Changes to the Internship Program

I have been talking with a couple of the other interns about how to improve the internship program and make better use of the coordinators’ time and to allow for a more organic way for the program to improve.

As it stands currently the coordinators spend a lot of time responding to emails from people who are applying to do the internship. Most of these questions are very repetitive since most people have similar concerns. At present there is not a comprehensive Frequently Asked Questions section on their website for interns to look. Because of this interns are forced to ask the coordinators more questions.

Another problem is that there are many interns who arrive throughout a week, and are all on slightly different schedules. The coordinators are forced to give the same introductory presentation and explanation of the Grameen system over and over.

Finally, there is only a very limited method of evaluation and feedback by interns of the bank. Each intern is required to write a report on the experience that they had while they were here and then fill in a very quick survey. However, after looking at some reports that they consider are good, it does not look like that read them all that thoroughly.

In addition to the changes we proposed below, I was also thinking about having more structure for the report that we write. I think the bank should encourage us to collect some data and do some research while we are here and write a proper research paper. I am going to try and do this a little bit when I go to the village again this coming week. I am going to go to a new branch and an old branch and compare the progress of borrowers in both by seeing how much they have improved their living conditions using land, buildings (size and building material), savings and diet to measure their progress (later today I will post more about what I am going to do this coming week).

So in response to these problems, three other interns, Joshua, Julian, Melanie and myself have been discussing simple solutions that we think could be easily implemented.

1. Feedback Form
• Purpose: To allow for an anonymous method of improving the internship over time
• To be completed at the end of the internship
• Would include feedback on performance of Translators and Coordinators, effectiveness of the program, areas for improvement of the program, educational benefits gained while at the bank and suggesting new ideas for social businesses, sister companies, etc.
• Anonymous System which will be run and maintained by old students shortly before leaving
2. Intern Forum
• Purpose: To save time for coordinators from answering emails and to allow for better communication between prospective interns and experienced interns
• There should be a link to the forum on the Grameen Webpage, and coordinators should direct new interns to look at the site before they come to the bank
• Would be maintained by alumni of the internship program during and after the stay.
• Would enable people considering the internship to ask questions of other people from their own country.
• Alumni would have the option to be ambassadors and list their: name, country, contact information, date and length of their internship, age and a summary of their internship
• Also a section to upload select reports and an FAQ section maintained by interns
3. Introductory Presentation by Old Interns to New Interns
• Purpose: Connect new and old interns, and allow for experiences and advice to get passed along, while also saving the coordinators from giving the same presentation over and over to new interns
• Presentation (Powerpoint, or other) of experiences at the bank as well as an educational presentation of the products that the Grameen Bank offers and their organisational system
• Group events – group trips to dinner, cricket games, sights, etc.
4. More Structured Program
• Purpose: to prevent the need for multiple introductory presentations in one week, place interns in groups right from the first day, creates groups of people even if they are not all living at the same hotel
• Only one starting date each week,
• We suggest Wednesday – allows for introduction on Wednesday and day trip on Thursday, and weeklong trip starting on Sunday/Monday
• Interns that are staying for longer than 4 weeks should be encouraged from the start to start thinking about a sister company that they would like to get placed in, or a research question they would like to study

 The network of alumni would enable people to be better prepared before they arrive. For example the issue of money: I only brought a little US dollars and some travellers cheques. The US dollars came in very handy at the airport, but I have been unable to find anywhere convenient to use my travellers cheques. The only place I have heard, are the banks in the Gulshan neighbourhood in Dhaka, which is a 45 minute cab ride away. On the other hand, the just the bank I use here, Dutch Bangla Bank Ltd, has over 300 ATMs in Dhaka. And withdrawing cash using them is very easy. Other questions about dresscode, the weather, sights to see and places to visit can be easily answered by past interns.

This would be supplemented by the forum which would have information about frequently asked questions, and places to stay in Dhaka, day trips around Dhaka, weekend trips around Bangladesh and other useful information. When a prospective intern contacted the bank with a question about the internship, they would be sent back an email with the list of ambassadors and the forum. Then the person could look at forum to get answers to some questions and if they wanted to ask more questions they could contact someone from the list. The list could be easily organised by country so that you could talk with someone in your first language, who was likely in a similar situation to you when they came to the bank.

One of the most important changes needs to be to the structure of the internship. Currently the bank is extremely accepting of interns who come for all different lengths and on starting on all different days of the week. This wastes the coordinators time, and prevents them from doing more important things like organising trips, and meetings for their interns. We are suggesting that the internship should start on a certain day every week, so that only one introductory presentation is needed each week.

For example:

• Week 1
• The Internship starts at 10am every Wednesday, they have introductory day, watch the Grameen videos, meet with old interns and their coordinator. Thursday they have their day trip to a branch in the morning and then discuss it and plan a weeklong trip for the following week. They then have the weekend (Friday and Saturday) to get settled in Dhaka and get to know the interns that they arrived with and ones that were already here.
• Week 2
• Sunday to Thursday they would go to a branch and experience in more depth what they saw on their day trip. 
• Week 3
• The following week, Sunday would a reflection day and planning for the coming week which would involve meetings with other Grameen departments and sister companies in the head office and visits to social businesses.
• Weeks 4-6
• At this point the interns hopefully have experienced most facets of the bank and can decide how they want to spend the rest of their time – a placement in a department / social business, more branch visits to new or struggling branches, etc.

Cheers,

Mike