Saturday was my birthday and I spent it at a Polished Volunteer training. It took me back to when I worked at TWU in their Office of Intercultural Studies. Jurrita Williams Louie was the guest speaker and taught about Cultural Intelligence. Learning how to close the cultural gap between sisters in Christ… becoming stronger as the body of Christ… reaching more people for Christ… there is no better way that I could have spent my birthday!!!
Do you want help restoring relationships? This is for you too! It’s not just about understanding cultural differences, it’s about working with people that are different than you. (Hence the title of the discussion, “What to do with our differences”.)
Where do you start? Let me break down some points that Jurrita made.
DRIVE:
Show interest, confidence, and drive to adapt cross-culturally. Ask God for help with this. He’s the ultimate cultural interpreter. He can guide you to function effectively in cultural diverse settings.
KNOWLEDGE:
Do your research on intercultural issues. Understand how cultures are similar and different.
STRATEGY:
After your research, write out a plan. Make sense of culturally diverse experiences and plan accordingly. Find out what topic your target audience wants to talk about. What’s important to them? What drives them? Who drives them? What causes do they love?
ACTION:
Be adaptable. May your behavior (verbal and and nonverbal actions) be appropriate when relating in multicultural contexts.
What does this boil down to? Let’s be proactive!
I want to leave you with some quotes from our training. These quotes summarize perfectly who we are in Polished! Hopefully you will come join us for lunch one day or even better, join our leadership team!
“Polished is a safe space. As we are working to learn about cultural intelligence and be more competent outside and inside of the work place, what we have right now is one another. We are all sisters and have permission to be awkward with one another.” -Feleceia Benton
“Sometimes when we feel uncomfortable we forget that we are good at loving people. You are so good at loving people!!! That’s why you are a Polished leader! And love changes the world. It changes the way we view people.” -Kat Armstrong
Special thanks to Pastor John Durham and the congregation of Highland Baptist Church for hosting our Polished Regional Training.
