn’t been the same. The person I used to wake up and annoy every Sunday morning and ask help for my math homework wasn’t there anymore. My routine was broken. After thinking about it for many hours, I noticed that although there was a different vibe at home, it wasn’t necessarily worse. My family was out of its comfort zone for many weeks after my brother left, but we worked collectively to get over it and construct a new culture that would keep us together. Something similar occurred two weeks ago, when one of our Innovation Academy family members left us. Emilio wasn’t just another student of the cohort, he was a key member of the team. I instantly noticed a difference in the class’ vibe, the level of energy and the interaction among members wasn’t the same. After my brother’s call, I understood that I had to change my mentality and think open-mindedly in order to find a solution to this spontaneous change in our culture. In the process of looking for this solution, I began questioning what is currently occurring in our culture. I thought of and analyzed the systems we are working on and I couldn’t find one that needed to be removed. I also thought of new systems that could be added, but the idea is not to load the class with unpurposeful habits. Nevertheless, I do believe that with time we are going to get rid of those that are not bringing our cohort together and helping us work purposefully and collaboratively. To be completely honest, I don't know exactly what needs to change in order to have this perfect culture we are all so obsessed with having. Maybe we are not even looking for the answer in the adequate question; I really don’t know. What I do know is that the first step into solving a problem is realizing that there is one to solve. We need to work harder and question what we are constantly doing in the building of our culture, and who knows, maybe we’ll end up finding it in the process--as a team.
2 Comments
Chiara Dasso
8/29/2016 11:35:26 am
Ari, I really like the way you reflected on change and how can it affect our class culture and habits. The personal anecdote you shared truly connects with the main idea you try to convey, making the readers engage from the very start.
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Corey Topf
9/3/2016 08:48:04 am
Ari, solid post. This is an important topic, and it definitely connects to your passion for human resources. In fact, one of the things I suggested is that you could be the cohort culture leader. Read back through the feedback here and let me know what you think (https://diigo.com/08v1jt).
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