eAsia is an annual international event with the objective of reinforcing technology and knowledge-centric growth and needs of Asia.  The eAsia Awards have the aim of acknowledging unique and innovative initiatives in the use of Information and Communication Technology for Development.  Nominations for the awards are screened by an eminent jury, which selects award recipients in each category.  The Award for Best Employment Creation Initiative is in the category of Driving Economy. eAsia is sponsored Cisco Systems, GPiT, HP, Huawei, Intel, Polycom, Samsung and UNDP.

Joseph graduated high school with Kenya’s Certificate of Secondary Education.

His parents, who work as subsistence farmers upcountry, didn’t have enough money for his school fees, so he relied on help from his two older brothers. Once he finished, he could only find occasional casual work.  None of his friends had regular jobs either.  He learned about DDD from the loan officer of one of our newest partners, Jamii Bora.

Joseph did well on the speed and accuracy test administered by DDD and interviewed with our Social Mission Lead, Ms. Reydon Otonde.  She was impressed with Joseph’s commitment, as well as the passionate support he had from his grandmother. Before Joseph started work at DDD, his grandmother supported the family by selling fruit in the market, but was constantly harassed because she couldn’t afford a trading license.  Then, on April 1^st, Joseph started work at DDD.

One of his first jobs was to help digitize business registration records for the Kenyan city of Kisumu. Based on the work that he and his colleagues have done, these records will now be publicly available online.  Joseph likes the opportunity to interact with his colleagues at DDD and to set goals for himself; the most challenging part of the job for him is to maintain accuracy in all his output.

Joseph says that working at DDD has already changed his life.  He no longer shares his grandmother’s small room but he’s been able to rent an extra room for himself, buy meals for his grandmother and to help pay school fees for his two younger brothers.  Recently he enrolled in the Open Learning Program at Kenyatta University to begin working towards a Bachelor of Commerce degree.

Irving Levin, Jeremy Hockenstein & Noosheen Hashemi

A "Thoughtful" Chenda Chhay

In 2001, at the age of 19, Chenda’s curiosity lead to another transformative moment when she joined a new start-up that offered her a chance to follow her dreams. She was among the first group of data management operators at DDD. Along with her peers, she learned to type quickly and accurately in English to digitize Harvard University’s student newspaper. Her Cambodian managers noticed she was facile with numbers; after a year she was promoted to help with accounting for our growing business. During her 5-year tenure at DDD, Chenda completed a degree in Accounting and Finance, helped DDD to open our office in Battambang, Cambodia, and then traveled to Laos to support the opening of our office in Vientiane.

One of Chenda’s dreams was to become an entrepreneur. So, she wrote her own business plan to offer basic accounting services to NGOs operating in Cambodia. “I was inspired to launch this project because I’ve seen a growing need for local, quality accounting resources”, says Chenda. “The big accounting firms in Cambodia are too costly for local NGOs and businesses.”

Another door opened for Chenda when her plan was recognized–and she had the opportunity to visit Shanghai, China and Paris, France–as a finalist in the Cartier Women’s Initiative Awards for Asia. She launched her own accounting services firm, working with clients globally. She learned to market her business and provide services to a range of clients—and also about the challenges of being an independent businesswoman. In 2011she took a position at FAO, the United Nation’s food security program in Cambodia. Chenda was thrilled to go to work for the UN, because as she says, “I want to drive a similar change as DDD.”

The “thoughtful” young woman her parents nurtured has not ceased to value education. She secured an internship at an accounting firm in New York City, to continue to build her skills. Even while she works for the UN, she is pursuing a 2-year advanced certification from the UK-based Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA).

“I am still exploring this beautiful world that we live in,” she says with a smile. “I don’t know where the next few years will lead me – getting an advanced degree from abroad, starting to outsource my accounting work, working to develop my country. All I know is I am committed to what I’m doing now and that I thank god for the people who supported DDD and gave me the chance to follow my dream. I’m proud to be part of DDD’s family.”

Won’t you become part of the DDD family with a donation today?

You can follow Chenda on her blog at: http://chendachhay.wordpress.com

Just to be clear, we don’t expect to go it alone. All of us at DDD are excited that so many social entrepreneurs around the world are embracing variations of impact sourcing to establish a global movement. The Rockefeller Foundation’s PRIDE initiative (Poverty Reduction through Information and Digital Employment) aims to harness the BPO sector’s ability to leverage technology to breakdown barriers in delivering services globally. As part of PRIDE, the Rockefeller Foundation made a grant that enabled DDD to start working in Kenya, employing youth from slum areas in Nairobi. (See our blog for a firsthand account about what it was like to recruit staff there!)

