women powering work in mena: discovery framework by ashoka changemakers

WOMEN POWERING WORKInnovations for Economic Equality in the MENA Region

WOMEN POWERING WORKInnovations for Economic Equality in the MENA Region

SUMMER 2013

DISCOVERYFRAMEWORK

Discovery Framework | Women Powering Work2

CONTENTS

Discovery Framework | Women Powering Work 3

1. Introduction to the Discovery framework 3

2. Introduction to the challenge 5

3. Framing innovation 5

4. Barriers 6

5. Design Principles 8

6. Discovery Framework Grid 10

7. Appendix: The Innovators 11


The case for hope

As a network of the world’s leading social entre-preneurs, Ashoka has intimately explored how an entrepreneurial mindset can unlock solutions to the world’s most pressing problems. Social entrepre-neurs are undaunted by how complex or unsolvable a problem may appear to be, and instead find ways to turn challenges into opportunities, and create sustainable solutions for the communities they are rooted within.Their solutions are often already reaching or poised to reach scale across a coun-try or region, and replicate even wider. Ashoka’s Discovery Framework is a tool for uncovering the entrepreneurs’ lense on a field that requires social change. It considers how entrepreneurs have broken down the components of a complex prob-lem - which we call barriers -, and the insights they offer on the most effective strategies for creating change based upon their decades of iteration on the ground - which we call design principles. Its credibility comes from the proven successes of the solutions included in the analysis, rather than

from statistical certainty or organizational met-rics. It offers an integrative approach and offers an inductive understanding of how the solutions work together in context in order to effect change. Thus, the Discovery Framework, is a different way of thinking about systems change—one that values practice over theory and on-the-ground invention over deductive academic analysis.

The lessons of the solutions profiled in the report point to a future that can get better. Ultimately, the discovery framework presented here should be seen as an invitation: to re-envision what is pos-sible, through the eyes of entrepreneurs.

Our process: Building the Framework

Discovery Frameworks are built on an analysis of thousands of social solutions created by Ashoka Fellows, experts, and thought-leaders to distill “design principles” for change. The framework allows us to uncover patterns of what works in the field and what solutions are missing. These pat-terns illuminate how change is happening. For any framework, we begin by determining a question. The question that underlies each framework both describes the shift we hope to see around a given issue in the future, as well as the goal of the organi-zations and entrepreneurs whose work we include in the grid.

Next, we sift through Ashoka’s Fellow database of more than 3,000 solutions from social entrepre-neurs to select those most applicable to the field. These innovators go through a rigorous approval process before their election to the fellowship, which includes a thorough vetting of their ideas and performance. To that select group, we add solu-tions recognized in the field as effective, whether they are created by individuals, companies, institu-tions or government agencies.

Then, we pair down the set of solutions to those that are the most relevant and innovative. Finally, we cluster them and look for patterns in how the innovators both define the problem they face, and what they do to solve it. These patterns can point to powerful ways to reframe a problem, as well as new ways of addressing it. Ultimately, this analysis reveals the “a-ha” moment of recognition, in which an entrepreneur accurately pairs a powerful idea with a compelling need.

Once the analysis is displayed in a grid the “distri-bution” of the solutions becomes apparent. The framework shows what proportion of existing solu-tions address each specific component of a prob-lem, thereby revealing which aspects are receiving less attention, and potentially short shift.

1INTRODUCTION TO THE DISCOVERY FRAMEWORK

Ashoka has intimately explored how an entrepreneurial mindset

can unlock solutions to the world’s most pressing problems”


The discovery framework should be seen as an invitation: to re-envision what is possible, through the eyes of entrepreneurs.”

The Strengths of the Discovery Framework

It creates an entrepreneur’s view of the world. Entrepreneurs—of necessity—design solutions that address the thorniest aspect of effecting change: the human interactions in a system. Recommenda-tions based on entrepreneurial solutions can predict and show ways to circumvent behavioral barriers to change that are often not addressed in strategies crafted from a more idealized viewpoint.

It allows successful solutions to be examined in context with one another. The framework shows how ideas relate to one another, as well as to the core elements of the problem. The result is the emer-gence of clear patterns: Which aspects of a problem are going unaddressed? Are some strategies unde-rutilized? Over utilized? Is there an aspect of a problem that has yet to be named? Are there holes in the system that await the design of a new solution?

It provides the map for deriving a theory of change at a systems level. The patterns and insights revealed by the framework allow a funder to develop a coherent strategy around what mix of solutions could lead to an overall increase in heat applied to the problem. While any theory of change is subjective, this contextual mapping allows for a holistic approach that merely quantifying the success of individual projects may not provide.

It creates clear criteria for predicting success. The design principles and barriers provide a road map for evaluating new projects and for guiding the invention of new ideas.

