Training grassroots NGOs to set up and run telecentres

In order to train grassroots NGOs to set-up and run telecentres, NASSCOM Foundation inked up with eleven NGOs with forty participants in a five days capacity building workshop in the state of West Bengal, ( located in the eastern part of India) India. NASSCOM Foundation (NF) partners with a large number of not-for-profit organization (NGOs) and voluntary groups for scaling up telecentres under the NASSCOM Knowledge Network (NKN) programme. A key component of implementing this programme and scaling up, is sensitization and capacity building workshops that help to build the necessary skills and capacities in grassroots organizations to use ICTs for community development. NGOs role as a link and an intermediary to facilitate development is well accepted, hence these workshops (and others that had been conducted previously) also serves the dual purpose of equipping NGOs with skills that help them to set-up and run telecentres on one hand, and also explore or introduce the use ICTs in their other programmes and their organization activities, thus overall enhancing their access and use of technologies.

The NASSCOM Knowledge Network (NKN) programme is a decentralized model of setting up and scaling telecentre network (http://www.nasscomfoundation.org/index.php/NKN/NKN-Model.html ), through a bottom-up, non-prescriptive approach, where the grassroots NGOs assume responsibilities of setting up and running knowledge centers/telecentre at the village/small town level. This capacity building workshops, a part of a series of annual workshops conducted by NF, gives interested NGOs an opportunity to be introduced to telecentres and be a part of the NASSCOM Knowledge Network.

The five days workshop was divided into discussion sessions for the first two days, interspaced with hands-on training for the last there days. For the first two days, through several interactive sessions the participants were introduced to various telecentre models around the world, how to set up and manage telecentre, how to be a social entrepreneur, a social infomediary, concepts and practices of marketing and communications, accounting and budgeting for running a telecentres. They were also exposed to the role of relevant services that can be provided by the telcentres, how to map local demands and develop locally relevant services, and how to price their services. While emphasising on financial sustainability, the participants were also told how to work towards achieving financial sustainability without losing focus from social and community development. Through examples from within the Nasscom Knowledge Network, participant were encouraged to work towards a sustainability plan when initiating a telecentre.

The ‘Training Commons’ (http://www.telecentre.org/uploads/tele-manuals.pdf) manual was extensively used for this training along with NF developed training content. The workshop included group activities and exercises and hand-on training on using computers and teaching basic IT courses along with familiarity session with adult literacy programmes, school curriculum support programme and other similar socially oriented services.

A unique part of this workshop was that most of the participant organisations were either new entrees to the ICT for Development space or have never used ICTs in their programmes. Most of these organsiations closely work with the local rural community in health, child education, women’s empowerment and livelihood programmes. This gave an interesting perspective to the workshop, bringing in new ideas and re-emphasising the need to ‘communicate’ and ‘partner’ with the community to run a successful telecentre.

One of the highlight of this workshop was that most of these participants were keen and was confident that they will set-up their telecentres in the next one-two months. A number of participants also thought that a telecentre is best supported and sustained if it is integrated in the overall activities of the NGOs or the voluntary group with shared resources and infrastructure.

NF will continue to provide network support to these organsiations who are start their telecentres and would also follow-up with intensive trainings on locally relevant content and services that can be rolled out from the centers.