Upskilling female entrepreneurs during COVID-19 via digital empowerment

As part of its move to help ensure businesses, particularly women-owned, adapt and survive, IFC – under the IFC-DFAT Women in Work programme – recently designed an innovative training concept. 

Given the travel restrictions across the country, the IFC programme was purely rolled out as a virtual training in collaboration with Women's Chamber of Industry and Commerce (WCIC) and Women’s International Foundation (WIF) – two institutions with a strong focus on empowering women. The 15-week programme covered an array of modules including entrepreneurship, taxation, marketing, supply chain, digital finance and financial literacy, IFC said in a media release.

“Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Sri Lanka have been grappling with the pandemic for more than a year. These businesses make up a large part of the country’s economy. Helping them pivot or restructure business models, and most importantly, prepare them for future shocks is crucial,” said Victor Antonypillai, IFC’s Acting Country Manager for Sri Lanka and Maldives. “This one-of-a-kind-online training programme was therefore a timely effort and will equip women-owned businesses to build back better and scale up their operations.”

WCIC and WIF each expertly selected the first cohort of women entrepreneurs representing different business lines. The programme was deployed keeping in mind the participants’ time, poverty and with hand-holding to make them comfortable using digital mediums. The expert trainer panel chosen by the two institutions with IFC assistance were made aware of ensuring a gender sensitive delivery. The unique bi-weekly mentoring sessions post each module, provided guidance and assistance when the participants needed support the most. This re-enforced the lessons learnt and contributed to building a community of support, paving the way to convert knowledge to action – an aspect most appreciated by the participants. “We didn’t feel abandoned during COVID-19. The training was held regularly and at a time convenient to us in the evenings. The continuous engagement by our coordinator was a comfort and encouraged us not to miss even one session,” said Thanuja Dharshini, a participant- member of WCIC.

“The women entrepreneurs for the programme were selected through a competency-based pre-assessment so that the most suitable were enlisted for the programme. Each session was constantly evaluated to better understand the participants’ needs and provide them with the know-how to move forward in this new normal,” said Indrani Fernando, Chairperson of WCIC.

“Women entrepreneurs have always been facing many constraints, and with COVID-19, things have been ever more challenging. Upskilling them with the right knowledge and skills through innovative programmes would have a lasting impact. We need to get our women entrepreneurs ready for the growth decade and ready for the new normal operations. We are committed to helping them. This is why we went a step ahead and invited even the Export Development Board to conduct a session,” said Seroshi Nandasiri, Chairperson of WIF. “The uptake has been positive, some of our participants are now embracing new digital solutions like Quick Response (QR) payments as well as digital marketing via social media for the first time.”

The programme is well aligned with the recently launched National Financial Inclusion Strategy – a multi-stakeholder effort led by the Central Bank of Sri Lanka with technical assistance from IFC, under the IFC-DFAT Women in Work program. The participation of WCIC and WIF, starting from the consultation process of the NFIS to particularly bring in the women’s voice, is reinforced via this training programme, contributing proactively to moving the needle on this national agenda, the IFC release said.