The Discovery Framework can show which strategies are most commonly (and most powerfully) used. Additionally, it can point to “holes” or areas where there can be unmet potential for a solution to be invented at the nexus of need and idea

Research solutionsFrame the question Pattern recognition Build the frameworkCull the solutions

?ASHOKA DATABASE


2INTRODUCTION TO THE CHALLENCE

The MENAT region faces a number of ecosystem challenges that make it difficult for all parts of society – not just women – to have full economic participation. These include ongoing social and political instability, lack of access to adequate education, healthcare, housing, water and more. For example, according to a 2012 report by the IMF, the MENA region has a far greater unemployment rate of youth than any other region in the world (25% of youths age 15-24). Increasing access to education is not a guarantee towards employability, with unemployment in fact tending to increase as schooling increases.

Social entrepreneurs fully understand and are deeply connected to the challenges faced by the MENAT region and are motivated to find opportuni-ties to create change. They pursue the implementa-tion of solutions tirelessly, often achieving transfor-mative impact on nationwide or regional scales.

Applying the Ashoka lens, we identify the patterns in approaches that social entrepreneurs choose, and use these patterns to determine new oppor-tunities for innovation and impact. We developed the Women Powering Work Discovery Framework by drawing upon the insights of thought leaders, practitioners, social entrepreneurs, and institutions at the forefront of transforming women’s economic participation.

The scope of this document begins with an intro-duction to the framing question, which determines the focus of the analysis. We then describe the fundamental system barriers that exclude women from actively participating in economic opportuni-ties, before we delineate principles that empower them for full participation, and finally map innova-tions to the Discovery Framework grid, followed by descriptions of the social innovations that have been studied.. This framework is intended to take a more specific focus on one (of many) elements that encompass the field of full economic participation for women in MENAT. It also provides a baseline knowledge that will continue to evolve and build on the innovations and initiatives that are submitted on changemakers.com that relate to this challenge.

Empowering women is not just a fundamental human right, it

is, as countless studies have shown, also a path to improved levels of economic and physical well being for an entire society.

As a social entrepreneur, my aim is to turn every challenge

into an opportunity.”

-Khalid AlKhudair, Founder, Glowork


The Discovery Framework is centered on identifying innovations that tackle the following challenge:

3FRAMING INNOVATION

How can women in MENA fully participate in and advance economic opportunities that help raise their standard of living, strengthen their families and communities, and contribute to global progress?

Framing Question:


Barriers are core components of a problem that, if altered, could allow for true systems change. Barriers are not underlying causes that merely describe a situation, such as something as broad as “cultural attitudes”.

Instead, they are moveable, actionable, and specific to the problem. This is because the discovery framework is designed to highlight the key issues social entrepreneurs have choosen to tackle with pragmatic solutions. The following is a synthesis of the key barriers to emerge from our survey of leading social entrepreneurs which will be shown within the Discovery Framework.

Recruiting “Best-Practices” are Exclusionary:Employers’ traditional job outreach doesn’t sufficiently reach women

Women employees who are qualified and actively seeking for job opportunities often have a difficult time securing a job. This is because companies that are open to hiring women employees are likely to pursue recruiting methods that are standard practice across industries – methods that do not reach most women. Traditional pathways to recruit new hires often consist of outreach to a company’s existing network of employers and business con-tacts. For small businesses, this may include “word of mouth” or referrals from family and friends. Women who lack prior work experience or the social capital to have access to such networks are completely left out of the process. Alternatively, a company may promote the opportunity more wide-ly by posting information through online channels. However, for women in developing nations (which are the majority in the MENAT region), there may not be well-known online job aggregators that they know of, or they may not have access to internet at all to search in the first place. If internet cafes are available, they may often be too male dominated to access comfortably. Attempts to visit companies and conduct searches in-person may be exacer-

bated by a lack of mobility caused by social pres-sures against women actively job searching or the inability to move about freely and safe from harass-ment. In all of these cases, the best-practices for recruitment aren’t sufficient to hire women who are seeking employment for the first time and lack existing connections.

Deficiency of Targeted Training:Vocational skills are not delivered alongside compelling value proposition

Even if women are able to find jobs that are avail-able to them, women face the challenge of gaining the qualifications needed to be eligible for jobs from the start. Even those that have had the privi-lege to take full advantage of a formal education system still may be left unprepared for employ-ment as a result of weaknesses in the education system, or they may not have gained the necessary apprenticeship opportunities that make it possible for them to get hired. For those left without path-ways to gain qualifications, there is an inadequate amount of vocational training targeted towards women in order to close the representation gap across occupations. Of the trainings that are avail-able to women, it is difficult to secure their partici-pation unless it is customized via its marketing and

4BARRIERS


Traditional families often don’t allow women to search for jobs in person, and Internet cafés are usually dominated by men, leaving female job-seekers with few resources for finding work – and with a greater chance than men of remaining unemployed” (and entering into unwanted early marriages)

Lana Hijazi, Founder, Souktel

In traditional societies - in Turkey, and certainly in parts of the Middle East, and definitely in Pakistan - women do not have social contact [with each other]. And we all know that social contact [is] collateral. They are a ways and means to progress, and ways and means to get further opportunities. So women are just connected to their families, they are never connected to women outside their families.”

delivery. Because women are not convinced that it is worth the significant sacrifice of their time, there must be additional outreach to address the time away from household responsibilities, the effort needed to convince family of its utility, the need to find childcare arrangements, and the challenges to mobility (such as safety concerns). Without a com-pelling value proposition, it is unlikely that women will regularly attend available trainings.

