Stumbling Forward with Purpose
Today marks two weeks since I landed in Minneapolis. Like all good hosts the residents of the great State of Nice - Minnesota rolled out great weather, fantastic company, incredible conversations and a pantry-full of food for thought.
As I had promised, having built a good view of PFS’s field terrain, I was armed with war stories aplenty. I got to share some of these in some awesome engagements at our corporate partners Cargill, General Mills, and at an Ardent Mills’ plant managers convention. The main question folk were asking was - what is the state of food security in Africa and how is PFS positioned to respond. It’s going to be important to make the case for how the “partnership” in PFS is responsive to a significant enough challenge for these great food companies to care and to put their names next to this venture. What was fascinating was the number of times the question around - what has surprised me the most coming in from the outside at PFS? It’s clear our partners anticipate and expect that the leadership transition at PFS is more than Mandla taking over from Jeff, but what organization PFS needs to become in this transition.
This being the longest time I have spent with my colleagues in our US office, it has been a time for connection. Curious Mandla has been in full force, enquiring, probing, engaging and chilling out with the team. I have learnt a lot, not only about individual colleagues and their motivation for being part of Team PFS, but also how they work, how they connect with the field teams, and how they keep the PFS home base pumping from all ventricles, and PFS nervous system transmissive and responsive.
PFS is unique in that a fair deal of the resources that make it possible for us to do our work comes from individuals, private foundations and corporates. When they give of their generous donations, they transfer a level of responsibility to us to manage their brand equity, staff engagement, strategic mandates and personal legacies. Meeting some of these folk in person was educational and left one with a sense of responsibility to do right by the commitments our funders have made to PFS. It was a privilege to engage and have intellectually stimulating conversations with our supporters and to learn first-hand what their expectations are.
PFS, as many of you will know, is in the “secret sauce” business! We have a number of unique brands and versions of these secret sauces. I think one of the most prominent secret sauces on the shelf has to be our volunteers. I had the pleasure of interacting with a wide range of these - early career and eager, mid-career and exuding quiet confidence in their value add, late career and wise, keen to have an outsized impact, retired and grateful for the opportunity to turn their decades of experience in delivering millions of meal experiences into global impact. The Project Asante team brought it home by helping us understand the typologies of the volunteers we have access to, what makes them tick and what support and approach they require. What was a surprise was how the volunteers who were part of the AINFP project were missing the engagement opportunities that program provided. Engaging clusters of entrepreneurs as a group of volunteers for the medium to long term seemed to create some level of community that resonated with volunteers. Food for thought.
I had the wonderful privilege of spending quality time with four PFS’ founders, including Ken Powell, our board chair, still steady at the tiller as our board chair and supporter; Jeff Dykstra, enjoying his senior statesman role, making validating introductions and unleashing his networking skills to good effect; Peter Erickson, supposedly in retirement but seemingly having the time of his life supporting entrepreneurs and helping me connect with PFS DNA ; and then there was “Mendy”, still exuding the same enthusiasm that propelled an idea and a challenge into the institution that PFS is today. I was grateful for the counsel, offers of support and genuine commitment to keep PFS relevant and impactful. Although not a founder, my good friend Ben Knoll has been consistent, sharing contexts, advice, hard questions, and good meals and conversations!
I had my first US factory visit, thanks to Staci and our great supporter Chris Majors. It was great fun to see how the General Mills Chanhassen factory creates dough-based delights and indulgences that we so enjoy, like cinnamon rolls! More importantly, the visit demonstrated the value of factory or plant level engagement. It helps us understand the skill sets we can tap into and also affords us the opportunity to directly pitch the volunteering opportunities to plant level folk by connecting directly to their work.
At some point the learning must give way to getting things done. This is where we are now, we have our first board meeting of FY25 coming up and the work to consolidate what we have been able to deliver in the first quarter, what we have learned, and how we are progressing, is upon us. I count on all hands to be on deck as we work to share with the board what they have oversight over.
Off to Denver and Cleveland - walking and chewing gum- learning and working - at the same time!
Mandla
23 September,2024
Denver, CO