Monday, May 25, 2009

Zanzibar, like many equatorial places, enjoys temperate breezes, sun showers, and equal parts day and night. But one cannot write about Zanzibar without including a description of the dhows that skim the waves, with their simple ancient structure and excellent balance, billowing sails and important cargo. Nor can one exclude the tall palm trees that fringe the sandy coast—sometimes chalk white and other times dusky and rocky. On either the east or west coast of the island, the receding tide leaves rippled flats that stretch far out toward deeper and dark blue water, where sand bars surprise and interrupt the otherwise flat horizon. On the beachfront or in the towns, men and women are busy with their industry: unloading the day’s catch, weaving fishing baskets, making large clay pots for houseplants and cooking, selling wares, conducting business, puttering on wide and narrow streets on their motorbikes. Moments after sunset, one hears the Imams call from the mosques to bring many of Zanzibar’s faithful to prayer. It’s a place to escape the bustle of the modern world and appreciate different sights, sounds, scents, customs, and beliefs—to hang a hammock by the sea and slip into a gracious society.

This is where we are to conduct the third and fourth sessions of Tanzania’s Enhanced Public Service Leadership (EPSL) Programme, which seeks to bring top level civil servants from mainland Tanzania and the island of Zanzibar together with the country’s CEOs so they can forge new understandings of their respective goals and build collaborative relationships that allow them to reach those goals successfully. Unlike any other group with which Touchstones works, this group has the future of an entire nation in its sights. They are dedicated and passionate participants who have set aside a week from their exceptionally busy work schedules—and away from their families—to focus on a new approach to problem solving and to investigate innovative forms of leadership during phase I of this programme.

The EPSL seminar, which first launched in August 2008, is part of a three-year programme that Touchstones will run with 80 Tanzanian leaders. The programme is the brainchild of CEO Roundtable Chair and Aspen Crown Fellow, Ali Mufuruki, who found support for his vision with Tanzania’s past President and who continues to champion the programme in partnership with the current administration under President Kikwete, the CEO Roundtable Scholarship Fund, and the World Bank. In consultation with Mr. Mufurki, Touchstones President, Howard Zeiderman, developed the custom seminar curriculum and programme format. He and Ford Rowan co-moderated the first two sessions last August and have returned now to run the final two sessions of the first phase of the programme.

Yesterday’s launch included opening comments by guests of honor, the Chief Minister of the Revolutionary Government of Zanzibar, Hon. Shamsi Vuai Nahodha, and the Tanzanian Minister of Constitutional Affairs and Justice, Hon. Mathias Chikawe in which they both urged participants to make the most of this opportunity to collaborate and build new and more effective means for achieving progress in Tanzania. After a short tea break and a chance to thank the guest speakers for their commitment to the programme, the participants and moderators set to work. First by covering introductions and then the Touchstones ground rules, they ease slowly into this unknown approach. With the first discussion on Plato’s Allegory of the Cave from The Republic, the group comes to life. By the time that they finish the afternoon session on a selection from Simone de Beauvoir’s Second Sex, the group is actively and openly exploring whether central issues in the texts are helpful tools for dismantling barriers between people. There are fireworks, as different perspectives expressed by men and women reveal the sensitivity to existing problems of gender equality. But humor never completely deserts the room, and even the most passionate exchanges remain mostly respectful and are followed by laughter or gentle teasing. Though the session ends on one of the lighter notes, the group has already done much hard work to forge new and respectful relationships. Thoughtful engagement and lively participation is securely underway.

More tomorrow on Day 2, as the group explores the topic of power—its use and abuse.