Restricted Access to Capital:Capital providers don’t customize offerings or inspire demand for them

For many women, starting an income generat-ing venture may be more feasible than pursuing employment given the lack of support structures to juggle household and family responsibilities while working. In these instances, a major challenge is being able to access financing that will enable them to start their own businesses, on their own sched-ules and within their own space. This may be due to a lack of access to banks that are willing to provide small loans to very low income borrowers, a lack of collateral to secure the loan, or a lack of knowledge on what services are available to them.

Limited Entrepreneurial Exposure:Women are unaware of the entrepreneurial possibilities available to them

One of the biggest obstacles women often face is ignorance of what opportunities exist for them to aspire towards in order to establish greater eco-nomic security. They may not have role models, self-confidence, or experiences needed to recognize entrepreneurial possibilities or feel confident in the role they can play in generating their own income. Even when encouragement is available to start busi-nesses, they may be more likely to concentrate only in producing items like traditional handicrafts that don’t have strong market demand. This problem of limited entrepreneurial exposure can be exacerbat-ed by poverty - whether in rural settings or concen-trated communities within cities – which creates isolation from the type of role models, information, networks and institutions that allow women to seek out new economic opportunities.


Design principles are insights and strategies we distill from the work of leading social entrepreneurs. They do not encompass tools (like technology or education) nor do they name specific organization-level approaches. They are clarifying ideas and insights that identify levers of change.

1. Create hands-on, group learning opportunities

Social innovators are creating groups run for and by women that are designed to achieve a par-ticular goal together – such as pooling savings and creating loans to spur income generation, providing critical resources such as daycare or starting a business cooperative. The collectives provide practice in a myriad of skills such as communications, teamwork, strategic planning, decision-making, and governance that carry over into life outside of the collective as well. The success seen by efforts such as these creates a shift away from deficit thinking – where there is no sense of optimism that challenges can be overcome - to asset-based thinking – seeing the rich wealth of resources available amongst her community as well, and the role she can play in making a difference for herself and her family.

2. Combine Practical Education & Essential Resources

While collectives often start as a vehicle for engaging women in more independent eco-nomic activity, social innovators are convinced that the provision of services such as financing or entrepreneurial training would not succeed unless they are offered side-by-side with essen-tial resources and practical skills education. The practical skills can range from family planning

and financial literacy to marketing and manage-ment, to organizing for broader change within home and civic life. They also provide access to essential resources such as daycare, counseling, and pro bono legal services.

3. Build business confidence with unified branding & arts

Although brands have traditionally been associ-ated with large corporations, social innovators are also building brands to create more stabil-ity for the hundreds of small women business owners they have trained and supported. As a part of managing their brand, innovators build-in processes for training and ensuring quality control. The unified brand allows the business owners to have their products widely marketed and reach a greater diversity than they could alone. Thus, the process of maintaining a brand creates confidence for the supplier, distributor, and consumer. Social innovators also utilized the performing arts and mass communications as a vehicle for creating confidence in the role that women can have in starting and running their own businesses and having greater economic participation. In particular, social innovators have created soap-operas for television, main-stream radio shows, and plays within school to build empathy and shift restrictive cultural at-titudes towards women and their right to access economic opportunities.

5DESIGN PRINCIPLES


4. Partner with complementary businesses in order to scale

Innovators have been particularly success-ful in helping to ensure a more sustainable economic future for women starting their own businesses, receiving vocational training, or applying for jobs by creating partnerships with the companies that will either hire them or buy their products. Partnerships might be on behalf of small women-owned businesses to have their products sold within small city shops or within large regional shopping malls. Services that help bridge women to vocational training (such as Punjab Skills & Development Fund) or job search tools (such as Glowork) partner with employers to ensure that the trainings and job search guidance is as relevant as possible to the company’s needs.

5. Customize technology to enable greater economic participation

Women in MENAT can face a number of con-straints to their mobility, which can make eco-nomic participation even more difficult. While Saudi Arabia may have the most restrictive gender laws in terms of segregation, behavioral policing, and driving, women living in many other MENAT countries also face challenges to mobility due to poor public transportation, lack of safety, harassment in public spaces, or restrictive cultural norms. Innovators, however, are customizing technology in ways that make it easy for women to search for and participate in jobs without having to travel at all, creating new norms for economic participation that are likely to upend unfair restrictions in the long run. The customization may include the cre-ation of user-friendly sites for job search and technology services to enable work from home, mobile solutions for job applications,or finan-cial transactions.


