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> Posted by Alyssa Passarelli, Communications and Operations Assistant, the Smart Campaign
Sergio Guzmán conducting a Smart Assessor’s Training in Budva, Montenegro
The month of May was filled with many exciting events for the Smart Campaign. Smart Campaign director, Isabelle Barrès traveled to Guatemala and Bosnia and Herzegovina for two Client Protection Certification events (please see our last blog post). Smart Campaign Lead Specialist, Sergio Guzmán also traveled to this corner of the world to conduct a Smart Assessor’s Training and to attend the 16th Annual Microfinance Centre Conference in Budva, Montenegro. Although the Campaign is based in Washington, D.C., Campaign staff thrive on opportunities to engage in client protection efforts beyond the office.
It’s a good thing that Sergio does not have a fear of heights. With the amount of time that Sergio spends in the air each month, he might as well be Superman. The Smart Assessor’s Training in Budva brought together a diverse group of financial services experts including donors, investors, consultants, and CEOs of microfinance institutions (MFIs), among others in the Eastern Europe/Central Asia region. Even with the ranging backgrounds of these participants, Sergio notes that the evident common denominators are the enthusiasm to incorporate the Client Protection Principles (CPPs) into their work and a keen desire to improve their commitment to those they serve.
It is very exciting for the Campaign to generate interest among such a wide range of actors at events like the training in Budva. The Smart Campaign’s growing involvement in activities among participants from different backgrounds reflects client protection’s increasing foothold. This layered interest and further desire to cement client protection into business practices is a promising achievement for the movement.
> Posted by the Smart Campaign
Smart assessments. You know, a tool to help MFIs diagnose if their institutional practices adequately account for the well-being of their clients and can help them towards becoming ‘Client Protection Certified?’ We’ve written about them through the years (The Dawn of Client Protection Assessments in India, Straight Talk on Client Protection – Aggressive Sales Techniques, Mapping the Numbers of the Smart Campaign, etc.) but this is our very first video on the subject. Smart Assessments examine an MFI’s implementation of the client protection principles, taking the institution through a process of internal review to identify strengths, weaknesses, and ultimately opportunities to enhance business practices around client protection.
In the video, Smart Campaign Lead Specialist Sergio Guzmán offers an overview of assessments, discussing the client protection principles, how assessments benefit MFIs, what the assessment process looks like, common client protection challenges, and next steps for interested institutions.
As Sergio mentions, to date the Smart Campaign has trained a total of 29 lead assessors and 45 support assessors, who have conducted roughly 75 assessments around the world. For more information – including the self-assessment Getting Started Questionnaire – head over to the Smart Campaign website. And stay tuned to our newly launched Smart Campaign YouTube channel for the release of more videos on client protection in microfinance.
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