Friday, June 10, 2011

The Hard Core!


Today a core group of entrepreneurs gathered at Slumberland for an “Expert Seminar”.

Over the years, we have trained dozens of people in large session settings – often 40 – 60 people at a time. These seminars have typically been a detailed introduction to business. Our goal from the beginning was to educate as large a group as possible and to watch which entrepreneurs stepped forward and which faded away. The 12 entrepreneurs that gathered today are the cream that has risen to the top. They are all people who have shown great interest in taking their businesses to the next level and have all been mentored by George and I, all produced business plans and a number of them have received loans and regular mentoring from us. We have decided that our best strategy will be to help this group go farther in their endeavors, rather than doing another “beginner” seminar for people of all kinds. Rather like tree farming, we are thinning the forest to allow the strongest trees to grow as quickly as possible. These are our mighty oaks!

We held three sessions today: Marketing, Business Risk and an Open Forum. Our goals were first, for people to continue to build on their understanding of the business concepts we have taught in the past, second to apply more advanced thinking to their own businesses and finally to have the group learn to work together, sharing issues, ideas and building camaraderie. In some ways we would like this group to become like a YPO group. This, then, becomes the group into which we pour most of our time and attention, these are the businesses that we look to help expand and grow, and this is the group that we hope will become the role models and mentors for all other entrepreneurs. I have known some of these folks for nearly five years now, and they have become good friends. We are able to talk openly with each other can challenge each other. This meeting was a very healthy exchange of ideas.

The great value for the participants at this meeting was that at each step in the teaching on marketing and the 4 P’s (Product, Price, Place and Promotion), we allowed the group to apply the teaching directly to their own businesses, had them write up their ideas on paper sheets which we hung on the walls, and then discussed them and affirmed the good ideas and questioned the less valuable ones. At the end of the day, each person had a first pass at a comprehensive marketing strategy, which we will now develop with them in the coming weeks and months. The most challenging task was for them to describe their businesses Value Proposition (what product to what customer segment in a way that would allow for sustainability?). We might be in Africa, but there is no point developing a business unless there is a clear understanding of how the business can win over the long haul!

George is really good at creating dialog in meetings like this, and the format that he had us follow really allowed for a great deal of interaction. The group came together and is looking forward to the next session that they can have together, which might be when George is next back in August. Their major complaint is that there was more to be done and that this was only a one day session!!

Incidentally the session was sponsored by the Mango Fund, a new fund that George has been able to raise with the idea of investing in growing businesses in East Africa. Thanks MANGO!

Unfortunately George leaves for Nairobi tomorrow to be a judge in a business plan competition there. I will miss him. I really enjoy our work together and his heart for economic development and social investing.

I will head out tomorrow to a building site of one of our investment companies and later spend time with the Board of the Business Vision Arua 2009 Community Based Organization that we helped found here, and the diocesan board of the Church of Uganda looking at a real estate development project they are considering.

Further good news, there was substantial rain overnight and people are planting with great urgency.

Please pray especially for George as he travels to Nairobi through Entebbe.
Blessings
A
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The Genesis of the 5810 Project

Vision

When Jesus was asked what was the most important command he answered: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your heart and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments”

As a follower of Jesus, it is challenging to obey these commands, particularly with regard to my neighbors.
How can I love my neighbors? How can I love my neighbors in a global context? How can I love my neighbors who are struggling to thrive in developing countries?

The classic response of western Christians has been to “send”. Whether we send those that have been called to vocational ministry, or send money and resources to “give to the poor”, or occasionally send ourselves on short-term missions trips. Each of these has value, but is this enough? Is it effective? Is it all that God calls us to?

The questions become more complex when you consider that no matter how much money we have spent on the “war on poverty” over decades, the problem remains as acute as ever. We are not winning the war, even here in the US. Are there other approaches?

As I struggled with these ideas, I was led to consider Isaiah Chapter 58. Here God tells us what true fasting is – to loose the chains of injustice; to set the oppressed free; to share food with the hungry; and to provide the poor with shelter. Then verse 10 says “…if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed then your light will rise in the darkness and your night will become like the noonday.”

“If you spend yourselves in behalf of others …….”

While we should send, we need to spend too.

What does it look like to spend ourselves?
For me I have been led to spend myself as follows:
• To go to a developing country, and to go repeatedly.
• To develop personal relationships with innovative leaders
• To use my own specific gifting and experience in business
• To find ways to move people out of the poverty cycle on a sustainable basis
• To invest money in parallel with my activities
• To share the love of Christ with my neighbor and to spend myself on their behalf.

5810 Project

The 5810 Project is predicated on the belief that while “teaching a man to fish” will provide him with a fish diet for a lifetime, it will not lead him out of poverty. To escape poverty people need to develop sustainable business activities. The 5810 Project’s vision is to provide an opportunity for business people from developed countries to share the love of Christ with their neighbor by “spending” themselves on behalf of others who are trying to build businesses and break the poverty cycle.

The 5810 Project is currently focused on two principal activities in Uganda.

Arua
Arua is a significant market town in the NW of Uganda, with Sudan to the north and Congo to the West. It is an agricultural market town that has grown because of government and NGO activity primarily in S. Sudan, but now increasingly in E. Congo. While the town has prospered and grown, the native Aruans have not enjoyed this economic boon.

Our efforts in Arua are centered on helping the church and Christian business people develop sustainable businesses.
We work with businesspeople to analyze the market situation in Arua, to offer training sessions, to encourage and mentor entrpreneurs and to invest in their businesses.

Kampala
Jesus Commissioned Ministries (“JCM”) is a church founded in 2000 serving three poor communities on the outskirts of Kampala. The leadership of JCM has a heart to reach the many underprivileged children in the communities it serves. Without education, there is little hope for these children to thrive. While education is available, the costs are prohibitive for most families. JCM has established Mercy Junior School (elementary) for these children. In addition to education, the children receive uniforms, food and school materials. The school currently has over 50 pupils in two Pre-K classes and Primary 1 (P1)and Primary 2 (p2) and is building classrooms for P3,4 & 5 for completion in the spring of 2011.

The 5810 Project has helped Mercy Junior School develop its rudimentary facilities and to buy a neighboring plot of land for expansion. We also advise the administrators of the school on business and education practices and have steered them through a process of becoming a fee-baseda significant drive to parent involvement and elevated educational standards and outcomes.

Opportunity
We believe that the 5810 Project offers a significant opportunity for the body of Christ:
• Grass roots opportunity to create sustainable businesses and deliver families and communities out of the oppression of poverty.
• Many business opportunities are apparent with relatively small investment levels necessary.
• Opportunities for talented business people to connect personally with emerging entrepreneurs and spend themselves on them.
• Opportunity for the body of Christ in the developed world to share the love of Christ with our neighbors in developing countries.
• Transformational impact on the “spender” and recipient alike!

If you would like to discuss this further, please contact me Andy Mills at amills@tkc.edu