6DISCOVERY FRAMEWORK GRID

The following grid shows how existing solutions address specific components of a challenge within the field. It can show which strategies are most commonly (and most powerfully) used.

Additionally, it can point to “holes” or areas where there can be unmet potential for a solution to be invented at the nexus of need and idea. For the purposes of this framework, innovators have been categorized by the predominant design principle they are applying and the barrier they are focused on. By no means does this suggest that innovators are limited to those principles and barriers. Most apply several principles to address multiple barriers. Such approaches make their strategies more robust and comprehensive.

DESIGN PRINCIPLES

BARRIERS

1. Limited Entrepreneurial Exposure:

Women are unaware of the entrepreneurial possibilities available to them

2. Restricted Access to Capital:

Capital providers don’t customize offerings or inspire demand for them

3. Deficiency of Targeted Training:

Vocational skills are not delivered alongside compelling value proposition

4. Recruiting “Best-Practices” are Exclusionary Employers’ traditional job outreach doesn’t sufficiently reach women

1. Create hands-on, group learning opportunities

· B-Fit

· Ka-mer

· Women’s Rights Assoc.

· Water Lily Women’s Cooperative

· Anjuman Behbood-e-Khawateen

· First Step Women’s Cooperative

· Kashf Foundation*

· Sakhrah Women’s Society*

· Support for Women’s Work*

2. Combine Practical Education & Essential Resources

· Water Lily Women’s Cooperative*

· Palestinian Center for Development Studies

· Sakhrah Women’s Society

· Ka-mer

· Lyari Community Development Project (LCDP)

· Anjuman Behbood-e-Khawateen*

· Support for Women’s Work

3.Build business confidence with unified branding & arts

· Palestinian Center for Development Studies*

· 96 Nisaa FM

· Kashf Foundation · El-Nafez · GloWork

4.Partner with complementary businesses in order to scale

· Kaarvan Crafts Field of Work

· Women’s Rights Assoc.*

· Punjab Skills & Development Fund

· GloWork*

5.Customize technology to enable greater economic participation

· Kashf Foundation · GloWork

· Souktel

*listed more than once within the framework

IDENTIFYPATTERNS

FRAMEQUESTION

IDENTIFYOPPORTUNITIES

IDENTIFYBARRIERS

IDENTIFYDESIGN

PRINCIPLES

RESEARCHSOLUTIONS

CREATEDISCOVERYFRAMEWORK



B-FITTurkey

Bedriye Hulya founded B-Fit as a gym and commu-nity center that is co-owned, franchised, managed and used by women. It aims to spread exercise as a human right instead of a luxury for the few that can afford other gyms in Turkey and creates alternative spaces for women of all ages and backgrounds to build confidence and develop a range of essential life skills. Participation in B-Fit’s programs and manage-ment enables women to enter work life, gain entre-preneurial experience, and shape attitudes towards women’s capabilities as leaders and decision-mak-ers, especially in the traditionally male-dominated fields of entrepreneurship and sports. As of 2012, B-Fit has impacted over 150,000 members with 250 entrepreneurs in 216 centers in Turkey, with one in Northern Cyprus and another in Germany, and has plans to expand to the Middle East. It will also add another opportunity for income generation by creat-ing shops within the gym where women can adver-tise and sell their own handicrafts.

Barrier:Limited Entrepreneurial Exposure

Women’s Rights Association Pakistan [ see profile on page 22 ]

Water Lily Women’s Cooperative Turkey [ see profile on page 17 ]

Anjuman Behbood-e-Khawateen Pakistan [ see profile on page 18 ]

Social innovators are creating groups run for and by women that are designed to achieve a particular goal together – such as pooling savings and creating loans to spur income generation, providing critical resources such as daycare or starting a business cooperative. The collectives provide practice in myriad skills such as communications, teamwork, strategic planning, decision-making, and governance that carry over into life outside of the collective as well. The success seen by efforts such as these creates a shift away from deficit thinking – where there is no sense of optimism that challenges can be overcome - to asset-based thinking – seeing the rich wealth of resources available amongst her community as well, and the role she can play in making a difference for herself and her family.

DESIGN PRINCIPLEONE

Create hands-on, group learning opportunities


KA-MERTurkey

Nebahat Akkoc launched Ka-mer as a center that could respond to women’s immediate and critical needs and increases awareness by women of their rights as citizens, wives, and mothers. The center is self-supported, financed by an on-site restaurant and daycare center. It provides a range of services, including legal and psychological counseling, human rights education, and child-care. Ka-mer facilitates professional development opportunities as well as group learning and consciousness-raising for wom-en. These groups, consisting of fifteen women each, meet for ten weeks to discuss a range of topics tai-lored to women’s needs and circumstances, includ-ing: human rights, democratic participation, leader-ship, education, and domestic violence prevention. While focusing on women, Nebahat also works with husbands and families to encourage broad accep-tance of women as independent wage-earners and citizens capable of valuable contributions to society.

