Mid-Year Stats
Here we are mid-year. Just tallied up some numbers:
I have been to 47 different communities so far this year (some more than once) and other OrgCode team members have been to a dozen more.
I have logged more than 100,000 air miles so far this year. That is the equivalent of going around the globe about four times.
About 850 people Like the OrgCode FaceBook page. (facebook.com/orgcode)
About 1,100 people follow me on Twitter. (@orgcode)
More than 105,000 viewers have come to the blog. (wow)
The most popular blog of the year (so far)? 10 Things to Keep in Mind if You are Serious About Ending Homelessness
OrgCode went from two owners to one (me) earlier this year.
“SPDAT” and “OrgCode” are the two most popular terms that lead people to our website through search engines.
110% is what we give it every time we make a presentation, speech or training session. Okay, not quite accurate. Just 100%. I was trying to sound like a jock there with the sports cliché.
1 is the average number of nights I spend at home each week.
Lives impacted through our work? Not sure. We hope a few.
Here’s to the second half of the year and the pursuit of being awesome.
Be Awesome
When I say “be awesome” to people or as a closing to an email, it isn’t something I say lightly. I say it because I want people to inspire awe in others. Our world needs more awe.
Here are some six random ideas on how I think you can be awesome:
Be really passionate about something meaningful for the world (beyond your own needs). Learn the most you can about it. Practice it. Commit to get better and better and better at it.
Find someone that inspires awe in you. Talk with them about how they inspire that awe. Ask them questions about their talents and the things they have learned along the way from successes and moments of painful learning. Mentorship is super cool.
Make even better mistakes tomorrow. It is inspiring to watch brave attempts rather than the ho-hum of planned mediocrity and failed nothingness.
Be your own person. Conformity does not inspire awe. What is amazing is someone with honed critical thinking skills that doesn’t come across as a dick or a know it all. What is amazing is someone that has come to peace with who they are – all the way around. What is amazing is someone that continues to evolve the more they learn about who they are and experiment with their talents and personality in different settings. For some this is quiet reflection and well-chosen moments to speak and a lifetime of active listening. For others this is boisterous rallying of the masses. People that are their own people come off as legit in a range of settings that play to their talents.
Always try to be worthy of the highest esteem of others. Some examples that come to mind: Standing up in front of a group of people to talk about an important issue? Do it with integrity and honesty and commitment to do your best possible. Have to convince politicians of a new way of doing things or a unique way of thinking about a complex social issue? Do it with intelligence and passion. Need to provide advice or direction to others? Do it with sincerity and sufficient explanation.
Have the fortitude to stand up to injustice – always – because it is a characteristic of awesomeness. These are people that don’t just do it when it is convenient. These are people that do it with each living breath. It is amazing and truly awe inspiring to watch stigma, prejudice, inequality, sexism, racism – and the like – tackled head on, with panache and grace.
Be awesome. It is our greatest responsibility – to leave our mark on the world and each other in the most incredible way we possibly can.
The Non-judgmental Practitioner
Thoreau famously stated, “It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.”
In discerning about how to write this blog – in my reflections and prayers (yes, I pray – or at least try to) – I have thought hard about how to describe being non-judgmental without coming across as, well, judgmental.
Rabbi Hillel in Ethics of the Fathers is quoted as saying, “Do not judge your fellow until you are in his place.” In the 7th Chapter of the Matthew in the New Testament it reads, “Judge not, that you not be judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove the speck from your eye’; and look, a plank is in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”
Am I suggesting you have to be religious or spiritual to understand judgment and the importance of non-judgment? No. I just happen to think these particular pieces provide guidance to me on how I think about how to be a non-judgmental practitioner.
Am I willing to accept that how homeless (or formerly homeless) people in my community live their lives is not something that I can or should judge? Or do my own values influence how I see the issue? Can I frame my thinking from an ethical standpoint (rules within a specific context to determine what is right or wrong)? Or do my morals override (how things should work or be understood as right or wrong based upon my individual ideals)?
Some examples…
You live an abstinent lifestyle but have service participants that use alcohol and other drugs. Your own morals may suggest abstinence is best – perhaps because of your own personal experience or religious beliefs.
