Give a man a fish, and you have fed him once. Teach him how to fish, and you have fed him for a lifetime.

This proverbial saying which suggests that the ability to work is of greater benefit than a one-off handout, is a well known way to say in short the goal of charity organizations aiming for sustainable development. Less obvious is the fact that this saying has to apply also for the organization itself...

The first time I came in contact with the French charity organization 'Passereles numériques’ was in 2007. I was working then for the ECS group, one of the sponsors of the organization by donations and by providing its employees the possibility to go for missions  in the field, more precisely in Cambodia.

Passerelles numériques enables the most underprivileged to access employment in a promising  sector and to break with their families the circle of poverty. The mission is to enable the largest number of youths, in a precarious situation, access to training and skilled employment in the Information Technology sector. The ambition is to help at least 90% of the students directly enrolled in the programs to find a qualified job and ultimately end the cycle of poverty for themselves as well as their families.

I have seen colleagues and team members going on missions for the organization and their feedback has always been fascinating to me. The idea of doing it myself often came to me but both professional and personal involvement, especially with young kids,  have always kept me away from dedicating time and focus to those missions.

When the Econocom group took over the ECS group in 2010, I was pleasantly surprised to hear during a managers meeting that Econocom sponsored ‘Passerelles numériques’ as well. Being in touch again with this organization, I have then been triggered by their new arising challenge : Learn how to fish !

Sponsors are very kin in helping charity organizations to kick off a project by providing funds. But sponsors are also more and more expecting those projects to be locally self-sufficient, to reach autonomy in raising their own funds, not depending 100 % from donations on the long run. This is the challenge the organization is facing now, learn how to fish, find a sustainable way of being self-sufficient by raising funds locally !

It is at that moment that the decision became obvious to me, after 5 years of maturation, that my involvement in this charity organization should be more than supporting colleagues. I foresee added value in providing support to this business model switch, and that time to go on the field for a mission had arrived.

A steering committee has been set up within the Econocom group to assist the organization in this change, and as a part of this project, I will be leaving for Cambodia for two weeks to volunteer with the main objective to bring value in the fund raising business model of Passerelles numériques. During these two weeks I will coach local managers on their commercial skills and strategy and will also hopefully help the sales team to increase efficiency in their local fund raising activity.

My responsibility and involvement is not going to stop after these two weeks. I will continue to support this unique and challenging project for much longer. I would like to share my experiences with you, via this blog and the use of Social Media (LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter).

And of course, feel free to follow the developments, provide support, inspiration, feedback, guidance, and why not use them as an inspiration for yourself.