Nebahat’s personal experiences serve as the foun-dation for work in Southeastern Anatolia. She lived through a fifteen-year war in which her husband was arrested and later killed. His mother, who spoke only Kurdish (forbidden in public spaces), was not allowed to speak with her imprisoned son before his death. Nebahat herself was imprisoned for a brief period and where she was tortured and sexu-ally abused. These experiences have contributed to Nebahat’s relentless drive to effect change.

Barrier: Limited Entrepreneurial Exposure

KASHF FOUNDATIONPakistan

By connecting women to one another and to educa-tion opportunities, Roshaneh Zafar is spurring entre-preneurship among women in Pakistan. Roshaneh founded Kashf foundation in 1995 to spearhead the development of a new model for a “full-service or-ganization,” managed by and for women. The model combines in-house, micro-scale banking and lending operations with closely integrated training and sup-port services. In a six-month period, Roshaneh and her colleagues have helped village women organize, taken them through basic business training, and coached them in basic literacy. As of 2007, over 157 branches distributed over 280,000 loans totaling over $265 million and supporting over 500,000 families. The Kashf Foundation is also actively involved in advocacy efforts, such as sponsoring a ground breaking soap opera by leading writers and actors that is intended to break restrictive cultural attitudes and better create an enabling environment for women’s entrepreneurship.

Barrier:Restricted Access to Capital

DESIGN PRINCIPLE: ONE


SAKHRAH WOMEN’S SOCIETYJordan

Sakhrah Women’s Society, the Arab region’s first farmers’ union for poor marginalized women, was founded by Zeinab Al-Momani and started out by organizing small agricultural projects. The coopera-tive then started offering revolving loans to mem-bers so they could start their own income generating projects. As of 2009, seven cooperatives have been established, with over 721 members and over 800 revolving loans. The cooperatives are involved in the cultivation and packaging of cereals, the manufac-ture of dairy products, textiles and crafts. The union has helped many women deal with legal constraints and assisted them in reclaiming and rehabilitating agricultural land. Zeinab has also worked on easing women’s access to capital and land by advocat-ing for the amendment of the law for the Jordanian Farmers’ Union that requires land ownership as a condition for joining the union. Thanks to her efforts, the law now accepts land rental as a sufficient condi-tion for joining unions.

Barrier: Restricted Access to Capital

Social innovators are creating groups run for and by women that are designed to achieve a particular goal together – such as pooling savings and creating loans to spur income generation, providing critical resources such as daycare or starting a business cooperative. The collectives provide practice in myriad skills such as communications, teamwork, strategic planning, decision-making, and governance that carry over into life outside of the collective as well. The success seen by efforts such as these creates a shift away from deficit thinking – where there is no sense of optimism that challenges can be overcome - to asset-based thinking – seeing the rich wealth of resources available amongst her community as well, and the role she can play in making a difference for herself and her family.

DESIGN PRINCIPLEONE

Create hands-on, group learning opportunities


SUPPORT FOR WOMEN’S WORKTurkey

Sengül Akcar has designed a community-based foundation, Support for Women’s Work, which educates and empowers poor women and families. Sengül is increasing women’s professional and personal opportunities and broadening the percep-tion of women’s role in Turkish society. She does this by enabling women to break from their traditional, limiting roles and to gain financial independence and self-respect by learning nontraditional skills, such as carpentry. Each provides a physical space where women can convene to identify and discuss prob-lems and challenges, design solutions, and learn from each other. The centers provide quality daycare and a micro-credit program, unique to Turkey, where women are taught financial management skills traditionally reserved for men. As of 2000, Sengül has launched five Women’s and Children’s Centers in impoverished neighborhoods in and around Istanbul.

Barrier:Deficiency of Targeted Training

FIRST STE WOMEN’S COOPERATIVETurkey

While living in a disadvantaged and violence-ridden district of Istanbul, Senum Gul was inspired by the work of another female social entrepreneur, Sen-gul Akcar, to go door-to-door to invite women for a communal meeting to address the problems they face. The communal meetings grew into the First Step’s Women Cooperative, which initially attracts participants by advertising childhood development and learning services along with a menu of other activities and seminars. As women get more deeply involved, they attend more formal training ses-sions and choose a task force to begin working on a particular issue they care about deeply. Through the trainings, women work especially hard on negotia-tion and communication, which has already resulted in marked improvements in the community and reduction of violence. They also learn about finance and governance in 10-member democratic savings groups. From an initial group of 19, as of 2007 more than 800 women are involved in two centers. After only three years, the success of her cooperative has already inspired replicas in other parts of the city and the country. Her idea has been widely publicized and generated interest from women’s groups in 16 different cities in Turkey.


