The power of lean thinking in a developing world
What can we learn from technology advances in developing economies? A 2010 United Nations study found that cell phones are one of the most effective advancements in history to lift people out of poverty. Inexpensive cellular networks help remote villagers make informed and skillful decisions on when and where to bring their products to market, and for how much. While only 4% of households in Africa have Internet access, and few have bank accounts, more than 50% have cell phones -- so the cell phone becomes the channel for communication, collaboration, commerce, and knowledge sharing. While serving those at the bottom of the economic pyramid, at a low transaction cost and small environmental footprint, we can learn how to do much more with much less. Insights from the developing world can yield surprising innovations to for-profit enterprises in established markets. Many technology savvy enterprises are now partnering with NGOs in the social business realm, reaping bottom line rewards while serving the global community. Join Khuloud Odeh, CIO of the Nobel Peace Prize winning Grameen Foundation, and Steve Bell, founder of Lean4NGO.org, as they share stories, insights, photos and videos from their June 2013 Lean leadership coaching trip to Grameen field offices in Uganda. You’ll see and hear how Lean IT, Agile, and Lean Startup thinking have helped Grameen in four core areas:
- Access to finance: micro credit, savings and other products to help establish economic self sufficiency
- Access to information: through tools and mobile applications built to be in the hands of the poor and benefit them directly: like the mobile applications for health, agriculture and livelihood improvement
- Poverty insights: help capture the voice of the poor through data collection tools and data analysis, understanding the real needs of the poor and informing the development organizations’ agenda and the development of solutions for the sector
- Converting Grameen to a fully cloud-based Lean/Agile enterprise in order to support a dynamic, field-driven global organization