The BPO industry is estimated to have created more than 270,000 jobs in the Philippines between 2005 and 2008, although it has not typically engaged the poor and disadvantaged in its workforce. By one estimate, the global industry is expected to reach $178 billion by 2015. Why couldn’t 10-15% of this business be channeled to create jobs for the poor? All of us at DDD are committed to working with peers around the globe to build this field of Impact Sourcing”. We hope you’ll join us!

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Photo by: Will Baxter/Phnom Penh Post

“[I] am here today because I don’t want to just read about Cambodia. I don’t want to just have someone else tell me what young people are thinking and doing. I want to hear that firsthand from you.” Those were the words with which Clinton launched an engaging Q&A session. In her speech she had focused on the process of transformation that Cambodia is going through, and how the country was now on its way to peaceful democracy. After, she readily listened to and answered questions from Cambodia’s youth.

One of the attendees in the audience was Treng Kuy Chheng, Senior Accountant in DDD’s Phnom Penh office. She raved about how inspiring it was to hear Clinton speak. Like many other Cambodians, she especially took note of Clinton’s remarks on how to resolve the debt issue between Cambodia and the US.

Clinton also spoke on human rights and gender disparities and referenced Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., when she answered yes to the question of whether gender had ever been an obstacle in her career: “[I]f you are willing to work hard, study hard, and be prepared, then you should be able to hold a job based on merit. And maybe at some point in the future, we will solely judge people on, as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., said, the content of their character and their ability to do whatever job they are trying to do.”

Clinton’s message hit home with Chheng: “Her courage and the inspiration she brings to the youth in Cambodia will make them work hard, study hard, and take advantage of the opportunities that present themselves. Her visit could help inspire the Cambodian society, especially the women who heard her speak.”

We were grateful to be invited and we look forward to seeing Cambodia and the US continue to strengthen their relationship in the future.

At DDD, we strive to bridge the gap between genders by giving women the same opportunities as men. Overall, at least 50% of the operators we accept are young women and half of DDD’s staff and managers are women.

Chaiphet’s exposure to the gender disparities that pervade Laos started at age 12, when her mother divorced her alcoholic husband. Divorce is still stigmatized in Laos, and there is no legal framework in place to guarantee the financial security of a woman who leaves a marriage. After the divorce, Chaiphet’s dismantled family moved in with her uncle, and her mother established a small tailoring business.

Before Chaiphet enrolled in university, her mother managed to negotiate a discounted tuition fee. Even still, it was hard to cover the tuition with her mother’s single income, and Chaiphet had to find work if she wanted to stay in school.

Through a friend, Chaiphet and her sister heard that DDD was looking for data-entry operators. They went to the interview together, where it was explained to them that DDD only accepts one trainee per family, in order to diffuse social impact as much as possible and to avoid nepotism. “My sister gave me this opportunity,” says Chaiphet. “After I joined DDD, my mother was so happy. Now I would have some money to support myself, and DDD would also pay half of my school fee.”

Chaiphet started her career at DDD as a data-entry operator, but was soon promoted — first to Team Leader Assistant, then Team Leader, and most recently to External Relations Assistant. In this role, she manages all logistical travel arrangements for out-of-town staff, board members and visitors and maintains DDD’s relationship with the local business community.

Chaiphet tells me she feels free when she works at DDD: she feels the satisfaction of helping other people, and feels that DDD has always supported her. DDD is like a family to her. But her job not only gives personal satisfaction: “Even if I am late for school… I still get good grades because of my experience from DDD. I think work and study can go together: I can transfer my tasks at DDD to the answers on my school test,” explains Chaiphet, who studies Business Administration.

She aspires to own and manage her own landscaping business, preferably within the next 10 years, but before that it’ll be time to get married. She expects her priorities to change when she has a family of her own: “I like my job at DDD, and I don’t mind to spend a lot of time working — I never set a time to go home, instead I go home when I feel the thing that needs to be done is done. But, when you are married you cannot spend so much time working, you have to do other things, like cooking, taking care of the children, looking after the house, etc.”

She recognizes how being an educated, working woman can be complicated to combine with married life: “I think in Lao culture a man can have good job, and the woman can have a good job. But I don’t think men have the same idea. Men feel they should have a better job than the women.”

