Putting together the intern feedback form made me consider what I would out on it...
Overall I would definitely say that the trip was an amazing experience and definitely worth it. I learned a lot about microfinance, poverty and development, met a ton of new and interesting people from all over the world and got to experience a completely different culture. To people who are interested in doing the same or a similar trip I would definitely encourage it, but there are a couple things to do differently.
Start to think about what you want to get out of the trip before you come here, research some of the sister companies and other NGOs and see if you want to learn more about them. Also see if there is some way to tie in what you are studying and interested in to the trip. For example I should have done some more research on NGOs or development agencies who were working in Dhaka on urban devleopment. So I would suggest set aside 4 weeks for the Grameen Bank, and then another 1-2+ weeks for one of the sister companies or another interest of your choice. In total I would say the ideal time would be about 6 weeks in Bangladesh which gives you enough time to learn about the Grameen Bank and get stuck in to another department.
I definitely have learned a lot and have seen so much that I never would have back in Canada. This trip has also inspired me to keep with it and expand on what we already have. Up until now I have mostly been focussed on just microcredit but now in Bangladesh I am seeing that MFIs a very important piece, but there are other important pieces as well. For example, after learning more about the Grameen Fund I am learning that Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) financing, is a hugely important piece of the puzzle which is largely missing right now.
Overall I feel that I could have gotten a lot more out of the program if I had a better idea of what I wanted to do before I came here. This was the motivation to try to get old interns talking to new interns before they come to the bank. The first week and a half was spent going on a day trip and a weeklong trip. The following two weeks was spent visiting and meeting with sister companies. After that, more and more time just got wasted sitting around the head office.
Before I came I was under the impression that they would have a program for us to follow for the whole 6 weeks, however their program at most lasts 4 weeks. Beyond that it is up to you to request to do certain things, the problem is that everything takes longer to do here. Frequently I came to the bank and was told to come back after lunch, or the next day and it took a long time for things to get done.
The first weeklong trip was a great experience, but I did not know what to expect and was not able to make the most use out of it. I would have liked to spend another long trip doing a more investigative study on the effect that microcredit has had on peoples' lives.
In the future I would suggest that interns should be told to use their weeklong trip to collect data to answer a research question. For example I was interested finding out how much the borrower's standard of living had improved since joining Grameen Bank. How much more savings, land, food, better housing did they have now compared to before? Unfortunately I did not think to ask these questions systematically to every borrower we talked to on our weeklong trip and I never got to go on a second.
So in summary the trip has been an amazing experience but I could have gotten a lot more out of it if I had been more organised before I got here and in my first couple weeks.
Cheers,
Mike
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