♠ Faith in Others, Faith in Ourself

I remembered there was once a time in my life where I was involved in a teambuilding program.

I remembered what it took me to join that program.

I was working for another company, doing a different job description from the position offered. And I knew it was a temporary setback cos I wanted to learn programming, to do programming.

Then I heard how other ppl joined a particular program offered by the government for freshies without any job experience.

And I took a gamble though I've already got a job. Then I followed up and prayed. How I prayed.

It's odd that in many of the milestones in my life, I've been praying extra hard. I'm legit for most, but in Malaysia, stranger things have happened.

After I got it, I kept to myself that sweet little victory. That as much as I'd like to say I did everything myself, prayers do help.

Sometimes when I joined those classes, I think to myself. When a thing is being offered without effort given, ppl do not appreciate it as much. I truly enjoyed every moment cos I made the effort to call up many times, fill in the application forms and followed up and made lotsa preparations for the interviews and preparing my resumes till I get the correct image I wanted to portray. It was like my personality split into 3; uniquely still me, the inexperienced trainee and the potential employer. I re-read all the documents just so I'd be passed off as a legit potential for them to take on.

And I was offered a spanking position at a vendor's location, which I had problem reaching cos I didnt have any transport of my own. I told myself, "Taxi at first, then I'll work it out later."

After a while, I moved to a place near to the company.

I make a lot of effort to be heard; learning by myself and from scratch, without mentor cos the current mentor was applying his effort towards a senior trainee who in my opinion, was wasting his time there cos he had no passion for his work; he never made any effort to learn.

In my opinion; a person do not need to be talented to do something, all they need is preseverence and not give up attitude. It's only matter of time for a talentless-but-hardworking person to catch up to a genius. Remember Gattaca?

That mentor made me do a lot of documentations, mostly cos I'm female and female's good at documentation. I grit my teeth and did it in my best knowledge; reading up other works and apply it to my work. One time he asked me "Could you speed up the documentation?" and I answered, "Sure, but I wouldnt do a good job" which was heard by everyone in the office as it was open cubicle. I was through being pushed around, and even if I was doing something I hated, I'd rather eat dirt than to do it half-hearted.

My effort was not overlooked by another mentor who helped me made my mark, gave me confidence that I was on the right path. He gave me my opportunity, and it set me off as a serious developer. All those self-learning effort paid off, finally.

While I was working as a trainee, I too took part in organising the teambuilding's first gathering. It took a lot of my time as I do not have any transport. But I made the effort; taking lrts to meeting places, hitching rides..just making the time for the meetings, which mostly happens after work or during weekends. Having friends help a lot in getting transportation problems out of the way.

I remembered the group which was organising the event had a lot of problem getting it's own group members to believe themselves in carrying it off; not enough time, will ppl actually go, what's the itinerary, how many will actually go and lots more.

I merely listened and judged the timeline, thinking to myself if we start extreme marketing, we just might get there. So I told them when my department's head starting to fidget; "If ppl didnt watch movies for 1 time a month, for a couple of months, they'd have the entrance fee ready." cos they were worried the amount we set was too high, considering none of us was actually on working salary that time.

That made a lot of ppl's indecision cleared up, cos if ppl are willing to pay for movies, they are willing to pay for a food-mingling gathering; simple rhetorical comparison. And my dept head tho looked still contemplative, he's willing to go the way if we'd support him all the way. A friend and me was under him that time, and we were supposedly to get the news hot and running. And the time's left 8 months to get 150 fresh trainees to join the gathering.

It was the turning point. No more questions bout how, where or if.

I remembered I did a lot of research on how to contact all team members without costing too much. I got connections to get the list of the trainees and their hp and send massive sms to them, that time yahoo had a beta version which enables sms to be sent thru emails. Then I took lotsa pics from the teambuilding programs and montages with invitations added to build the excitement. Everybody was excited and I got to know lotsa ppl whom I could name off my list, which was a long list. My other team members were wrecking their brains as well while not disrupting our daily job.

For me, time is more precious than money. Cos time equals to effort. And tho effort has a price, our tasks were eating into our personal time for something that pays us nothing. My teamate made the effort to call up to book the place, catering and gifts..all done voluntarily and without needs to be assigned. It was amicable, and I respect her a lot for that. And I respect a lot of our effort that time too, cos we did a lot without being asked and really go the distance, something which money cant buy.

All of us delegated and supported one another. We constantly reassured the teamlead a lot cos the teamlead was smoking a lot during that time I remembered, haha..but we all hold our ends.

We didnt manage to hit the target of 150 believers, but we got 80. It wasnt ideal, but we got the first gathering to start, meaning the rest of the annual gatherings will pick up.

I learnt during the endless meetings and discussions that when one trust the other ppl to do something with guidelines clearly stated, it can be done. It's called having faith in others.

The guidelines are needed cos I remembered in another gathering event, a person offered it's group members that he would pay the exact same amount for each tix they bought. Which for me is insane cos it's wasted effort, de-mines the effort the committee's done and money doesnt solve everything. End of the day, clear outline of guidelines are needed.

I had no experience in organising an event, which was good news for me cos anything goes short of stalking. The thing I love most is when there's no limit set, I can do just about anything and learn from trials and errors. It was great.

And I knew I was a great supporter; a person who supports another into reaching their goals or a teamplayer. My character never lets me to overide over the other person, the only expectations I was trying to prove was mine, if I get overexcited, that's cos I know I can do it, skies' the limit.

The freshie program was called MDC Internship, the teambuilding program was called Leadership and Teambuilding Program (LTP), which had been changed to Keepers of the Flame (KOTF) by the D'JunglePeople.

I learnt a lot from that out-of-comfort-zone sessions. And I meet lotsa ppl whom became friends.

This post is for my sisters; I dont know how to do a lot of things either. I learn as I go, thus you can too.