Still, Chaiphet is ready to face the world, husband or no husband, once the time comes to graduate from DDD: “I feel confident about getting a job outside [of DDD] now. I would like to run my own landscaping business, because I like trees and flowers. If I get my own business, I will take my family and my mom to visit other countries.”

Your support makes it possible for Chaiphet, and other girls like her, to dream big and realize their goals. Please continue to support our mission by donating here.

“All they have is me”.

She was referring to her family and to the fact that she is their only opportunity for achieving some level of financial security in the future.

Sokunthea grew up in rural Cambodia, close to the Vietnamese border. When she was one year old, her family moved to Battambang. The move was spurred by the military activities close to the Cambodian-Thai border, as her father was in the DN army and had to follow the action.

Sokunthea is the youngest of the family’s eight children, and she was able to attend school longer than any of her siblings: They all left school after 9th grade – a few of them even earlier than that. They have their own families now, and work as farmers or have small businesses, where they sell fruit or textile.

During Sokunthea’s final year of high school, her parents could no longer afford the expenses that come with studying, and it looked like she had to drop out of school. It was due to the grace of one of her older brothers, who worked as a driver and therefore could afford to cover some of the cost, that Sokunthea was able to finish the 12th grade and get her high school diploma.

But after finishing high school, it was clear that Sokunthea needed to find a job and help support herself and the rest of the family. Her friend offered her a job in her phone shop, where she made 5000 riel – the equivalent of $1.25 – a day.

In 2008 Sokunthea heard from a friend that DDD was seeking operators. She passed the admission test, was hired as an operator, and then received the scholarship that allows her to now study accounting at the university. Beyond receiving the scholarship, she also makes a salary at DDD.

“I can’t support my family a lot, but sometimes I can send enough money home to pay the electricity bill. When I can, I do it.”

She tells me that she and everyone in her family were very, very happy, when she was accepted to work at DDD, because they knew it meant she would get the chance to educate herself. An education leads to a better job with a higher salary: it’s a promise of better times to come. Sokunthea explains, “I want to be an accountant – a good one – so that I can support my parents when they get old.”

In a couple of years, when Sokunthea has finished her studies, DDD will help her find another job where she can apply her experience and skills, and where she’ll go on to make approximately four times the average salary in Cambodia.

Naturally, Sokunthea is happy to work at DDD and to attend the university, but she’s also sad and gets upset when telling her story. She is worried about the future: “My father had a heart attack, and I worry about his health every day.” She knows that she is all the family has, and there is no doubt she knows that that is a big responsibility to carry.

Four project managers were already working in that office, three of whom had started at DDD as data-entry operators years earlier. Since it is part of DDD’s mission to develop and empower our staff by continuously providing training and new challenges on the job, the senior management decided to give all of the four existing project managers a chance to sit behind the wheel for a few months, before deciding to either hire internally for the open position or look elsewhere. First up in the rotation was Socheat Keo.

Socheat joined DDD in October 2001, when he was 20 years old, as part of the second batch of operators ever hired by DDD. He grew up in Phnom Penh as the youngest of three sisters and two brothers. His mother was his father’s second wife, a practice that’s not so uncommon in Cambodia, so his father never lived with the family and Socheat’s mother struggled to provide for all of them. When Socheat was in high school, he worked as a waiter at night to help pay for the household expenses.

After coming to DDD, Socheat quickly graduated from data entry operator to take on larger professional roles. As a Team Leader, and later, when he helped open DDD’s second office in Battambang, he worked fulltime while studying at the university in the evening. Eventually, working as a project manager back in Phnom Penh, he came to manage some of DDD’s biggest projects, including quality assurance for the digitization of the Royal Dutch Library’s content. When the Royal Dutch Library finally launched the first section of their digital archive, Socheat was the one who organized a celebration with cake and cheers for the operators in Cambodia, who had worked on the project.

I asked Socheat what he learned from working at DDD. “I learned a lot from DDD…. I didn’t have anything before I joined DDD. Computer, English, all kinds of skills — confidence, and management — all that I learned from DDD.” Even though Socheat says he regards DDD as his family, he can imagine a time and a career after DDD: “I would like to work for an NGO, or a company with a social mission, so I can share my experience and gain new experience.”

About a month after Socheat took on the senior project manager position on a trial basis, senior management got in touch with him again. “They said they’d decided not to rotate the position after all, and that I had their full support,” says Socheat. “I’m happy with my new position, and I’m very happy I also have the support of my colleagues. We all come from the same background, and we’re all good.”