The Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU) and Social Enterprise Development Partnerships, Inc. (SEDPI) conducted five simultaneous trainings to ARDCI NGO Group, Inc. (ARDCI) on March 17 – 27, 2012. Key management officers and operations staff of ARDCI attended the “Branch Viability” training. The course aims to provide metrics that could be monitored at the branch level to ensure sustainability of branches.
Alma T. Villanueva, ARDCI’s Operations Head explained, “In our effort to serve more clients, we need to be certain that each branch we open will be able to sustain its own operations”. This goal prompted the organization to strengthen its branch operations through building the capacity of their staff. ARDCI currently has 32 branches in its areas of operations covering six provinces in Southern Luzon serving nearly 50,000 poor households.
Feedback from the participants showed positive response to sessions delivered and to the facilitators as well. One of the participants commented, “the training course gave valuable information for our branch operation.” In addition to the trainings, SEDPI staff went to each ARDCI branch to mentor the staff in the branches. This is to ensure application of the learning from the training. During the mentoring, the branch managers expressed that the training will certainly help them on monitoring the actual performance of their branch versus their targets.
The training is one of many collaborations of SEDPI and ARDCI. In 2007, SEDPI played a pivotal role in the turning around the performance of ARDCI. ARDCI was at he verge of collapse then. The organization was swamped with challenges in governance as a result of frequent change in leadership. For four consecutive years, from 2003 to 2006, ARDCI experienced consecutive net losses. The losses incurred reached approximately PhP20 million. Through the SEDPI’s capacity buildings services, ARDCI was able to turn around its performance. Today, key measures of performance show that ARDCI is performing excellently. The institution scored a peso rating of 83 out of a possible 100 for 2011. In 2006, ARDCI only scored a measly 21 points. Operational self sufficiency soared to 138%, better than the industry best practice of 120%. Portfolio at risk ratio is also within the industry best practice of less than 5%.
ARDCI continues to avail SEDPI’s services to keep it abreast with the latest trends in microfinance as well as maintain its stellar organizational performance. SEDPI provides numerous trainings, conducts various researches and facilitates strategic planning to ARDCI as needs arise. Through continuous improvement, ARDCI is poised to become the forerunner in grass-roots led delivery of service for the economic empowerment of the poor in the Philippines.