Reflection – Storytelling

CHALLENGE

With this project, I aim to coordinate the community’s efforts to help neighbors in the context of social  distancing amidst Covid-19. Specifically, I want to explore how elderly neighbors can get access to the  help they need within the community. The community I am focusing on is located in the apartment  complex I live in (twelve renting parties, some of which live with family members, some alone). The  apartment complex is located in a large city with a population of 3,7 million, so in general people are  used to living with a certain degree of anonymity. When Covid-19 broke out and the government first  introduced social distancing measures, many were eager to help neighbors that are more vulnerable,  specifically the elderly and those with underlying health conditions. Neighbors would offer their help  with everyday errands such as grocery shopping, walking dogs etc. These efforts were offered in a  closed Facebook group.

I noticed that there were plenty of offers available, but hardly any takers, which was not surprising to  me, based on my assumption that the elderly, a large group of those who require help, oftentimes  struggle with technology and information access online. Additionally, as I mentioned earlier, we live in  a large city with anonymity between different tenants - interactions on a day-to-day basis are limited  to greeting each other when running into one another in the hallway. In an environment as such,  community building is already challenging under normal circumstances. With social distancing in place,  it becomes even more difficult.

SELECTION

I chose the storytelling tool as its main aim is to create empathy, which I believed to be most suitable  when trying to connect people of different age groups, backgrounds and circumstances. By telling a  personal story of my grandmother’s experience during the pandemic, I had hope to achieve two things:  Firstly, I wanted to help those offering their help with little to no responses to identify how to distribute  the offers more appropriately. Secondly, telling the story of my grandmother may help those on the  receiving end - in this case, the elderly neighbors – tell their story to further help identify how to help  them in the difficult times we are facing. The Good Kitchen Story featured in the first week of the  Coursera course “Design Thinking for Innovation” inspired me to look at the needs of elderly people,  although the Design Thinking tools used in this particular project were others. Eventually, it was a TED  talk on “The magical science of storytelling” by David JP Phillips with its focus on the positive scientific  impact storytelling has that convinced me that this was the right tool to use to invite the community  to empathize with one another.

APPLICATION

I applied the storytelling tool by telling the story of my grandmother’s experiences during the course  of the pandemic to the community. My grandmother is one of the many elderly people whose lives  and daily routines have changed since the pandemic. While she used to be able to go out and buy her  own groceries and have regular human interaction, local restrictions have prevented her from doing  so since March. As a result, she spends most of her time watching TV and walking in the house. As she

lives in a different city from mine of similar size, and as I was unable to travel, we asked a family friend  to check in on her from time to time and buy groceries for her. When talking to my grandmother on  the phone I was surprised to hear that she would mention our family friend coming by almost daily to  drop off groceries. I found that strange, as surely there was a more practical way of doing shopping  without having to stop by every day. I offered to have food delivered to my grandmother, which both  her and our friend rejected. After speaking to my grandmother more regularly and piecing together  the story, I came to realize that this was much more than errand running on both sides. By spending  most of her day watching TV, most my grandmother hears about are the negative impact the pandemic  has had and continues to have on everyone. She is concerned and needs people around her who help  her stay connected and process her feelings. While the digital age offers so many solutions to stay  connected for those of us who are technology affine, my grandma had not been able to benefit from  the many online resources, as she simply cannot use a computer.  As a result, my grandmother started  a routine of cooking for the friend who would drop off groceries, who works during the day and does  not have time to cook for herself. They would sit down together, share a meal and talk. What they have  developed by now is a friendship, and the grocery shopping is just a pretext to continue seeing each  other.

I told the story of my grandmother to a group of eager community members, to kick off a brainstorm  exercise. After realizing that running errands was only one aspect elderly people are struggling with,  we explored what would need to be done to make the elderly feel more connected and less lonely.  One of the ideas that we have started testing is simply calling the elderly neighbors and having  conversations with them, and combining this with offering to run errands. Individual neighbors have  started connecting with elderly community members to see if these phone calls are a positive way to  connect. So far, the responses have been positive. The other learning the story illustrated was that  elderly people who need to be contacted offline rather than in an online space which many might not  be able to access. We are currently addressing this by printing relevant pamphlets and distributing  them within our apartment building.

INSIGHT

Applying the storytelling tool helped shift the focus of the challenge I was aiming to fix to what is a  more pressing issue, which also needs to be addressed. I initially thought the issues with the  coordination of help was mostly of administrative nature, and the problem could be solved by  presenting the offers of help in a different form or space. The above story of my grandmother illustrates  that while running errands for elderly people is a nice gesture, the underlying issue elderly people may  be facing in this difficult period is a different one: Experiencing isolation and loneliness in times of  great uncertainty. While this may be a common issue for elderly people in large cities such as mine in  “normal” times, the pandemic and constant media coverage may now have an even greater negative  impact on their mental health. The storytelling tool therefore helped uncover the underlying issue of  isolation of the most vulnerable during the pandemic.

Since talking to my grandmother more regularly to understand her story, I have gained a heightened  sense of the emotional toll this pandemic has had on many who are already vulnerable under normal  circumstances. Retelling the story invites others to understand and consider a view different to their  own. Of course telling the story of one person comes with its limitations: I realize that my grandmother

is not a perfect representation of every elderly person in the building. However, is does illustrate that  solutions need to be made with the individual person on the receiving end in mind.

APPROACH

During the course of the project, I realized that this was only the first step in a larger effort of building  community. I found that applying the storytelling tool encourages broadening the scope of this project  by hearing and telling the stories of our community members. I would like to continue by further  relying on the storytelling tool as I could see the positive effect sharing a story has on building trust  and empathy. I would expand the scope of the project by asking members of the community -my  neighbors- to share their story after offering mine. This would give us a better insight as to what  specific issues individuals in our community face, and eventually help identify a way to tackle their  specific problems. I imagine that by using the storytelling tool and inviting others to use it and share  their stories and insights, we may be able to connect people of different generations, bring in fresh  perspective and build the basis of a solid community that supports one another during the pandemic  but also in post-pandemic times.

