Developing Entrepreneurs through Business Development Centers: BDC Rwanda as a Prototype

John E. Mulford Posted on
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.64010/EEIR4700

Abstract

This paper describes the development and testing of a comprehensive, replicable model for training and supporting entrepreneurs who want to start and grow ethical businesses that will transform their communities and nations. After a brief review of the power of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to create jobs and drive innovation, the paper describes the prototype Regent University Center for Entrepreneurship (RCE) developed in Rwanda. The results—50% of graduates run businesses, several of which are becoming industry leaders—demonstrate the effectiveness of the program. RCE is replicating the results through licensing—currently in seven countries with a dozen others in conversation.

Developing nations lack the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) that drive job creation and innovation. To make matters worse, their business environments make it difficult for entrepreneurs to succeed. Entrepreneurship training is not enough to overcome the obstacles. What is needed are comprehensive programs that inspire, equip, and support aspiring entrepreneurs. This paper describes the design, implementation and results of such a program in Rwanda.

Entrepreneurship and Economic Development

Since David Birch (1987) published his work concluding that small businesses create the most jobs, many studies have addressed the issue with conflicting results. Using the National Establishment time series data, Neumark, Wall & Zhang (2008) concluded that, while the effect is not as large as Birch found, it is still unmistakable. Regardless of the relative number of jobs created by firms of different sizes, small businesses clearly create many jobs.

Not only do small businesses create jobs, they are also responsible for major innovations. Christensen (1997) found that large companies rarely introduced the latest technologies, because, in their infancy, these new technologies could not meet the needs of the large company’s customers. It fell on small companies to develop the new technology (Nelson, 2004).

These innovative small businesses are not uniformly distributed across the globe. According to Kushnir, Mirmulstein, & Ramalho (2010), the density of Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) is positively correlated to per capita GDP. It should come as no surprise then that Sub-Saharan Africa has the lowest density of MSMEs of any region in the world (Kushnir et al., 2010). Developing nations, such as those in Sub-Saharan Africa, need more MS-MEs to increase jobs and income (Bee, 2004).

Given the importance of small business to create both jobs and innovation, the entrepreneurs who conceive and launch those small businesses take on great importance to an economy. Without a sufficient supply of such entrepreneurs, an economy cannot reach its potential (Wennekers & Thurik, 1999).

Ease of Doing Business is one of many factors that affect the supply of entrepreneurs and their effectiveness at starting and growing businesses (Aidis, 2005; Arinaitwe, 2006). The World Bank ranks countries by Ease of Doing Business, which correlates positively with income-that is, ease of doing business increases with increasing per capita GDP. Despite the obstacles to doing business in developing nations, the MSME gap represents an opportunity for both governments and entrepreneurs (Schlog, 2004).

This paper focuses on developing entrepreneurs in Rwanda, one of the poorest countries in the world. According to The World Fact Book (2017), Rwanda ranks #208 of 228 in GDP per capita. To attract and stimulate business, Rwanda is taking intentional steps to improve its business environment. It improved its World Bank Doing Business In ranking from #150 in 2008 to #29 in 2019 (World Bank, 2007, 2018).

Programs to Develop Entrepreneurs

There are many approaches to developing entrepreneurs. Programs differ by the way they combine training, mentoring, coaching, networking, incubation and accelerator spaces and services, and investment (Valerio, 2014). Some specialize by the type of entrepreneur they target-aspiring, novice, experienced. Others specialize by industry, growth potential, or stage of development. A program’s niche depends on its goals, expertise, and resources.

Regent University Center for Entrepreneurship (RCE) gears its approach to preparing and nurturing entrepreneurs to start and grow ethical businesses that have the potential to transform a nation. Consequently, we focus on developing small and medium enterprises (SMEs) rather than micro-enterprises, which provide for a family but rarely generate significant jobs per firm (Karnani, 2007). We target emerging leaders who have shown a desire to start and grow businesses that will benefit their families, communities and nation. We provide comprehensive training and support to help fledgling entrepreneurs succeed in a challenging environment.

BDC Rwanda: Background

The BDC concept that RCE prototyped in Rwanda in 2010 arose from a 2007 Symposium hosted at Regent University. Founders of twelve organizations that train entrepreneurs in more than forty developing nations gathered to discuss best practices of their training programs. The takeaway from the discussions was that training by itself would not produce many successful businesses in those environments. A more comprehensive program of ongoing mentoring and support was required to help aspiring entrepreneurs overcome start-up obstacles, which tend to be especially severe in developing nations.

