Accounting and Program Audit Team
Log # 5
By Tyler Deng
For our reading this week, we had to return to a reading
regarding the qualities of successful social entrepreneurs. It
reminded me a lot about my time in Panama when I did the Panama
Plunge. It was a great experience helping out the St. John’s
community and the local community in Panama. The local communities
were made of entrepreneurs, mainly fisherman and farmers. We were
doing service there as per our conduct with Vincentian beliefs so
we had slight interaction with several of them. Many of them were
very willing to do anything it took to succeed in the field of
their small businesses. I took that memory with me when I left
Panama but I’ve been aching to go back ever since.
Social entrepreneurialism is not an easy aspect, it takes a lot
to put away your self-esteem and be willing to correct yourself.
I’ve noticed a lot of social entrepreneurs are very humble and open
to changes; this is perfect for those who are unable to see the
changes they need. When we were at our service sites, many of them
didn’t speak English but we had a translator that worked at the
service center who helped us out. She told us about their strong
work ethics and how they were willing to put so much on their
shoulders, not for fame, but for survival. I have a great
understanding of companies that support social entrepreneurship,
including Starbucks. In fact, I’ve seen several companies include
their trademarks in Panama, which was a good sign but I kind of
thought it was a sham for some companies to do so, yes they support
this community but besides funneling some money through some
company and not being hands on.
It was a good memory thinking about my short trip to Panama.
After reading about social entrepreneurialism, it made me think
about all the qualities that people need to be a social
entrepreneur and how many people lack these qualities.
Finance and Risk Assessment Team
Log # 5
By Megan Lane
It’s amazing to see how relevant GLOBE is to my other course
work. I recently discussed GLOBE as part of my English class, where
we were reading A Palace in the Old Village by Tahar Ben Jelloun.
In the first few chapters, I came across the following quotes:
“[He] no longer knew whether this racism sprang primarily from
the color of their skin or from extreme poverty.”
“Skin color and poverty ganged up easily to reject a human being
whose sole crime was not being white and rich.”
“Poverty, insecurity, and overcrowding left no room for dialogue
or tolerance.”
I immediately thought of Mohammad Yunus and microfinance. Yunus
said that “poverty is a threat to peace.” The reading in my English
class supports this claim in telling the story of a Moroccan in
France dealing with poverty, racism, and intolerance. I always say
that people are good at realizing and criticizing problems, but
fail when it comes to offering realistic solutions. Microfinance,
as described by Yunus, would be an effective remedy to the issues
described by Jelloun.
In my Commercial Banking class, we discussed the “Five C’s” of
assessing credit: character, capacity, capital, collateral, and
conditions. I immediately thought of how this applied to GLOBE. We
assess character through the recommendations of the Daughters of
Charity. The Daughters provide us with a numerical rating from 1-5,
with 1 being a strong recommendation, 3 being a moderate
recommendation, and 5 being a weak recommendation. We believe that
this is one of the most important pieces of information on the loan
application, as it gives us information about the applicant’s
reputation in her community. We assess capacity through a number of
questions. Is this a new business or an existing business that the
applicant wishes to expand upon? If it is an existing business, how
much does it earn? Are there similar businesses in the area? What
is the business plan? What is the applicant’s current economic
condition and what are cultural and societal issues that may affect
her ability to repay this loan? Capital is assessed through total
current income, current earnings from the existing business,
outside sources of income (such as stipends from the government),
and training, education, or skills that increase the chance of
success for the business. Collateral is always a problem for us, as
we have social objectives. Often, our borrowers don’t have a source
of collateral, and if they do own something, such as a home, it
would be detrimental to our goals to seize it in the event of
default. In GLOBE, we remove this “C” and replace it with an “N”
for need. We want to reach the poorest of the poor, helping those
with few opportunities and no access to credit. Conditions include
a specified repayment period and interest fee. A sixth “C,” as
identified by Rose Hudgins, is control. This is something that our
team, along with the accounting team, is working on right now. We
are trying to develop and implement a better system of tracking our
outstanding loans in order to better assess GLOBE’s impact on
reducing poverty and identify the qualities that make borrowers
successful.
The more I learn in GLOBE, the more relevant it becomes to my
own life. Not only is GLOBE helping people in developing countries
lift themselves out of poverty, but it is helping me to understand
the concepts that I am learning in my other business courses. I
remember once, when I was telling someone about the many community
service projects that I have participated in, I was asked, “If you
like to help people so much, why are you going into business?”
