The difficulties of leaving, captured in Colombian graffiti.

Field work requires comfort with transience. Many development workers parachute into places, build their lives from scratch, weave themselves into communities and are subsequently yanked away, to a new project or some other life demand.

As I wrapped up my last workshop for women ex-combatants and victims of conflict in Colombia, discussing community organization strategies for sustaining the impact of our gatherings, the women had one question: “When are you coming back?”

The truth is that I do not know. My fellowship requires that I design and implement projects in conflict and post-communities worldwide, always charting new ground for myself, veering away from the familiar. If love for the community and the project were enough, I would not have left Colombia yet. But for now, I boarded a one-way flight with no firm plans of return. This begs two questions: First, how do field workers relate to their projects once they are no longer on the ground?

There are transitional mechanisms that can sustain impact after formal project completion:

• Training community leaders in conducting a version of the project in the future, thus multiplying its outreach effects;
• Compiling archives of materials and strategies used to preserve institutional memory;
• Establishing monitoring & evaluation systems to gather data and discussing future changes and applications.

The second question is more introspective: What role will this project continue to play in your life after your departure? Was it a chapter in which you gained experience and gave a bit of yourself? Was it a stepping stone to a continuing project? Was it an escape from another world? Trying a new career? Confronting a fear? Do you plan to come back? Explaining that “this may have been it” to project beneficiaries is always hard; it creates feelings of abandonment and sadness in all of us. Somewhere far away, another community awaits your ideas and your service. Once you embed yourself within it, what role will this community continue to play in your heart?

How do you deal with the emotional and professional consequences of leaving a project? In what form do you stay involved?

Following Colombia, Roxanne is now in Guatemala. For a sneak peek into her observations,  follow her on Twitter or read more thoughts about impact on her blog.