A second takeaway was that existing organizations were too occupied with their current programs to attempt an entirely new model. RCE volunteered to develop and test a prototype.

Fortuitously, the International Christian Chamber of Commerce (ICCC) approached RCE in 2008 with a partnership proposal for such a prototype. ICCC had been invited by four African nations to help them develop their economies. RCE and ICCC evaluated the four nations and chose Rwanda as having the most potential for a successful prototype, because the government strongly supported entrepreneurship and was improving its business environment through business-friendly policies, laws, and institutions. ICCC signed an agreement with the government of Rwanda in 2008 to establish a Business Development Center in Kigali, the capital, with RCE as the operating partner.

After two years of planning, curriculum development, and recruiting, BDC Rwanda was launched in August 2010 with a cohort of 42 aspiring entrepreneurs.

As of July 2018, more than 350 entrepreneurs have graduated from BDC Rwanda’s 14-week training program. About half of the graduates have active businesses. Some are small, employing a few people to serve a local market, while others are multi-million-dollar businesses operating internationally.

Graduates are active across the spectrum of industries in Rwanda, because the BDC encourages all the entrepreneurs in the program to follow their passion, rather than seek our guidance as to the most promising industries. The program provides entrepreneurship basics that have been equally applicable to a wide range of businesses, including small farms, retail shops, software development firms, construction firms, and major energy generation projects.

Graduates say the BDC gave them the confidence, skills, and vision to pursue their passion-starting small but growing significant businesses. This was true of both inexperienced entrepreneurs and seasoned business owners.

Paniel Meats was started by a man in his early twenties who credits store operators from Chick-fil-A, in Rwanda on a BDC-sponsored visit, with believing in him and instilling the confidence he needed to launch his pork sausage business. He was soon producing and delivering 1,000 kg. of sausage weekly to local restaurants, hotels and supermarkets. Now, a few years later, he is developing the value chain for meat in Rwanda.

He provides young animals, feed, medicine and veterinarian services to small farmers, advises them on growing healthy animals, purchases the grown animals, and transports and sells them in urban markets. He shares the profits with the farmers, most of whom have never had a cash crop.

Africa Medical Supplies was founded by a successful pharmacy owner. His award-winning business concept was rapid diagnostic tests kits for 30 diseases. Upon graduation, he won the national contract for HIV/AIDs testing in Rwanda. But the BDC program prepared him to continually expand his vision. He now provides both test kits and medical equipment to hospitals and clinics throughout Africa.

The program that helped produce these results grew out of years of experience and research. The program’s co-authors have trained and observed entrepreneurs in dozens of developing nations over the past twenty years. They have researched entrepreneurship in those and other developing nations, including several in Africa (Kiggundu, 2002; Ladzani & van Vuuren, 2002). The program has also gone through a continuous improvement process since its launch in 2010. Below, we describe the program design and the lessons we learned from its implementation in Rwanda.

BDC Program Design

From spring 2008 through spring 2010, RCE researched entrepreneurship programs, brainstormed curriculum ideas, and discussed our evolving plan with ICCC and several colleagues who had participated in the 2007 best practices symposium. We applied the best practices we learned over the years to our objective of preparing and equipping transformative entrepreneurs in Rwanda. We built the curriculum on several foundational principles, which are captured in our philosophy of developing ethical entrepreneurs (Morris et al., 2013).

Philosophy of Developing Entrepreneurs

Train the Whole Person. We are preparing the whole person-heart, head and hands-to Be, Know, and Do. The heart is the internal guidance system that decides what is worth pursuing and the right and wrong way to pursue it. The head is the intellectual store of knowledge about anything that is relevant to the business. The hands represent the skills that enable the entrepreneur to put his ideas into action. Each one of these must be fully developed if we are to achieve our goal of developing ethical entrepreneurs. A heart of integrity ensures that this highly proficient entrepreneur stays tuned to ethical goals and methods. A well-developed head ensures depth and adaptability in a changing environment. Well-developed hands ensure that the ethically-motivated, well-thought-out ideas are implemented efficiently and effectively.

