What about Brian?

Hi everyone! This is Brian. I thought I would take a blog and write about all the things that I have been up with regards to work.

To say things are busy is almost laughable. Our company is growing so fast right now that every manager is following their daily activities, planning for future growth, and managing a number of new initiatives designed to help manage the growth.

For those that are unaware, our company's website can be found at http://www.ujjivan.com/ Since I have just finished my first three months with the company, you probably won't find me on the website yet as I just finished my probabtionary period.

My official job title is Operations Manager. Ujjivan has three major areas of Operation: Bangalore, Delhi, and Kolkata, where Bangalore is where our headquarters are located. As of today, and soon to change, we have 17 Branches in the Bangalore region, 7 in Kolkata, and 4 in Delhi. We just recently eclipsed 40,000 customers. Such a number after only 2 years in existence is unheard of in the microfinance world. As all of our branches are working with poor women in their areas and offering a number of financial services, my department processes and makes all of those actions possible, currently for all of regions. All paperwork for the customers, loan applications, insurance forms, transactions occurring in the branches, and loan disbursements are processed in my department. We are currently receiving around 200 new customers per day and over 300 loan applications per day.

In our department, I report to the Head of Operations for the company. The Accounts department, data entry and loan booking department, customer service, and help desk report to me. I have also recently hired an engineer to handle our IT-related projects. Our department also has a Cash Manager, MIS Specialist, Credit Manager, and Risk Manager, each with their own sub-departments who report to the Head of Operations like me.

The main challenges for day to day activities are in handling the large volumes, controlling errors, and managing all the change going on in the branches. My group has 25 people but the turnover for our data entry group is very high as many people move in from semi-urban villages, get training from us in data entry and English, and then move on for higher paying jobs from IT firms. Many of the changes I have had to make since Istarting have been in putting tracking mechanisms in place to monitor the daily capacity and branch priorities associated with them, instituting a batch process for our loan applications to make the process more efficienct, teach our supervisors better planning and management techniques, and managing all the people problems that take place every day. I have had to make my first termination a few weeks ago, which was very unfortunate because it was a young girl who is dealing with mental problems and was not willing to receive help.

Other projects I have been working on or leading include developing a Change Management procedure for the company, process mapping all company processes and perform risk assessments on every process, develop process management training for all of our branch managers, prepare our main software and network capabilities for transitioning the company to a regional operations set up so that Delhi and Kolkata can begin to process all of their branches' activities, modify our operations to handle a new individual-lending product (where we are currently completely group lending right now and this new product woud also onclude men), institute our customer service and help desk which just started this week, and begin a pilot project in January that would give our field staff hand-helds to perform all transactions.

I also get to get out to the branches and meet our customers. Real change is being made but not every customer wants to get out of poverty or even make life better for her and her family. Some situations can be disappointing but the majority are very encouraging. I am confident that what we are doing is the financial solution for the poor. More wholistic approaches are being explored, though still lacking in spiritual substance.

A great part about all of it is that I don't feel overwhelmed and have been so excited about everything that I am doing. Things are never perfect. People are still the same sin-bearing vessels that they are everywhere else. Some days are better than others, but the work atmosphere here is very good.

After 3-1/2 months, I am completely confident that the reason for coming here is being fulfilled. I am learning every in and out of microfinance and even banking itself. The experience I have been getting would never have been possible in the US, even with firms doing the same thing.

There are only a few born-again believers here at work. Going deeper with people here is difficult being an American. The real inroads I have made have been with 19-25 year olds who work in my group, but the boss-employee issues that go along with that make it more challenging.

There are an infinite possibilities with future ministries being involved in microfinance. The future is still unclear but the experience I am getting here is invaluable.

There are a few men at church who I have been able to get to know better. One of the pastors and our Sunday Bible study leader have already begun to be real partners and mentors for me in faith and sanctification.

There has also been a recent big event ( more of a step in the process though) with four wheels that I will let Colette disclose the details to....

Hopefully this has provided a little more information on my job and what I do every day.

Thanks,

Brian