Quarterly Trainings

 

It is worth keeping in mind that at the beginning of the year, successful entrepreneurs market and create a personal and business marketing blueprint to guide their business-building activities on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. That’s why for one day in January, the Kenya Association of Women Business Owners (KAWBO) held a Marketing workshop that aimed at enabling participants to achieve success in Marketing and develop a Marketing mix strategy that will ensure enhancement of their marketing skills to increase sales and double profits.

Discussion Topics in Marketing that are Making Headlines
The Marketing Workshop sessions were current and enabled participants to take away practical knowledge and proven methods they could use every day. Here’s just a sampling:

- Pricing Strategy and Tactics
- Social Media and Marketing
- Branding
- Sales and Marketing
- New Product Development
- Organizational Change

The Marketing Workshop also offered a remarkable networking opportunity. The sessions are usually taught by today’s industry leaders, and participants meet other business owners that have used different effective strategies in marketing their enterprises. It is a wonderful forum to create lasting contacts.

At the end of this training participants are be able to:-

– Explain what marketing really means and how

marketing can help their business

– Describe the basic steps in planning marketing

strategies and the items to be addressed in each

step

– Identify the relationship between the steps in the

marketing mix

– Explain how to identify marketing objectives.

– Describe the tools that would help in designing the

marketing mix.

We Complete Your Success 4

How this Course Helps:

• For business owners and managers:-

– Set a long-term development strategy for the

company

– Work and plan systematically

– Learn how to take advantage of teamwork

• For marketing managers and staff:-

– Set up and develop marketing programs that are

suitable for business conditions

• For other departmental heads

– Better co-ordination among departments

The training was the 2nd of 6 training events being carried out in 2011/2012 by the Kenya
Association of Women Business Owners (KAWBO) for capacity development of existing
and prospective members, drawn from the business and professional sectors.
The training content was based on the IFC’s Business EdgeTM curriculum and was
delivered according to the typical KAWBO participant profile, which is the experienced
and sophisticated business owner or professional who wants to enhance knowledge and
skills they already have or to acquire new, practical, applicable knowledge and skills.
The course objectives were for the participants to be able to:-
– Identify the functions of accounting information in the decision making
process
– Explain the elements of financial statements.
– Conduct a basic analysis of financial performance.
– Use accounting information for decision-making. The training programme covered the following areas:-
1. The Accounting Process, Functions of Accounting and the Decision Making
process.
2. Elements of financial statements:
- Statement of Financial Position (Balance Sheet)
- Income Statement (Profit and Loss Account).
- Cash flow Statement
3. Basic analysis of financial statements.
- Horizontal and Vertical Analysis
- Profitability Ratios
- Working Capital Ratios
- Borrowing Ratios

Participants noted how information can differ depending on the analysis tools used, and
appreciated the need to use them all to measure their overall business performance.
It was also noted that they should not get ‘lost’ in analysing the financial statements, but
should use the information gained to take action to improve their business performance
in future.
Despite most of the participants having limited prior exposure to financial management,
they got to understand the principles well, and were able to correctly calculate and
interpret the various ratios. They appreciated that they would now better understandtheir financial statements and use the information to make more informed business
decisions. They also saw that they could use their newly gained knowledge to assess the
financial performance of other companies, for investment and other purposes.

Recent KAWBO activities include the facilitation of a Leadership Coaching and Influencing training. Some objectives of the training were to enable participants to: identify desirable skills and qualities of a good team leader; describe methods to enhance leadership skills; explain ways of developing a team so that it becomes more efficient and effective; use suitable strategies, skills, and tools to influence others; formulate and implement long-term coaching strategies in the workplace. KAWBO is actively engaged in exposing women entrepreneurs to resources, such as trainings, that will empower them with knowledge on how to excel and grow in their business ventures.