DESIGN PRINCIPLE: ONE


WATER LILY WOMEN’S COOPERATIVETurkey

Selma Demirelli has founded Water Lily Women’s Cooperative, Turkey’s first women’s housing coop-erative, to empower women as property owners with full citizenship and financial stability. Selma orga-nized local women in a series of development, learn-ing, and income-generation activities. The group searched for a place on state-owned land and per-suaded the Ministry of Development and Housing to sell them the property with a low-interest long-term payment. Each woman took on a US$12,000 mort-gage over time for the parcel and all are involved in the design, architecture, and urban planning of the development. As of 2007, the initial cooperative was able to secure housing for forty-eight families and a second cooperative has been founded nearby.


Palestinian Center for Development Studies [ see profile on page 19 ]

Barrier: Limited Entrepreneurial Exposure

Sakhrah Women’s Society [ see profile on page 15 ] Barrier: Limited Entrepreneurial Exposure

While collectives often start as a vehicle for engaging women in more independent economic activity, social innovators are convinced that the provision of services such as financing or entrepreneurial training would not succeed unless they are offered side-by-side with essential resources and practical skills education. The practical skills can range from family planning and financial literacy to marketing and management, to organizing for broader change within home and civic life. They also provide access to essential resources such as daycare, counseling, and pro bono legal services.

DESIGN PRINCIPLETWO

Combine Practical Education & Essential Resources


LYARI COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT PROJECT (LCDP)Pakistan

Sabiha Ghani runs the Lyari Community Develop-ment Project (LCDP), an entrepreneurship incubator, to provide poor women comprehensive systems of support for their business ventures with a package of services, including business training, marketing advice, and financing that helps them to take full ad-vantage of opportunities for business development. She organizes neighborhood-level women’s groups to help members support each other as workers and entrepreneurs, and she brings these groups into contact with a wide range of financial and social services. Through networking and continuous education, Sabiha helps women entrepreneurs grow their own businesses. As of 2005, this approach has helped over a thousand women in Lyari to set up businesses. Sabiha is now shifting her focus to assist women in the rural areas of Sindh province. Sabiha chooses roughly 35 business ventures to incubate each year, and this number is rapidly growing.


ANJUMAN BEHBOOD-E-KHAWATEEN (ABKT)Pakistan

Shad Begum works to improve the lives of women in communities of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, a conserva-tive region in Northwest Pakistan. The Association for Behavior and Knowledge Transformation (ABKT), founded in 1994, provides opportunities for women to gather and work together in groups. The groups are introduced to the community in a way that is not seen as threatening to the local men, unlike the neg-ative way outside interventions often are. ABKT has a program that provides these groups with non-for-mal basic education, health services, health educa-tion, and the microcredit and skills training needed to establish their own income generating. The group activities instill confidence, create trust, and provide a platform to voice needs and collaboratively devise solutions. They also serve as a basis for political edu-cation and organizing. Shad has been able to assist over a hundred women to become elected to local councils and is encouraging the spread of groups and formalized training through partnerships with a number of community organizations.


DESIGN PRINCIPLE: TWO


PALESTINIAN CENTER FOR COMMUNICATION & DEVELOPMENT STUDIESPalestine

Fida Abu Turky founded The Palestinian Center for Communication & Development Strategies (PCCDS) to economically empower women in rural areas of the Levant by implementing a grassroots venture capitalist approach adapted for the cultural context. PCCDS provides grants to women living in rural communities adversely affected by the Separation Wall based on their needs and conducts regular follow-up and evaluation to ensure the project is run-ning smoothly. To complement the grant, Fida also provides business support resources and services through a network of thirty-four rural organizations. She partners with a local marketing company, which markets and sells the project’s products regionally and internationally. She creates partnerships with organizations to provide services and competitive marketing and offers a branded label under which the products that women entrepreneurs create can better sell. She is the first entrepreneur in the Arab World to adapt business incubation for the Levantine cultural context in order to create jobs for women, encourage women entrepreneurs, and diversify local community economies. As of 2011, PCCDS incubat-ed over 1,200 projects and has managed US$2M in funding. The Arab Fund for Economic and Social De-velopment has pledged an additional US$750,000 to support expansion.


Although brands have traditionally been associated with large corporations, social innovators are also building brands to create more stability for the hundreds of small women business owners they have trained and supported. As a part of managing their brand, innovators build-in processes for training and ensuring quality control. The unified brand allows the business owners to have their products widely marketed and reach a greater diversity than they could alone. Thus, the process of maintaining a brand creates confidence for the supplier, distributor, and consumer. Social Innovators also utilized the performing arts and mass communications as a vehicle for creating confidence in the role that women can have in starting and running their own businesses. In particular, social innovators have created soap-operas for television and plays within school to build empathy and shift restrictive cultural attitudes towards women and their right to access economic opportunities.