Our goal is to equip ethical entrepreneurs to produce life-improving products and services in a way that benefits their communities. We believe that businesses that prioritize their customers and employees will not only do the most good, but they will be the most financially successful. We want to prepare entrepreneurs who have a passion for business and who expect to flourish and prosper by treating people well.

The ideas that you can prosper in your passion, and that you can do well financially by doing good and being honest, are not often taught or experienced in developing nations. For one’s beliefs, attitudes, or values to change, one must be challenged to examine oneself, offered an alternative perspective, and given the opportunity to “try it on”, to see how it fits in discussion and action. Discussion of an ethical issue among trusted colleagues who may differ in their views can stimulate reflection and examination.

The Word of the Day provides a forum for such discussions at the beginning of every class session. We discussed words that characterize successful, ethical entrepreneurs, such as, inquisitiveness, courage, humility, etc. In addition to these discussions, we designed activities that stress one’s character-e.g., time pressure, temptations to bend the rules to win, etc. When the pressure elicited lapses in judgment or character, we treated it as a teachable moment. The BDC program plants seeds that we hope will grow as the entrepreneur grows.

Provide Self-directed, Action Learning.

If we are going to achieve the goal of graduates starting and growing SMEs, we must produce highly competent entrepreneurs-people predisposed to action and equipped to succeed when they act (Morris et al., 2013). Entrepreneurs are inquisitive, action-oriented innovators. By nature, they want to be in control of their lives, including their learning. Our training program targets people who have demonstrated entrepreneurial potential. It facilitates the development of that potential through self-directed, action learning (Cope & Watts, 2000).

Historically, teachers conveyed truth about a subject and students “learned” it. Modern pedagogy recognizes the advantages of problem-based learning, in which learners are responsible for articulating the relevant questions about a problem and finding answers through self-directed, facilitator-guided research (Tan & Ng, 2006).

This method is especially effective for developing entrepreneurs, because it exercises some of the most important traits of an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs visualize where they want to go and then figure out a way to get there. Following someone else’s path of logic or memorizing existing facts both work against invention and innovation.

Self-directed learning is especially challenging for people who have been educated in developing countries where “teacher conveying knowledge” is the exclusive model. Students memorize what the teacher says and never question it. The BDC program is intentionally designed to reprogram this type of learner to realize that it is OK to question received knowledge and wisdom. Even the least experienced entrepreneur has valuable ideas and insights that are worth sharing. For these reasons, we call the enrollees in the program entrepreneurs, or aspiring entrepreneurs, rather than students, regardless of their level of experience in starting or running businesses. This may sound like trivial semantics, but it sends a powerful message.

Entrepreneurs are doers. To develop true entrepreneurs, the BDC program must involve action-both in class and outside class (Cope & Watts, 2000). The program incorporates action-learning activities in class and schedules periods of fieldwork after every content module to provide opportunities for the entrepreneurs to practice what they are learning. For example, in the marketing module they learn customer acquisition techniques and practice them on their classmates. During fieldwork they try to acquire real customers for their product or service.

The culmination of the program is purposely oriented toward doing. Rather than present a “business plan” at the end, they “present their business”. We encourage them to start the business before graduation. Even if their business is still on paper, their mindset is presenting the business as if it is operating, not as something hypothetical.

Provide Business Basics to Support a Lifetime of Just-in-Time Learning.

Our core training is designed to provide entrepreneurs the foundation on which they can build their careers and businesses. It focuses on the basics of business that apply to a business of any size. Our expectation is that most graduates will start small.

They will have few employees, use simple technology, and start with a small amount of capital raised through informal networks. In the core training, we do not spend time on sophisticated technology or complex systems to manage large organizations.

Our core training provides a framework of business that fits businesses of any size and level of complexity. It presents foundational principles that apply to any industry or country. Its critical thinking approach prepares learners to ask the right questions and gather information to answer them. Graduates will then be ready to learn and adapt not only as their businesses grow and become more complex, but also as the business environment changes. The BDC provides advanced, just-in-time training which graduates of the core program can take when they recognize their need for it. We encourage our graduates to become lifelong learners.

Provide Mentoring, Coaching, and Consulting.

No matter how well the training prepares the entrepreneur, everyone needs ongoing interaction, encouragement and advice. During the program, successful executives and entrepreneurs, mostly from other nations, visit the class. They serve as role models of business success with integrity, examples which are often lacking in the lives of our entrepreneurs. Visitors meet one-on-one with the aspiring entrepreneurs, listening to their goals, and providing feedback and encouragement.