You are personally against abortion and believe that life starts at conception. The laws of the land indicate that abortion is legal, and you may have female clients that are seeking assistance with knowing the whereabouts of an abortion clinic.
You believe that sex outside of marriage is sinful. Yet unmarried clients you are supporting may be seeking condoms to prevent disease or pregnancy.
You are against corporal punishment. However, it remains legal in domestic/home settings where you live. You see parents spanking or hand-slapping their children after the child has done something wrong.
See my point?
I have come to accept that I am remarkably flawed human being. I have so many faults that I am on the precipice of being perfectly imperfect. Do I want to be judged? Goodness knows I judge myself plenty. I don’t need someone else doing it too. I know the areas of my life that I suck at…some are a work in progress, some are on the to-do list, and others are on the “I have accepted it will always be there and now let’s move on” list.
But it isn’t because I have an exhaustive list of defects that I cannot and will not judge others.
It is because I have learned to accept that the people I serve will be different than me. This makes them no better or worse – just different. There are laws and due processes that we, as a society, have put into place to deal with the bigger stuff like murder and abuse and victimization and exploitation. The other stuff? Unless I am ready to hold a mirror shoulder high and say it to myself (gulp) I am certainly not in a position to pass any commentary on others. I haven’t walked a mile in their shoes nor can I point out the sawdust in their eye when there is a log in my own. Or from the wisdom of Thoreau, am I willing to see all the strengths and opportunities within the person, or is what I see only the defects and shortcomings and past mistakes? Guess it depends on what I see. I hope to see the good in everyone.
Wow – That is a Big Number
This is a short, supplemental blog to acknowledge the amazing achievement that the 100K Homes Campaign and the Campaign Communities reached today, announcing that the goal has been surpassed (101,628 of which over 30,000 were Veterans).
Whether your community participated in the campaign or not, you need to learn from what they were able to accomplish.
Others may outline this better than I, but here is what I have taken away from the experience:
Have steadfast fixity of purpose and don’t waiver from it.
Set a target that stretches you beyond your comfort zone.
Appreciate that imperfect action trumps perfect planning…much is to be learned from the art of doing.
Put together a kick-ass leadership team.
Create excitement amongst service providers and celebrate their awesomeness and leverage their expertise.
Don’t lose sight of the people that you serve…the homeless persons that receive housing.
Prioritize who gets housed rather than creaming or first come, first served.
Pull in geniuses like the Rapid Results Institute to accelerate change even more.
Challenge dominant thinking in a community if that dominant thinking is entrenched in ineffective ways of doing things.
Stay on message in talking about your achievements.
This campaign may go down as the greatest game changer that has ever happened in the sector. High five to every homeless person housed through the campaign; high five to every campaign community; high five to every elected official and government employee that supported the campaign; high five to every volunteer that participated in a registry week; high five to Community Solutions and the 100K Homes Campaign team.
Compassion
Those who work on social matters – by and large – are people filled with compassion, or at least initially attracted to the work because of their strong sense of compassion.
‘Compassion’ is a beautiful noun, initially born from the Latin ‘compati’ which means “to suffer with”. In essence, compassion is solidarity coupled with tenderness and mercy, and a steadfast resolve to alleviate and conquer hardship.
Much has been written about the need for improved data in addressing and solving social issues – and that is a good thing. Much has been written about the need for strategic and informed programming and policy development grounded in evidence – and that is also a good thing. There is an increasing understanding of compassion fatigue and the impacts that has on helpers – and this is good knowledge to have.
But we should never lose sight of the compassion that drives most people to address social issues in the first place. It is for this reason that I know with absolute certainty that there are only ever going to be six types of people that need your compassion:
Someone’s mother
Someone’s father
Someone’s sister
Someone’s brother
Someone’s daughter
Someone’s son
These are the only people with whom we shall ever suffer with, and these will always be those most deserving of a steadfast fixity of purpose to ensure their hardship is alleviated and resolved. Keep this in mind and you can exert the fullest potential of your compassion.
#YESALLHOMELESSWOMEN
I am not an expert on women’s issues, women’s safety, women’s empowerment, or women’s health, nor do I claim to have specific expertise on women’s homelessness. Like many of my male friends, the #YESALLWOMEN hashtag experience exposed me to some of the most sensitive, personal, violent, demeaning and unacceptable experiences of many female friends. It was jarring, but important learning for me on the magnitude and far reach of women’s experiences with men – and both threats and experiences of violence.
