Why We SleepOut Together
Source | LinkedIn | Rahul Varma | Senior Managing Director at Accenture
This week, for the second consecutive year, I will be participating in the New York Executive Sleepout organised by Covenant House. In the run up to the event, as before, I reached out through all the social channels available to me to seek support in helping young people get off the streets.
My outreach again met with overwhelming encouragement from friends, colleagues and acquaintances. The notion of young people driven to homelessness and having to fend for themselves against all kinds of odds evoked anguish and many people from around the world responded with both financial and moral support. The prospect of yet again laying in a sleeping bag on a concrete floor is not a particularly enticing one as the temperature dips below freezing. But doing so in service to these young kids, in the company of my Accenture colleagues, and ensconced in the warm embrace of support from well-wishers makes it worthwhile.
While I received massive encouragement from many, a few people had differing opinions on what I was embarking upon. Some felt that an event was unnecessary and that a different set of actions would be more effective. Others suggested that I might want to focus my efforts more on the country of my origin – India – which has far greater poverty, than where I currently reside.
I reflected upon all that I heard and decided to pen a few thoughts….