DESIGN PRINCIPLETHREE

Leverage Savvy Communication Tools to Build Confidence


96 NISAA FMPalestine

To achieve her goal of a Levant region that is proud and inclusive of women -giving them equal rights and opportunities to participate fully - Maysoun Odeh Gangat chose radio as her tool because of its accessibility to a large audience. Maysoun presents inspiring role models of women in the region from all sectors, both young and old, housewives, students, and working women. 96 Nisaa FM began in Ramal-lah, Palestine, and expanded to further locations, including the Northern territories, with many mar-ginalized communities.

Maysoun also plays an important role in respond-ing to a real hunger for knowledge and the need of information that can truly help transform the lives of women by providing useful information to help them flourish rather than simply survive. Nisaa FM serves as a platform that connects listeners with commu-nity organizations that can support them in different areas of their lives, such as; counseling for domestic violence, how to file for welfare, educational oppor-tunities and job training.

While there are two other women radio stations in Egypt and Iraq, Maysoun’s station is the first and only station operating on a commercial model, airing both online and on air, while addressing women’s issues from a non-traditional approach and incor-porating men in the process of change. As of 2012, 96 NISAA FM was ranked as third of twenty stations across the Ramallah Governorate by the Ministry of Interior.


EL-NAFEZAEgypt

Mohammed el Naga established the El Nafeza papermaking center to revive Egypt’s historic craft of papermaking by providing training in how to use a community’s agricultural waste to manufacture paper products with high artistic and commercial standards. He specifically looks for candidates to train among women and those with special needs and utilizes materials that would otherwise be burned and further exacerbate problems of pollu-tion. Mohamed trains 10 to 15 trainers annually, who in turn, train at least ten others, particularly in poor, rural villages. Graduated trainees are equipped to establish their own papermaking centers in com-munities all over Egypt; creating job opportunities, and opening new markets. New centers started by El Nafeza and its community of trainers are given guidelines to help achieve maximum social impact, addressing issues such as employing a proportion of the unemployed, marginalized, and disabled in each community where they operate. By creating a unifying brand – El-Nafez- el-Naga is also helping to connect these producers to global markets – allow-ing for products such as greeting cards and attrac-tive writing papers to be sold and marketed in well renowned, international stores.

Barrier:Deficiency of Targeted Skills Training

Kashf Foundation [ see profile on page 19 ]


GloWork [ see profile on page 15 ] Barrier: Recruiting “Best-Practices” are Exclusionary

DESIGN PRINCIPLE: THREE


KAARVAN CRAFTS FIELD OF WORKPakistan

As microfinance has become more readily avail-able, many women in rural and suburban areas of Pakistan have started to earn incomes, but social norms and taboos serve to restrict their access to markets. Kaarvan Crafts was formed as a spin off from the microfinance organization KASHF, because Aysha Saifuddin felt that organizing women and linking them with the mainstream market required an entity dedicated to that task alone. Kaarvan provides women with business and skill training, introduces systems for pricing and quality control, and conducts research to guide the creation of more marketable product designs, helping them become appealing subcontractors for international brands. It has set up a distribution network that includes four self-operated retail outlets in Karachi and Lahore as well as other large retailers like those operating in hotels, boutiques, and malls. Kaarvan is in the pro-cess of strengthening the recognition of its brand as a symbol of style and quality and partnering with one of the largest retail outlet malls in Pakistan to pro-vide a steady market for the goods created through its network of women entrepreneurs. Additionally, Aysha is exploring training women to become sales agents of solar technology, an urgent need across the country given frequent electricity shortages. As of 2012, Kaarvan had built up the producer base of over 2,800 women entrepreneurs.


Innovators have been particularly successful in helping to ensure a more sustainable economic future for women starting their own businesses, receiving vocational training, or applying for jobs by creating partnerships with the companies that will either hire them or buy their products. Partnerships might be on behalf of small women-owned businesses to have their products sold within small city shops or within large regional shopping malls. Services that help bridge women to vocational training (such as Punjab Skills & Development Fund) or job search tools (such as Glowork) partner with employers to ensure that the trainings and job search guidance is as relevant as possible to the company’s needs.

DESIGN PRINCIPLEFOUR

Partner with complementary businesses in order to scale


WOMEN’S RIGHTS ASSOCIATIONPakistan

Shaista Bukhari, recognized the lack of women entrepreneurship in her region of Pakistan was due to not only a lack of training, but also a lack of ideas for what businesses to start. She began the Women Rights Association, which works with women to identify opportunities, develop products, and create partnerships for the purchase of raw materials and distribution. In doing so, the WRA provides access to social capital, networking opportunities, business trainings, and other resources, while encouraging participants to come up with innovative ideas for new ventures. As a part of ensuring the sustainability of her trainees, she is builds partnerships with shops that will sell the women’s products, and is in the process of securing larger retail partners. She also selects between 20 and 35 women each year from different local governing bodies throughout Pakistan and provides them with networking opportunities and the latest information regarding product mar-keting. As of 2008, she has developed an inclusive and supportive network to provide lasting support to over 325 graduates of her program. Additionally, she has trained over 200 community members who can train others in micro-business entrepreneurship.


