Eyes on Ukraine

Just a year ago, when I was introducing myself to American colleagues, I would hesitate before I would say I am from Ukraine. One reason was not many people appeared to know much about Ukraine or where it is, but another; deeper, more personal reason had to do with my own identity. I was once a proud Russian. I was born in Russian dominated Crimea, Ukraine. My father was a Russian Navy officer with his family living in Siberia on Lake Baikal, Russia. My mother and her very Russian side of the family are from, and continue to live in Crimea. We were a “Russian-Soviet” family. It was natural for me to be associated with the Russian ethnicity, heritage, and culture of my youth growing up in Siberia and later in Crimea as a young adult.I never really learned about the Ukrainian people, out history, and culture until I moved to Minnesota in 2002. This discovery of who Ukrainians really are, the Country’s historical struggles for independence, and the 2004 Orange Revolution spiked my curiosity and desire to partner with Ukrainian activists and human rights advocates to promote societal and governmental changes towards more conscious democratic society.

My husband Richard (a former City Manager in Minnesota) and I began exploring the possibility of a leadership exchange between local government officials in Minnesota and Ukraine. Local government there was fraught with corruption and poor service, with rapidly crumbling infrastructure. It was hoped that our exchange would be a first domino in challenging the basic assumptions about public service and civic engagement. A group of public officials from Minnesota agreed to travel with us to Ukraine in May of 2011. Our destination was the city of Boryspil, a 1,000 year old community of about 70,000 residents and home to Kiev - Boryspil International Airport.  During the five day engagement, over 70 community members, including students, participated in various discussions, brainstorming sessions and planning activities facilitated using TOP methodology. For the very first time, most of the participants were working together with their city officials and staff, addressing the issues that mattered to them. Most came away with the sense of responsibility and desire to stay engaged.

The 2025 vision for the City of Boryspil identified the three overarching categories: Boryspil is the City of Hospitality, Drive into the Future, and Everything for Everyone. It doesn’t quite translate into English as well, but the main insight in this session came from the Mayor and City Officials who noted that what they were able to accomplish in half-day was much more powerful and unifying than the strategic plan they worked on for over 6 months and were trying to communicate/sell to the public (which we learned was their original intent for participating in this engagement project).

As we continued to support the participants, assist them with their intentions for further learning and engagement, other exchange events took place. The City of Boryspil and the City of Hopkins, Minnesota became sister cities. A resolution was passed by the Councils of both cities to continue to develop relationships and engage communities in greater ways and with purpose. The City of Hopkins and Hopkins School District hosted a group of 18 students from Boryspil. The City also hosted two delegations, representing the City of Boryspil government, businesses, educational institutions, and civic organizations.

The events inspired the creation of ICA Ukraine, which was formed to support the Ukrainian participants in their efforts to initiate changes. Many of our participants have paid a great price for challenging the system (losing their positions or political support). We launched a ToP training program in 2013 seeking financial stability (since all of our activities were self-funded) as well as community of like-minded professionals who can assist in spreading ToP values and principles across all sectors of Ukrainian society. Many course participants came from business management, academic, HR or adult education backgrounds. All 36 of them continued on their journey of exploring ToP methodology further, and by the time the late November events began to unfold in Ukraine, this group of newly trained facilitators had the ToP tools to help them manage crisis situations at client’s workplace, organize various civic groups (from social media campaign to forming new political party), or facilitate healing dialogues for victims and refugees.

Moving ahead ...

More:

 Watch: Eyes on Ukraine Webinar recording  (loads slowly, be patient)

 Watch:  Ruslana speech and video on Ukraine at TEDx in Sao Paulo, Brazil.  More about Ruslana.

 Watch:  Televised program in Ukrainian -- see ToP methods and sticky wall at 1:04 minutes into the broadcast.

The 2014 Annual Gathering Facilitation Acrobatics session featured the Ukraine Social Media Project.  Check out materials from that session.

ToP mentors from ICA and ICAI are collaborating with ICA Ukraine to provide virtual mentoring toward certification of ToP trainers in the Ukraine to support the spread of ToP methods at this critical time.

 
 Posted May 12, 2014