Training of Female e-commerce Advisors for SMEs in Jordan

Client: The World Bank

Location: Jordan

Target Sectors: eCommerce

Markets: Jordan and international

Delivery: 2020

About the project 

OCO Global delivered market intelligence, capability building and strategic support to promote women-owned and led business economic involvement in the eCommerce space.

We-Fi is a collaborative partnership hosted by the World Bank Group including governments, development banks, and other public and private sector stakeholders. They  aim to address a variety of financial and non-financial constraints faced by women-owned/led small and medium enterprises in developing countries, in the MENA region and globally.

Key Challenges:

Increase Jordanian women’s economic involvement in the eCommerce space to sell locally and internationally. The project aims to achieve this by using the missing technical skills and capabilities of leveraging local and international marketplaces.

How OCO Global Supported:

  1. Scoping and market analysis followed by development of a training course – OCO Global went into the market to study the ecosystem with the help of local contacts and focus groups to understand the operations locally and challenges faced by women operating in the eCommerce space. That market analysis later dictated to the specialists how to develop the training material and course.
  2. Advisor Training – The first step was a train-the-trainer course for a cohort of approximately 15-20 advisors. This gave the advisors the skills they need to be able to effectively coach and support the women-led SMEs. It also provided the advisors with tools and resources that they use to help them effectively assess the maturity of the SMEs they work with and develop their e-commerce growth plans.
  3. SME Support Facilitation – Advisors were expected to deliver facilitated, supervised training and coaching support to 7-8 high potential women-led SMEs each (100 in total). This support was structured in two stages: i) an introductory meeting and ii) follow up coaching sessions. The programme team helped organise the initial meetings between the advisors and SMEs and assisted in their delivery. The team has also helped the advisors set up 3 further coaching sessions over the course of a month with the SMEs to build up their skills to the point where they are able to sell effectively online.
  4. Ongoing Advisor Support – In between facilitated support sessions, and in the weeks following the sessions, the programme team has regular check ins with the advisors, providing quality follow-up support and continuous check-ins with advisors to enable continuous learning and improvement.
  5. Monitoring and evaluation – OCO Global has developed a M&E framework to monitor the performance of the SME sales post-coaching sessions to measure the impact of the program.

Outcomes:

  • Detailed market analysis report highlighting the challenges and opportunities in the local and international context for women-owned and women-led businesses in the eCommerce space.
  • Development of a playbook to be used by the advisors and SMEs
  • Train-the-trainer sessions for 20 local experts
  • Coaching and mentoring of 100 SMEs
  • Deliver a package of incentives for both the advisors and the SMEs