Reading this helped me put some of what was happening into context. While I have intentionally applied a gender lens to matters of homelessness in specific projects, I have more to learn. I knew, for example, that women face higher degrees of exploitation and higher rates of sexual assault than males that are experiencing homelessness, but recent events caused me to look deeper into the issue.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the literature on sexual assault episodes and homeless women point to several limitations in capturing data from the population. Part of this stems from under-reporting within an already vulnerable and marginalized population (on top of generally accepted under-reporting of rape and sexual assault generally), as well as the experience of homeless persons engaging with police generally. All the same, as I read through scholarly articles and other publications, here is a smattering of what I learned:
homeless women are likely to have experienced sexual assault before, during and even after their experience of homelessness;
because victimization often is a precipitating factor for women’s homelessness, any approach to addressing homelessness than uses a “law and order” rather than a service driven response presents greater risks for retraumatizing women;
while rates of sexual assault have generally gone down, this same trend is not experienced with homeless women where the rates of sexual assault have remained unchanged;
homeless women are more likely to experience multiple victimizations from multiple perpetrators;
almost two-thirds of homeless women have experienced intimate partner violence as adults;
over the past 12 months, greater than 1 in 10 homeless women report being raped – and over half of these report being raped more than once;
approximately 1 in 5 homeless women will have been raped at some point in her lifetime;
impacts of the sexual assault are both physical and psychological, with higher rates of depression, suicide attempts and ideation, and dependent use of alcohol or other drugs to deal with the effects;
homeless women are disproportionately victims of hate speech;
one study from the mid 1990s even found that some men even saw a woman’s homelessness as a “license for sexual abuse”;
undoubtedly, homelessness is a risk factor for sexual assault.
So what is to be done? We can take steps to improve safety for homeless women. Here are 10 ideas that have crossed my mind or examples that I have seen in practice in other jurisdictions:
Focus on housing as the solution to homelessness. Safe, secure and affordable housing decreases the likelihood of experiencing sexual assault.
Through outreach and shelters, expand knowledge of available sexual assault resources within the community to help address and work on recovery from past experiences.
Further educate outreach workers – especially street outreach workers – on how best to work with women they encounter that have experienced sexual violence and/or victimization, and how to work with law enforcement in report it.
Provide adequate women’s only shelter resources in community – beyond Domestic and Intimate Partner Violence Shelter – for homeless women. A stand-alone, safe facility is preferred. However, if in a shared facility, a separate entrance with appropriate staffing and secure sleeping area is possible as an alternative.
Expand access to women’s health resources through health services available to homeless persons.
Address stigma, sexism and inappropriate comments and actions amongst service providers, government programs, and other homeless persons where/if it is encountered.
Integrate education of homeless women’s issues into orientation to homeless services for new employees.
Expand integrated offerings of homeless women’s issues into conferences at a local and national level – not solely as a “special track” but as a core element to presentations, seminars and workshops.
As resources allow, permit formerly homeless women to select a woman as a case manager, if preferred.
Integrate local sexual assault resources and law enforcement specializing in matters of sexual assault with homeless service provision rather than separate systems to be navigated (and re-telling of experience thereby potentially re-traumatizing).
Want to know more? A small example of the research that exists on the subject:
The University of Ottawa’s Institute for the Prevention of Crime: Homelessnesss, Victimization and Crime, 2008.
Novac, S., Brown, J., & Bourbonnais, C. (1996). No Room of Her Own: A Literature Review on Women and Homelessness. Ottawa: Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation.
No Safe Place: Sexual Assault in the Lives of Homeless Wome by Lisa A. Goodman, Ph.D., Katya Fels, & Catherine Glenn, M.A. with contributions from Judy Benitez
Victimization and Special Challenges of Women. Ontario Women’s Justice Network, 2008.
Tyler et al. The Effects of Early Sexual Abuse on Later Sexual Victimization Among Female Homeless and Runaway AdolescentsJournal of Interpersonal Violence. March 2000, Volume 15, No. 3, 235-250.
The Street Health Report, 2007.