Training Programme in Growth-Cum-Counsellors' Programmes

Training Programme on Effective Business Counselling: Small enterprise consultancy and training services form an integral part of the support system's initiatives for entrepreneurship development. While services are generally directed towards new enterprise creation, the need to extend the same to existing small enterprises, beyond mere business plan formulation is well established. In response to such a need, EDI formulated and conducted several Performance Improvement Programmes targetted at existing enterprises in several parts of the country. EDI further modified the programme, in association with Durham University Business School (DUBS), UK and thus formulated a training cum counselling programme designed to encourage consolidation and growth of small enterprises. A key aspect of the model is to provide one-to-one counselling services to existing entrepreneurs.

This programme focuses on developing business counselling skills of small enterprise consultants, officials and trainers, thus enabling them to provide the much needed counselling services to existing entrepreneurs. The programme objectives can be summed up as below :

* To develop skills in profiling of small enterprise in terms of its current performance and its potential for growth
* To enable counsellors to acquire and use problem solving skills
* To bring out counselling skills in counsellors and further hone them
* To clarify the role the counsellors would play in the Growth Programme for small scale entrepreneurs and the support services they would provide to these small enterprises
* To develop skills required helping small scale entrepreneurs for consolidation and growth of their businesses, especially to harness the export market.

Growth Programme for Established Entrepreneurs : Any business venture could grow by virtue of market forces without involving deliberate intervention on the part of the entrepreneur. However, systematic and sustained growth is a result of planned efforts on the part of the entrepreneur. Training and counselling to entrepreneurs could hasten the pace of this growth process. In keeping with this belief, EDI offers a unique training cum counselling programme. The programme helps entrepreneurs

* take an objective look into their enterprises to understand how well the business is performing
* understand the potential that the business has for optimally tapping the export market
* understand necessary and sufficient conditions to exploit export market
* chalk out clear cut growth/ change plans through the support of EDI trained business counsellors
* understand competencies that contribute towards top performance, thus taking the business to new heights in a planned and purposeful manner.

The programme is divided into two blocks; the first block helps in understanding the performance and potential base of a venture whereas the second block focuses on delivering inputs such as those on hard skills, delegation and leadership, entrepreneurial competencies, interpersonal relationships besides inputs focusing on export.

One-to-one counselling to these trained entrepreneurs by the EDI-trained counsellors in its Effective Business Counselling Programme forms a separate and a detailed part of the programme. The business counsellors spend around two-three mandays with each entrepreneur in order to take care of counselling specific needs.

In order to achieve the maximum benefits and make the programme immensely impact making, the Growth-cum-Counsellors' Programmes are now designed in a way to focus on specific sectors/ products. In the recent past, such programmes have been conducted on various sectors viz. the knitwear industry of Ludhiana; seafood cluster at Cochin; lether at Chennai; drugs and pharmaceuticals at Ahmedabad; rubber cluster in Thiruvananthapuram and machine tool cluster at Bangalore.