After graduation, the need for mentoring, coaching and consulting continues and may even increase. Many graduates start their businesses solo. During this lonely start-up time they need support and encouragement from people who understand them. Fellow alumni share their experience and expertise as peer mentors. We assign distance consultants who engage graduates by phone and internet to hold them accountable to their action plans, encourage them as they go through trials, and provide consulting advice.

Program Content (7 Modules in 14 weeks)

The program consists of seven 2-week modules alternating between the Classroom, where you learn concepts and skills, and Fieldwork, where you apply those concepts and skills. In the first module, you learn the significance of entrepreneurs in growing an economy, and see how your talents, experience and interests may be pointing you toward a significant life as an entrepreneur. In Module 2 (fieldwork), you investigate a business concept that fits your passion and immerse yourself in that industry.

In Module 3, you develop a unique selling proposition (USP), develop a strategy that accounts for the competitive landscape, learn how to acquire and retain customers, and how to price for profitability. Module 4’s fieldwork provides the opportunity to test your USP on potential customers and refine your strategy.

In Module 5, you forecast sales, develop pro forma financials, and design systems to make and deliver what you sell. Module 6 is the time for launch preparations-recruiting a team, lining up suppliers, distributors, customers, etc.-and for honing your business presentation.

By the end of Module 7, you either have launched your business or will launch it soon. Your final exam is an oral presentation and defense of your business.

BDC Program Delivery

While the content, organization, and materials of the program are important, the facilitators are the key to the program’s success. This may sound counterintuitive after we said that entrepreneurs should take the initiative and responsibility for their learning. It is just this fact that presents the challenge to facilitators. Gifted facilitators can greatly enhance an entrepreneur’s learning, but the sign of excellent facilitation is that at graduation the entrepreneur feels he deserves all the credit for what he has learned. The facilitator is almost invisible, or at least seen as incidental. Tracy Kidder (1981) captured this phenomenon beautifully in his classic book The Soul of a New Machine.

Facilitator Role and Characteristics

In a nutshell, the facilitator’s job is to help aspiring entrepreneurs become successful entrepreneurs. They do this by guiding, pointing, drawing out, and modeling, more than they do by proclaiming or lecturing (Balan & Metcalfe, 2012; Larso & Saphiranti, 2016).

A good facilitator likes people and cares deeply about helping them succeed; is comfortable leading a group without dominating it; is highly organized and prepared, but flexible to capture teaching moments; has contagious enthusiasm for business and high energy to motivate the class; and has broad business experience.

Facilitator Training and Manual

Because facilitation is so key to program success, RCE screened and trained all the facilitators in Rwanda. The facilitator training program and materials are now developed enough for experienced facilitators to use them to train new facilitators.

Facilitators have access to a 500-page manual containing detailed lesson plans for each class period. Every PowerPoint slide that facilitators show in class includes a notes section on how to facilitate that class activity, suggestions on how to handle common problems, comments explaining how that slide fits into the whole curriculum, and language for transitioning to the next slide.

The Classroom and Class Size

The ideal classroom can be reconfigured during the class period to accommodate discussions where everyone in the class can see each other, presentations by one person or a team to the whole class, teamwork at tables, and action projects where people are moving around. The ideal class size is 20 to 30. Slightly smaller or larger class sizes can work, but classes with fewer than 15 lack critical mass for teams and discussions, whereas class sizes larger than 35 make it difficult for everyone to get “air time” in discussions and “face time” for presentations.

Training Schedule

The program can work with a variety of schedules. The two key parameters are total class hours and total program duration. The 14-week design includes 100+ hours of evening class time-30 hours each for Modules 1, 3, and 5, and 10+ hours in Module 7. Class modules are separated by two weeks of fieldwork.

Weekend programs and daytime programs can work if they include comparable class hours spread sufficiently to allow the fieldwork the entrepreneurs need to absorb and apply the concepts to their businesses. The schedule should include at least three fieldwork periods.

Content experts, Visiting Executives, Distance Consultants & Mentors

Although the lesson plans do not call for facilitators to be content experts, sometimes they are uncomfortable with certain class material-often accounting and finance. They can invite content experts, such as CPAs or tax specialists for classes dealing with financial issues, to provide technical expertise and knowledge of local regulations and practices.

