Introducing “Her Business, Her Future”: An Open Source Training Program for Women Micro-Entrepreneurs
Running a small business is hard. For many women around the world, owning or running a small shop that sells goods offers a pathway to greater economic security, resilience, and level of control over their future. So how do we support women who own, run or co-manage micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) in building their capacity to sell and build for their future? A lot of attention has been paid to the financing gap for women MSMEs: The $5 trillion financing gap for formal MSMEs is real, with women-owned businesses accounting for 32% of that gap. However, improving access to finance is only one part of the puzzle. Research shows that effective support programs for women micro-entrepreneurs bundle components that address the financing gap and help them build their soft and hard skills, including supporting them in envisioning themselves as business owners and managers and using digital tools.
That is why we created the “Her Business, Her Future,” an open source, global training program designed to build capacity for women micro-entrepreneurs to own and manage their businesses. These training materials, funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) with support from DAI’s Digital Frontiers, are inspired by the MSME training content developed for Mastercard and USAID’s “Project Kirana for Women.”
Our global training program was created with three main goals in mind:
To help women micro-entrepreneurs develop business management skills that they can apply to grow their customer base and revenue.
To teach women micro-entrepreneurs how to use financial services and their phones for business operations and transactions.
To build women micro-entrepreneurs entrepreneurial drive, capacities, and skills through trainings on business and digital literacy.
The eight module training program is designed for organizations working to build the capabilities of women micro-entrepreneurs selling fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) in small shops. As we designed the training, we kept in mind its usefulness to INGOs, governments, and financial service providers.
The eight modules of “Her Business, Her Future”
The curriculum features three women characters from around the world: Ratana, Imani, and Sofía. We’ve also included Sofía’s husband, Mateo, to allow for discussions of gender roles in household and business decision-making. All eight modules are available in English, French, Swahili, and Spanish. By downloading the training materials, trainers and participants also have access to shop and character image files, encouraging a fully customizable experience.
To help trainers use the curriculum, we also created an accompanying user guide. Each module also includes a “tip sheet” with guidance on areas where organizations should consider customization.The eight modules can be used individually or offered in their entirety in any sequence most relevant for the trainer and their trainees. By allowing the full customization of these modules, the curriculum material can propel the goals of any organization seeking to build the business, financial, and digital capabilities of women micro-entrepreneurs.
Her Business, Her Future modules can be downloaded in PowerPoint for ease of editing at https://www.siaedge.com/herbusiness-herfuture. The training lessons include content, exercise activities, and tips for customization to ensure relevance in the market where the training is used. We incorporated various activities and lessons to accommodate different learning styles and preferences, and to vary the instructional delivery methods. The modules also incorporate audio lessons from “Hey Sister! Show Me the Mobile Money!” and ”¡Oye Amiga, hablemos sobre tu billetera móvil!”, our two women’s digital financial literacy campaigns. These audio lessons can be used as a complementary resource, and we also provide suggestions for other helpful training resources, including GSMA’s MISTT. If you are interested in using the modules as they are, PDFs without customization prompts are also available for download.
We hope these materials will support women on their business journeys as they run and grow MSMEs that match their vision for themselves and their futures.
To learn more, visit https://www.siaedge.com/herbusiness-herfuture.