Lending a Helping Hand

As part of the Operations Leadership Development Program, we are required to perform a variety of community service activities. While I was in Georgia, this proved to be more difficult than you would imagine. We first had to have an idea of what we wanted to do and take that to our Community Service person at Lockheed and get it approved. The only thing was, they weren't very quick about responding and shot down almost every one of our ideas. It was hard to rally the troops to keep trying to come up with ideas.

Now that I am in Syracuse, the rules have changed. This is just one of the many differences between the sites. In this case it's a good thing. Here we more or less pick what we want to do and then go do it. This was mind blowing! To be empowered to choose appropriate events and go do them. How about that?

Our first event was on Tuesday at the Rescue Mission. They look for volunteers to help out in their warehouse to sort their incoming goods and other tasks as needed. Five of us signed up for this event and ended up sorting hangers for 3 hours. This probably sounds like a silly task, but I have never seen so many hangers in my life. We probably sorted through about six 4 ft. cube boxes sorting pants hangers from shirt hangers and putting them into smaller boxes. This wasn't too difficult of a task, however, when you add about 5 pounds of dust sprinkled all over the hangers, then it gets interesting. I have never blown black snot out of my nose before, but hey, we all have our firsts. Next time, we are bringing face masks.

Our second event was helping park cars at the Red Cross Parking Lot for the New York State Fair. We were up and downtown by 8am to start our day with brisk weather and gray skies. First task, clean the parking lot. I am always amazed at the people who feel no responsibility for the trash they throw on the ground. All I can say is, thank god for the gloves they gave us. The next task involved eating delicious donuts. Yum! Then we were off to direct cars to their lovely parking spots. This is what I learned from a day of directing cars. When you are getting directed by some poor sucker for event parking who is waving a flag like a lunatic, they are doing it for the 95% of the population that can not nor will not follow directions. Who knew it would be so difficult to do! Five hours later, we had our picture taken and headed on out.

In both cases people were exceptionally pleased to have the free help. For me, it was rewarding to do some physical labor and see actual progress with a task. Compared to my current desk job, this was immensely more enjoyable. I am excited that we will be able to do a lot more of these kinds of events and make a difference in this community. :)