GLOBE proves that effective business principles and social
objectives do not have to be at odds. It is teaching me about
justice and risk assessment at once, confirming that social goals
and economic goals can, and do, exist in harmony.
Marketing and Fundraising Team
Log # 5
By Tiffany Wong
Today was our first information session of the semester, which
helps us to recruit members for next semester. Honestly, I’m a bit
nervous and I hope that more people show up for the second info
session. Only 3 people showed up today. But hearing Dr. Sama talk
about GLOBE to those 3 students and to hear how passionate she felt
about it was so inspiring. She believed in something and did
something about it. It inspired me to work harder towards our
objectives for GLOBE as well as some personal goals. As a class we
aren’t only working towards helping budding entrepreneurs, but we
are working towards making Dr. Sama’s vision become an even greater
reality than it already is.
Last week, my team and I met with Scott VanDeusen. Last semester
the marketing team began working on the phone campaign. So this
meeting with Scott was basically to figure out how and when we were
to continue this. We did come up with great ideas from this
meeting. I personally have a better understanding of the phone
campaign and I’m excited to see how it goes.
Scott was such a great help! He went above and beyond, and even
offered to help us out with possibly getting some raffle prizes for
our upcoming raffles. As a team, we are still looking at a few
dates when we will hopefully host the phone campaign. It is all in
the works to happen very soon! My biggest concern at this moment is
raising awareness to potential future GLOBE members. I think this
class is such a great opportunity and you learn so much about
yourself. You learn things that you didn’t even know before. I’ve
learned that I am patient and that I need to do more things to help
others. My previous efforts to make a difference can be greatly
improved. I’ve also learned that I need to change as a person. I
need to speak up and use my voice. I need to stop thinking that I
may not be heard. Even if that is the case, making a little noise
may bring attention from someone. If it’s just one person, it’s
still a start.
As the semester goes on, I’ve found that what I really love about
GLOBE is that we’re not just giving people money, but we are
helping them find a way to maintain a stable life through providing
them with opportunities in which they are helping themselves. We
are helping to educate them/their children through our efforts.
After reading the readings from class, I’ve found that education is
the key!! GLOBE has opened my eyes to how important education
really is. I’m a lot more grateful for the opportunities that I’ve
been given. And to be graduating from college in 2 months is such a
blessing, seeing that so many people aren’t as fortunate. It would
really sadden me to see other students miss out on such a great eye
opening opportunity just because they weren’t aware of it, which is
sometimes always the case. GLOBE is a life changing program and I
hope that we can help others see that as well!
Technology and Communications Team
Log # 5
By Nirveeta Mahabir
The last class meeting after Spring break, all the groups
presented their mid-term progress reports. Half the semester is
done and all the teams are making great progress. I enjoyed all of
the presentations a lot and the chance to be given all updated
information from the teams.
Firstly, with regards to the finance team, they are doing a
great job of researching possible countries to issue our loans. One
of the countries of their choosing which was of particular interest
to me was Haiti; due to the poverty in this country I think this is
a great idea. I believe our loans can make a great difference in
this country. I hope that we have access to a daughter that is
willing to help us make this possible.
Secondly, the marketing team has also done a lot. I look forward
to the next bake sale that is on the 15th and hope that we can
raise a considerable amount of money at this sale. The marketing
team has also planned an international buffet sale to display and
sell some of the meals that reflects our diverse culture in the
class. This in a way represents GLOBE, we are not just focused in
one country for giving a loan, our efforts are widespread and we
aim to get potential clients from various developing countries
globally.
Thirdly, I really liked the internal audit performed by the
Accounting Team. They really provided a lot of useful and
beneficial information to all the other teams. The changes made to
the Lexicon and the use of Microsoft Access to easily keep track of
the loans, the clients, the number of children they have etc.
basically all the relevant data needed is definitely a very clever
way of accessing all of the information and hence keeping track of
the loan applicants. This will be very beneficial to GLOBE.
Finally, the IT Team has been working diligently on promoting GLOBE
via the social media through accounts such as Facebook and Twitter.
We have also resurrected all the past GLOBE accounts such as the
BlogSpot and Linked In account and have been updating and managing
these accounts. Another focus of our team is to communicate with
one of the daughters of charity via Skype so that she can speak to
the entire class, for this to happen we would be creating a
tutorial that shows the steps as simple as possible for the
daughter to understand so that she would be able to access Skype
and hence connect with all GLOBE managers.
In conclusion, as the semester continues to progress, I firmly
believe that the GLOBE managers of Spring 2012 would be able to
accomplish all of the set goals and most importantly issue more
loans and hence assist in changing the lives of others.