PUNJAB SKILLS & DEVELOPMENT FUNDPakistan

The Punjab Skills & Development Fund (PSDF) Fund provides resources to help private sector enterprises and partnerships develop and offer vocational train-ing courses. This partnership model ensures that prospective employees receive training that is as relevant as possible to their potential employers. It is deliberate in ensuring it opportunities are attended by the poor and vulnerable populations of the four poorest districts of Punjab, and that women are well represented as participants. Its trainings aim to improve participants’ ability to find work, progress in their current employment or develop their own enterprises. It also aims to up-skill those in low-skills-low-returns’ jobs and enhance their earning potential.

PSDF is currently associated with 47 training service providers from all sectors engaging in different vo-cational trainings of its products Skills for Jobs (SFJ) and Skills for Market (SFM). PSDF has successfully trained over 26,000 (both men and women) deserv-ing trainees from the targeted districts in more than 117 different trades.

Barrier:Vocational skills are not delivered alongside compelling value proposition

GloWork [ see profile on page 15 ] Barrier: Recruiting “Best-Practices” are Exclusionary

DESIGN PRINCIPLE: FOUR


GLOWORKSaudi Arabia

Khalid Al-Khudair is working across four key areas to increase women’s economic participation: First, he is customizing technology to overcome challenges to transportation and segregation laws that prevent companies from easily hiring women. He created a virtual office monitoring tool that allows compa-nies to hire women to work from home; it has been recognized by the United Nations and World Bank for its role as an innovative solution for job creation. Second, he is working with the Saudi Ministry of Labor to change policies that make it difficult for companies to hire women, proposing and passing new laws mandating the hiring of women in several sectors including retail and manufacturing. Third, he is building a platform that fills the gap between job seeking women and companies that are ready to hire them. As of 2013, Khalid’s organization, Glowork, has worked with unemployment records to build a database of 1.2 million unemployed women. In his first year, he has created over 6,000 vacancies for women by establishing partnerships with both Saudi and international corporations. He is also convening the largest regional job fair for women that features prominent corporations. Fourth, he is launching a series of marketing campaigns that encourages Saudi society to think differently about the role of women in the workplace. As the first local job portal of its kind, Khalid’s initiative is paving the way for women’s employment to vastly increase.

Barrier:Recruiting “Best-Practices” are Exclusionary

Women in MENAT can face a number of constraints to their mobility, which can make economic participation even more difficult. While Saudi Arabia may have the most restrictive gender laws in terms of segregation, behavioral policing, and driving, women living in many other MENAT countries also face challenges to mobility due to poor public transportation, lack of safety, harassment in public spaces, or restrictive cultural norms. Innovators, however, are customizing technology in ways that make it easy for women to search for and participate in jobs without having to travel at all, creating new norms for economic participation that are likely to upend unfair restrictions in the long run. The customization may include the creation of user-friendly sites for job search and technology services to enable work from home (such as Glowork) or mobile solutions for job applying (such as with Souktel) or financial transactions (such as with Kashf Foundation).

DESIGN PRINCIPLEFIVE

Customize technology to enable greater economic participation


SOUKTELEgypt

Lana Hijazi & Mohammed Al Kilany established Souktel Inc., an organization whose core innovation helps job seekers (regardless of location, gender, or socio-economic background) and employers con-nect through simple text-messaging (SMS) process-es. From any mobile phone, job seekers create SMS “mini-CVs” that include basic data on their skills and location. From the other side, employers create similar mini-job ads and post them to the same data-base, enabling job seekers to search these opportu-nities from their own phones. As of 2011, Souktel is changing Middle Eastern labor markets and econo-mies from opaque systems that exclude most job seekers, to transparent systems that empower all, by using simple and accessible mobile technology. To date, 8,000+ job seekers and 200+ employers use Souktel’s JobMatch technology every day.

Barrier:Recruiting “Best-Practices” are Exclusionary

Kashf Foundation [ see profile on page 19 ]


DESIGN PRINCIPLE: FIVE

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Authored by Reem Rahman with thanks to Ashoka colleagues Patrice Mobley, Chloe Feinberg, Chitra Krishnan; Ashoka Fellowship offices in the Arab World, Pakistan, and Turkey; and the generosity of the interviewees for their contributions to the thinking that produced this Discovery Framework.

Ashoka Changemakers is grateful to General Electric for its support on the Women Powering Work global competition

women powering work in mena: discovery framework by ashoka changemakers

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