i-genius - social entrepreneur business, venture and enterprise community

Amazing People Doing Amazing Things - social entrepreneurs, social enterprise, social business, social ventures

I-Genius Academy: business development training courses


Educat's friends

Mailes Zulu Muke
Kwela Sabine Hermanns
Anne Trusler
STEPHEN GYASI-KWAW

"Unleashing Entrepreneurship" workshop

posted on Monday, March 16, 2009 03:02 PM

On request we will write a summary of the workshop portrayed in our previous blog. We were asked to facilitate a workshop, hosted by our closest local partner; Youth Employment Systems Rwanda (YES). We off course took the challenge. First of all because it was a great opportunity to get on common ground with a lot of interesting people. And secondly, the two of us representing Educat in Kigali have had thorough training in designing workshops and facilitated them in larger international conferences.


There were representatives from several influential organizations (Among other Private Sectors Federation and Business Council for Peace) as well as a Education and skills development Expert from Ministry of Youth.
Both YES and Educat started out presenting our organizations overall and then we went into the different subprojects that we run, which gave a greater insight on how we try to do things.


The theme of the workshop was “Unleashing Entrepreneurship” which goes very nicely hand in hand with “Business for change”.


We started out using a brainstorming tool, which we’d chosen to call “The sky is the limit” so people would think a bit more out of the box, which can be a problem at some of these events in my experience. Everyone wrote down whatever they had on their mind, that being new ideas, add on’s to existing ones or how to connect them from an overall perspective. It generated a bunch of energy and people loved going in to deeper discussions. We therefore also took much more time than intended (great facilitatorship, ey?), but it was to some extent a deliberate choice, since this flood of inspiration could be really beneficial to us.


We thereafter turned the focus and asked people to throw the biggest challenges down on post-it’s, regarding the 2 projects they felt most passionate about. It worked as planned and we were again given some food for thought! We ended up having lunch together, both to take the seriousity down a notch and also to get the chance to dig deeper into the most fascinating ideas that came up.


Overall the result was great even though we had to skip the last exercise. We now got a lot to work with and shared our thoughts. But more importantly we got everyone onboard, creating a broader ownership of Educat’s vision in Rwanda. It’s essential for us to have as many local organizations in on this project, since they will a big part of the fundament our future school will be build on. So a lot of excitement from the workshop participants was the best result we could get.

Comments
Barry Crisp
Tuesday, March 17, 2009 12:37 AM

Great facilitatorship indeed. It's always good to get people thinking outside of the box as much as possible. You definitely have set yourself a big challenge! How is everything coming along now? Also, is any organisation or institution supporting your work from back in Denmark?

Barry Crisp
Tuesday, March 17, 2009 12:37 AM

Thank you for the update by the way!

Educat - Business For Change In Africa
Tuesday, March 17, 2009 02:08 PM

Everything is seemingly going great. You'll never know what challenges that will suddenly surprise you though. Hopefully we have a meeting with the Minister of Youth tomorrow, which could be another door opener. We're applying for Danida funding (Danish government money) for 2 different projects created to strengthen our relationship with the local organisation and generate growth in Rwanda. Besides that, the projects will also make the launch of the university much more effective, so our students the 1st year will get as good a education as the ones on year five etc.

Barry Crisp
Wednesday, March 18, 2009 11:48 AM

That's really fantastic to hear! If you ever strike any deals or agreements, or any other related news to the work you're doing. Give us a shout and we will see if we can post it up. Events also!

Educat - Business For Change In Africa
Wednesday, March 18, 2009 01:11 PM

We will for sure. Thanks! But how do i message you? Last time it said, that you couldn't receive messages.

Barry Crisp
Sunday, March 22, 2009 03:28 AM

Yes, sorry about that! My account profile has got some problems with it... hence amongst other reasons, we will be launching a new website platform within the next few months or so. You can message me at: barry(AT)i-genius.org - Just replace (AT) with @ (protecting from online computer spam trolls)

Anne Trusler
Wednesday, April 01, 2009 06:19 AM

Exciting to hear what Educat is embarking on. The biggest challenge in rural areas is understanding the circulation or leakage of money from an area, and what the multiplier is. In SA for every R1 that comes into a rural village about 30 centre remains, whereas in urban areas it can be 3 to 4 times. We have developed a performance called "How to create a working local economy" using local people from a village where we are project managing an infrastructural & entrepreneurial project. This has gone down very well because it uses local anecdotes and people are really getting an understanding that cash often comes into a rural village three times a month - salaries, pensions and grants, and if that money "gets into a taxi and goes to town" then it leaves behind a cash desert for the other 22+ days of the month - and no matter how great a business person or entrepreneur, if there isn't a constant cash flow so that products and services can be sold every day of the month, the business cannot flourish. How are you addressing issues like money circulation?
Add your comment
(you must be logged in)