Social Enterprise Development Partnerships, Inc.

Governance plays a crucial role in microfinance since this is the key in setting the MFIs’ direction towards reaching their social mission and at the same time achieving financial sustainability. The course will enable participants to identify and delineate roles, duties and responsibilities of the board and management; and determine board involvement and their required knowledge and skills. Best practices in microfinance governance will also be shared in during the training. The course also tackles growth and expansion as an issue that many MFIs face. Participants will be taught how to weigh institutional capacity implications of plans to expand or consolidate microfinance operations. The different challenges in terms of determining institutional preparedness for growth will be discussed, such as developing financial product designs; preventing and arresting or preventing delinquency; achieving financial sustainability; integrity of information systems and controls; adequacy of human resource; and effective marketing of financial products. An appraisal tool will be introduced to enable participants to determine which areas an MFI should address and prioritize.

As a higher level course, the financial management course requires that participants understand financial analysis and are knowledgeable on financial performance industry standards. The course assists microfinance institutions in improving their financial performance through effective treasury management, asset-liability management and liquidity management. The course also includes sessions on projecting an organization’s future financial performance given its current financial performance level. Although the course is heavy on finance, emphasis is given to participants on the danger of mission drift or abandoning their social mission. Actual case studies gathered on field will be presented to highlight current practices of successful microfinance institutions.

This course is designed to assist microfinance institutions in crafting and implementing microinsurance and savings programs. On microinsurance, the course presents the seven basic principles of insurance, and the challenges that microinsurance faces. The course differentiates the characteristics of informal and formal insurance, and the different microinsurance products available. The course also introduces frameworks for assessing the insurance needs of clients and developing relevant microinsurance products. The course also outlines strategies in implementation such as linking up with insurance companies and integrating insurance with other financial products. Meanwhile, savings is discussed as a social service that benefits microfinance clients through consumption smoothening and reduction of vulnerability to risks. At the same time, savings mobilization also benefits microfinance institutions by generating funds for its credit products. In this course, participating organizations will be able to determine whether they are ready to mobilize savings, and what considerations have to be taken in the design process. Finally, marketing campaigns for microinsurance and savings will also be developed.

Effective communications is essential in performing functions as branch and area managers. Conflict is deemed inevitable in organizations. As such, participants must have an understanding of conflicts and learn how to manage them. Manager’s human resource function of enforcing of rewards and penalties on their subordinates will be strengthened with the training course. One of the activities will be a workshop on writing memos. The course will also highlight effective listening and feedback giving.

In microfinance, credit is the main product demanded by low-income clients. It is also the source of an MFI’s largest earning asset – the loan portfolio.  This course starts with the definition and principles of microfinance.  The course also discusses the characteristics of microfinance clients. Various methodologies in the provision of microcredit such as group methodologies with group and individual liabilities, village banking, individual lending, and crowd financing are thoroughly illustrated.  The course also presents character and debt capacity as bases for assessing credit worthiness. Participants will be familiarized to use and understand the rationale behind tools such as the loan application form; credit and background investigation forms; cash flow analysis form; and credit scoring system. The course will also give a preview on how to prevent delinquency. Through the identification of the causes and costs of delinquency, the participants are encouraged to develop policies on how to prevent and mitigate these. SEDPI also shares its vast experience in implementing effective delinquency management techniques during the training.

Delinquency is one of the major challenges that MFIs face. Delinquency Management enables participants to understand delinquency by tracing its causes and costs. Participants are also taught on how to measure delinquency using international standards. The course emphasizes both preventive and curative strategies against delinquency. It also presents research results of common delinquency problems and how successful MFIs have addressed these concerns. The training course includes disaster preparedness and ways on how to mitigate external forces that affect the repayment behavior of clients. Actual strategies implemented by MFIs in these situations are shared during the training.

Delinquency is one of the major challenges that wholesalers face. The course enables participants to understand delinquency by tracing its causes and costs from various perspectives. Workshops will be conducted to teach wholesalers on how to measure delinquency using international standards and financial indicators. The course will discuss prescribed report formats integrated in the organization’s information system to track important information for decision-making. Aside from these, the course also includes topics on risk management, principles and methods of collection, and incentive schemes for delinquency crises. The course will also present research results of the most common delinquency problems that MFIs face, and how successful MFIs have addressed these problems.

Excellent customer care is essential to the rapidly changing landscape of the microfinance industry. Amidst the increasing number of microfinance players, providing clients with utmost care play a key role in the success of the organization. The course will start with understanding customer care and why there is a need to invest in it. The challenges of customer service and the strategic dimensions to undertake it will also be presented in this course. Participants will explore the role of the microfinance institution in crafting and sustaining delightful customer care for their operation. The course extends the process of customer care not only to the clients of the microfinance institutions but to the employees as well. In order to effectively deliver products and services to retain clients, the institution must have systematic and efficient strategies of motivating their employees. Customer care emphasizes the sustainability of a program through a thorough measurement of customer service levels provided by an institution. In addition, this course will also discuss how to take advantage of technology in order to develop and improve customer care. To end the course, industry research and practices on customer care and product and service delivery will also be shared with the participants.

Conflict is natural and common phenomenon in social interaction. Every person and organization faces conflict. There are positive and negative outcomes of conflict. What makes conflict negative or positive is the way in which it is handled. The course introduces different theories of conflict and different perspectives used to understand and assess conflict. The training course also examines the nature of conflict as it occurs in organizations, how conflict can function both destructively and constructively in that context. In addition, various approaches to managing conflict would also be discussed. The differences between negotiation and mediation would also be discussed, as well as the use of communication skills to minimize and even prevent conflict. At the end of the course, the participants are expected to be able to gain skills to be able to manage conflict effectively.

Most microfinance institutions turn to automation to solve their bookkeeping system problems. However, most software providers do not have enough background in microfinance, therefore, software designs are not attuned to the needs of microfinance institutions. Off the shelf software, on the other hand, do not have the required flexibility to adapt to policy and changes in operations. The color-coded bookkeeping system is an alternative bookkeeping system specifically designed for microfinance institutions. The system, once installed and diligently applied, will enable microfinance institutions produce aging of loans on a daily basis; strengthen internal controls; and measure the performance of loan officers, branches and the institution as a whole. The scheme follows a color-coded technique that guides management in crafting required reports that are necessary in making well-informed decisions.