This article profiles Cheryl Cook, a community building trainer of Washington D.C. What Cook strives for in her work with community organizations, reportedly, is cultural competence, an approach that emphasizes the differences between people rather than creates generalizations. According to Cook, generalizations are dangerous. He says that programs in diversity, sensitivity, and/or awareness categorize people and deal in exactness. It is, suggestively, better to gain an understanding about the differences in people. Cook is working as the director of the online performance measurement system at the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs at the U.S. Department of State. She also works with community groups across the country. Cook often works with community groups that have divided into factions and find themselves at odds. In training for cultural competence, she favors scenarios and role playing as training techniques as she attempts to get at such difficult issues as poverty, prejudice, and power.