Visiting executives (VEs) can contribute at any stage of the training. In Module 1, their testimonies about how they developed their businesses can stimulate ideas in the class. In Module 3, VEs can help the entrepreneurs articulate and structure their business models. In Module 5, VEs can help the entrepreneurs solidify their financial projections. In Module 7, VEs can help entrepreneurs prepare their final presentations and act as judges for the competition. During fieldwork modules, VEs won’t be exposed to the whole class, but they can meet one-on-one with the entrepreneurs, helping them move to the next stage in developing their businesses.

Distance consultants and mentors are usually assigned upon graduation to help the graduates execute their action plan for either launching a new business or growing a current business. Some VE’s become ongoing mentors, staying in touch during the year and visiting annually.

BDC Rwanda Implementation

Obtaining Facilities

Our government partner, the Rwanda Development Board (RDB), provided office and classroom space in a modern, centrally located building. The classroom had been used by the Senate of Rwanda before they moved to new quarters. We had to emphasize to the aspiring entrepreneurs that they should not spend money on such luxurious facilities when they launch their businesses. We also prohibited use of the microphones at their seats, because their tendency was to speak too softly. Entrepreneurs need to project to an audience.

Recruiting the First Cohort

Working with RDB, we obtained a list of 600 past attendees of government-sponsored short entrepreneurship training seminars. We also obtained lists of alumni from Universities in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital where the BDC is located. Because the government wanted the program delivered in English, we tended to attract applicants with extensive formal education, even though our admission criteria did not require any certificate or degree. Finally, we developed our own lists by holding information sessions in Kigali, advertised through churches, business associations, and by brochures placed in local businesses.

We announced the program in May 2010 and began receiving applications through our website www.bdcrwanda.com. We received more than 100 inquiries and 60 applications-large numbers for a new, unknown program. We attributed the high interest to the general enthusiasm for entrepreneurship in Rwanda-virtually everyone dreams of starting a business-and to our partnership with the Rwanda Development Board.

The first cohort of 42 aspiring entrepreneurs enrolled in August 2010. They ranged from 20-year-old university students to 45-year-old seasoned business owners. Those who weren’t students or business owners were employed in businesses, NGO’s, churches, and government.

One of the business owners, who built a trucking company over twenty years, had helped us arrange several information sessions. We asked him why he enrolled. He said that our information sessions presented many ideas that were new to him, and that he wanted to learn and apply them to his business. Few Rwandan small business owners are so enlightened. Most feel that their business survival is evidence that they know everything they need. They don’t see the value of investing their time and money in learning more about business. Although the training is presented in “start-up” terms, it was very beneficial for helping existing businesses expand.

All enrollees had stories of how the 1994 genocide affected them. One young woman said in her application that she had been the head of her household since age six, taking care of her brother and cousin, because everyone else in her family had been killed. Everyone saw the BDC program as their opportunity to achieve something significant for themselves, their families and their nation. That common bond led to tight, supportive relationships in the cohort, which helped everyone work through the trials of life and obstacles to starting a business.

Fees

We charged 150,000 RwF (about $300) for the training (increased to $500 a year later). We set the fee to attract emerging leaders who were willing to invest in their futures. To pay this fee, one needed at least an entry-level professional income and to sacrifice financially for a time. We gave 100% scholarships to five university students in the first cohort, which was a mistake. Their attendance and effort were significantly below average. After that, we limited scholarships to 50%.

Weekly Schedule

The class met for 3 hours per night, 5 nights a week in two-week blocks, separated by two-week fieldwork periods. That time commitment coupled with the significant fee weeded out those who weren’t serious. Those who persevered (37 of the initial 42 enrollees graduated) demonstrated tremendous dedication and effort.

Facilitation

The two co-authors of the curriculum alternated modules, facilitating the whole program for the first two years (five cohorts)-i.e., each traveled to Rwanda for a two-week block every other month. Although the schedule was arduous, we wanted to see what happened when our curriculum met its first audience and to continuously refine the program to best meet the needs of the environment and our aspiring entrepreneurs. We made many small changes; however, we were somewhat surprised and very gratified by how well the program worked in an environment so different from our own. Our 88% graduation rate dwarfed the 10-20% rate of the only comparable pro-gram-run through a local university. Government leaders were amazed that 50% of BDC graduates were running businesses.

