Designing a Project that WORKS

For the last few months I’ve been doing my best to design a Composting Latrine project with my community.  I have done a lot of Health Promotion and Bucket Latrine demonstrations in the past, which has raised consciousness of the community.  It has also helped me find my current Health Committee President, Atilio Guianora, who took a 3 day Project Management & Leadership course with me.

But how do I then translate a few educated and motivated people into developing infrastructure for an entire community, and continue to grow leaders?  If I were to follow the development norm in rural Panamá, I would solicit a big latrine project for everyone.  If I wanted to be a bit more strict, I could ask people to come to meetings and only those who came to meetings would then be part of the project.  That may work, but there are too many factors to make things go wrong:  people not showing up to work days, not viewing the project as their own but as “Peace Corps Project”, and the worst is that they might not even use the latrine.

I’m more interested in initiating a Community Action Cycle.  Designing a project that can be run by community members - first along with me on a small scale, and then independently on a larger scale. 

Initiating Behavior Change

In order to improve health, you’ve got to get people to change their behavior.  Placing infrastructure in front of them won’t do it.  Behavior change needs to come from within a few, and can come from the rest following a good example.  I thought it would be best to start with only a few latrines for those who chose to sit on a Health Committee.  I would train the Health Committee on Sanitation issues and how to design a project.  They would be the example for the community not only on how to build, maintain, and use the latrine, BUT how to participate in a community wide project.  When they see their neighbor using something new, they will hopefully be more interested in having their own

Making Things Exclusive

Why does Steve Jobs only release a limited amount of iPhones at first?  Exclusivity.  Release a few, intrigue the many. I am hoping that by only a few members having a composting latrine, the rest of the community will be interested in having one as well.  

Make Special Drink

I recently read a book called 'Made To Stick' which is based on the notion that ideas can be communicated more effectively if they follow a certain structure.  Structure in creativity?  The authors studied thousands of advertisements and campaigns to find that the most successful ones had similar underlying components them:

Simple Unexpected Concrete Credible Emotional Stories

I'll leave you to read the book to fully develop the ideas.  I followed this framework in 2 health talks that I give in my village.  Health promotion is essentially engaging in behavior change.  How do you change behavior?  Convince people of your ideas.

I took advantage of a Panamanian Ministry of Health (MINSA) health visits that come into my town to give a talk about how to make Special Drink, or suero.  Having them present with me made what I had to say more credible because it came from Panamanian authority.  This drink is meant to be given to babies who run the risk of dehydration when they are are suffering from diarrhea and vomiting.

I kept the talk straight to the point and very simple by talking only about how to make and administer the drink.  It is made very easily by mixing 8 spoons of sugar, 1/2 spoon of salt, in 1 liter of purified water.  Parents should give this to children by the spoonful until they see signs of improvement in the condition.  It is not a substitute for going to the hospital, but can save a child's life when they are severly ill and one cannot reach the hospital.  There is no conventional transport to or from Alto Playón between 6PM to 6AM.

We presented the talk on a sheet of paper full of pictures on how to make the drink.  Then, I unexpectedly made the mix in front of them, pouring 8 spoons of sugar and 1/2 a spoon of salt into a bottle of water.   A cup of the drink was passed around to the room full of women for them to try, a concrete sample of what they should make.  Finally employed their emotions by elaborating a very common story:  it is 9PM, your child is crying uncontrollably, has diarreah or vomiting, and it is pouring rain outside.  What do you do?  MAKE SPECIAL DRINK.

For the next couple weeks I would ask the women: "How many spoons of sugar & salt?" and they were able to repeat the recipe.  One women told me that the recipe helped when her child had diarrhea, and that makes it all worth it.  We did the talk again 3 months later and the women were able to repeat the recipe and were even more responsive to the talk.