By: Francis Padi
When I joined UN-Habitat as a Junior Professional Consultant, I expected structured tasks and a lot of policy reading. That happened. But the real experience was messier, more human, and more rewarding than I could have planned.
My main task involved researching how six countries (Canada, Germany, the UK, the US, Kenya, and South Africa) house and integrate refugees in cities. I imagined policy documents, Zoom calls with acronyms I’d need to learn, and maybe a few late nights with datasets. All of that happened. What I didn’t expect was how personal the experience would become. I didn’t just learn about urban refugee housing. I learned a lot about my own working style, limits, and interests.
The project was intense. I spent weeks reviewing legal frameworks, analyzing housing systems, and tracking the lived consequences of bureaucratic delays. In places like Toronto and Berlin, even with public support, refugees struggle to find decent rentals. In Johannesburg or Nairobi, they’re often pushed into informal settlements with little protection. Sometimes I read government documents that said a lot without saying anything. But I learned to ask better questions. Why is it so hard for a refugee to rent an apartment in Toronto, even with financial support? Why are work permits delayed in the UK, effectively freezing people out of the housing market? What does it mean to integrate someone in a city where locals are barely housed themselves?
I wrote thousands of words, edited them down to hundreds, then rewrote them again. I drafted the final comparative report, pulled out lessons and recommendations, and wrote a policy brief that felt like trying to distill a novel into a postcard. I summarized policies into sharp briefs and edited long chapters down to what mattered most. I sent one too many versions of a draft to the wrong email group and once mislabeled a country chart. But I figured things out quickly. I learned to write clearly, verify everything, and meet deadlines without panicking.
Even across time zones, there were small things that made the work feel more grounded. One colleague sent me a playlist to help me focus. Another always signed off with the weather where they were. Those small gestures helped break up the long writing days.
Work was the focus, but it wasn’t the whole picture. I started journaling again. I tracked productivity by what I actually produced, not by hours. I learned to take breaks without guilt, to close the laptop when I hit a wall, and to return with a clearer head. I even picked up a few Swahili phrases reviewing Kenyan documents. This exposure gave me direction. It reminded me that policy work is about real people, real housing, and systems that need fixing.