Over time, we trained others to facilitate the program. Eventually, we licensed the program to two graduates from the first cohort.

Visiting Executives

We created the role of visiting executive (VE) to ensure that the aspiring entrepreneurs would hear from ordinary people like them who had achieved extraordinary success in business by operating with diligence, excellence and integrity. We (RCE and ICCC) recruited accomplished entrepreneurs and executives from our networks in the U.S., Europe, Australia, and Africa who shared our vision and were willing to volunteer their time and travel at their own expense.

The results exceeded our expectations. The VEs bonded with the aspiring entrepreneurs. They spoke into their lives with knowledge, wisdom and encouragement. In addition to interacting with BDC entrepreneurs, VEs shared their expertise with the government and business community. Chick-fil-A operators delivered seminars on leadership and customer service to 110 executives from twenty of Rwanda’s largest business and government organizations. A managing director from Goldman Sachs spoke about global capital markets to a gathering of 200 of Rwanda’s top business and government leaders, including the presidents of the central bank and all the largest banks in the country.

Our BDC entrepreneurs had the opportunity to network with the business leaders of Rwanda, which fulfilled one of our goals-to create the business network our enrollees lacked, because their families did not have connections to business leaders or because they didn’t have families (many were orphaned by the Rwandan genocide of 1994 that killed almost 1 million people in 100 days).

Alumni

We envisioned the BDC as a family-a lifelong connection-and presented it that way to enrollees. Through pre-existing relationships (many BDC entrepreneurs recruited their friends and family to enroll) and friendships built during the 14-week program, alumni stay in touch on both a social and professional level. Alumni help each other with advice and contacts. Some have joined together to start a business. Others are strategic partners, suppliers, or customers of fellow alumni.

While these informal relationships are strong, our attempts to create a formal alumni organization have not been successful. Alumni will convene for annual reunions, but they don’t seem to have the time or interest to develop a formal alumni organization and programs.

Investment

Based on our experience in other developing nations, we purposely omitted investment from our initial program design. If you ask aspiring entrepreneurs what they need, the overwhelming response will be money. Some have said, “If you give me the money now, I won’t take up your time with an entrepreneurial training class.”

We tell inexperienced entrepreneurs that money is the last thing they need. If we loaned them money, they would likely lose it. Both we and they would be unhappy they couldn’t repay. Instead, we tell them to start small, financing their businesses from personal savings, money from friends and family, and advances from suppliers based on contracts.

Once they demonstrate that they can operate a business profitably, even a small one, we are ready to help our BDC graduates obtain financing from a variety of sources. SMEs are notoriously starved for capital, because the traditional sources of investment and working capital are often closed to them (Beck et al., 2008; International Finance Corporation, 2009). Rwanda has established many programs to invest or guarantee investments in SMEs; however, most are targeted to businesses larger than our typical BDC start-up and consist of loans fully collateralized by hard assets, such as land, buildings, and equipment.

To help fill this gap in size and type of investment, BDC Rwanda began sponsoring Investment Expos. The BDC invites investors from the U.S. and other nations to meet and hear presentations from Rwandan entrepreneurs. Any entrepreneur can attend the Expo (500 attended the second Expo), where investors speak about how to prepare your company to attract investment. Those who want to pitch their businesses to investors are pre-screened by the BDC using criteria provided by the investors. The most promising ones are invited to meet the investors.

The first two annual Expos have resulted in several investments but have also revealed a mismatch between the readiness of the entrepreneurs and the expectations of the investors. BDC graduates have “won” most of the investments, but many BDC graduates and most other entrepreneurs are not prepared to answer the probing questions of the investors and to provide the financial and operational details investors require. RCE is developing a short course to help entrepreneurs get their businesses operationally ready for investment and document that readiness.

Lessons Learned: Expansion through Licensing

Our experience in Rwanda demonstrated that the BDC program can help talented, aspiring entrepreneurs start and grow successful businesses. We also learned that the program is too intense and demanding for two facilitators from the U.S. to run it as a sideline to their primary jobs.

Personal exhaustion and demand from other nations, once they heard of the success in Rwanda, led us to formalize what we did in Rwanda into a concrete package including an Operations Manual and a Facilitator’s Manual and to License the program to individuals or organizations in other countries. We have licensed the BDC in seven countries-six in Africa and one in South Asia-and are talking with potential licensees in a dozen other countries.

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