My Experiences of Poverty. Blog action day for Poverty – 2008

Poverty, has a broad definition in most places and in conjunction with Blog Action Day I am going to write about my experiences of Poverty.

My first experience of poverty is a personal one. I was 4 years old and my Dad was out of work for a year. To keep us in food he fished in the Thames a lot, and possibly done things he shouldn’t have to keep a roof over his and our heads. I don’t recall a lot about this time, other than we ate fish a lot. I still love fish, but my younger sister hates it, she can recall this time vividly it appears. I didn’t know it but we were below the breadline, we officially lived in poverty that year.

The next time I encountered it, it was 21 years later when I started my recruitment career. I couldnt understand why certain clients would not comply with my requests to smarten up, wear a suit and try to get a job. So, my boss the formidable Kansongo Tchinyama (a.k.a Maurice) taught me some lessons that I will never forget, and the first one was to find out about my candidates.

It turns out, I was recruiting in the welfare to work sector, and the candidates had been out of work 6 months or had never worked. They were often here as refugees or asylum seekers, and then granted permission to stay, and then after several years they were allowed to look for work.

Their self esteem was on the floor.

Image via Wikipedia

Some had lived in UN refugee camps, their they are not allowed to plant seeds and grow vegetables because that means it may be considered a permanent residence. One lived for 2 years out of a hemp bag the size of a carrier bag. They were not allowed to be self sufficient, they were encouraged to become dependants – proud and independent people were treated less than the human beings that they are.

These people settled here in the UK, and tried to fit in. The hospitality shown to me was amazing, I was made to feel a treasured guest even though many of these people did not have enough money to live on themselves. The sense of community and family was like something I had never encountered before.

I did not believe there was poverty in the UK, everyone was as lucky as me, or so I thought.

After this enlightenment, I had a good talk with my boss. He explained to me that I could not give my candidates the clothes for an interview, they needed to earn it. They needed to help themselves.

So, I set up an hours meeting with all of them, and I got to know them, their skills, their languages, their culture and their community. From start to finish this took 3 weeks. At the time I thought I could never hear another tale about how someone had travelled to the UK, what they had endured and see the hope they had for their new life in London. But I did, again and again I listened.

I spoke to the local RSPA charity shop, and in exchange for a suit (which my company paid for) the candidate would work for a week and gain some skills in the retail sector. Retail and catering had the quickest turnaround from application form to job to pay day, so this is where I focused my efforts.

I also had arrangements in place with Somerfields, Tesco, Clinton Cards  – all local agreements, nothing national I must add.  This was all arranged by me walking in the stores with 6 people (all I could get into my car!) and begging the manager to give the candidates a chance, try them for a month, so what if they didnt speak English, they would learn on the job, so what if they didnt have fairs to work for a week – couldn’t they help a little?

In the first week I placed 30 candidates this way, the same the next week, the same the week after. Some left after a few days, they had found jobs elsewhere some stayed and become cashiers and some have gone on to become managers. There is one store in Forest Gate where the entire staff were recruited by me, including the manager who was one of my first candidates and 2 years on, had his own store.

Just because a person lives in poverty, it doesn’t mean there isn’t a way out. They just need listening too, their stories need to be heard and it needs some creative thinking, if only I had Ed De Bono’s thinking tools back then!

There are many reasons why someone lives in poverty, and Sally Church touches on one way in her Pharma Marketing Strategy blog – Cancer can make you poor.

There are ways to overcome poverty, and Ida Horner has an excellent event this week, to raise money to help a Ugandan village receive water. Like Barbara Saul and Nigel Grainger we will be donating a prize for Ida to auction or raffle.  Ida is still accepting prizes and donations, please contact her through her website if you can help http://www.lethemhelpthemselves.com/help/

Torrent Freak has an excellent idea for donating your piracy download savings, if you do download items off the web, that you possibly shouldn’t….

It doesn’t take big things to change the world, it takes an ear to listen and a heart to do something. It changes one small step, one blog post at a time… to do your part for poverty, even if it is just a blog.

Sarah

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