Sportsmith Impact

1. Problem - 

• Lack of information and ability to fight poverty and other related family and community challenges.
• Social and self stigma, discrimination lack of awareness and fear.
• Unpleasant legal environment, cultural settings and  socialisation
• Economic factors, biological/cultural factors and intolerance

2. Solution - 

Identify and work with vulnerable and marginalised women/girls in the community and empower them to engage into productive activities that will generate income, to sustain their families and upgrade the standard of living.

3. Positive Change

The solution will allow many vulnerable women and girls globally to be productive and use their readily available skills, talents and ideas and transform them into income generating activities that would change their lives - economically and socially. This will help global action of poverty eradication by high percent.

We believe everybody can participate in the global fight against poverty and become change agents.

The main specific problem we are solving is Poverty level within the community. Its entails lack of income, productive resources to ensure sustainable livelihoods, hunger, malnutrition, limited access to education, basic services, social discrimination/exclusion, and lack of participation in decision-making.

Globally -  Around 10% of the world population is living in extreme poverty and struggling to fulfil the most basic needs like health, education, and access to water and sanitation. There are 122 women aged 25 to 34 living in poverty for every 100 men of the same age group, and more than 160 million children are at risk of continuing to live in extreme poverty by 2030.

Kenya - Overwhelming majority of Kenyans, almost 80%, are either income poor or near the poverty line. The poorest inhabitants by income in Kenya live in rural areas, where poverty rates are higher (40%,compared to 28-29% in urban areas).

Migori County - The main challenges are unemployment, accidents, STIs, HIV/AIDS, drug and substance abuse, sexual and gender-based violence, teenage pregnancy, child labour, school dropout levels, lack of training and skills development opportunities, poor pay and exploitation, social disputes and crime. All the above challenges are mainly a product of poverty.

Empower the vulnerable and marginalised women/girls in the community by:-

1. Empowering and creating economical activities that will generate income and promote its sustainability, by using their personal skills, talents and innovations.

2. Developing and training them in leadership, communication skills, simple self financial independence, simple book-keeping, customer care and other basic financial management skills that will be a boost in their daily economical activities.

3. Counselling and advice on relevant information on ways to overcome the stigma, hopelessness, discouragement, fear and low self esteem. Develop ways to bring them back and accept themselves into the society.

4. Forming team groups that will supervise each other, through the personal activities and encourage stability and sustainability.

5. Empowering them into becoming the voice of the community through leadership, communication and participation in community and county level decision making forums.

6 Training them in understanding the simple technological and digital use in terms of use of internet for knowledge, marketing, banking and communication.

The above solutions will give them a head start in transforming their lives to be productive, development centred, self reliant, gain human dignity, demand for their basic rights and knowledgeable in the world of digital space.

The project will identify 1,200 vulnerable and marginalised women/girls living rural informal settlements from Migori County, situated in the South-Western part of Kenya. The county has 10 sub-counties, which are further sub-divided into 40 wards. The project will identify 30 women/girls from each ward.

This project will utilise evidence-based best practices from well trained and experienced professionals and community women leaders who will deliver quality innovative and sustainable ideas.

The main aim is to empower the women/girls to be productive generating  income, to sustain their families and upgrade their standards of living.

Most of these women/girls are victims of the following; HIV/Aids infections which many are widows, wife inheritance and neglect, school dropouts which renders many with no opportunities, single motherhood whose population is rapidly increasing and left to raise children single-handedly after their male partners flee. Research indicates 6 of every 10 Kenyan women are likely to be single mothers by the time they reach 45, one of the highest rates for single-parent families in Africa, in which 3 in 10 Kenyan girls become pregnant before the age of 18. This leaves most women in this region poor, vulnerable and with no employment or any income generating activity.

Knowing of the existence of the above challenges that this women and young girls undergo, we strongly want to address the growing population and the social needs of these women. Their basic human rights obligations have been ignored, in disturbing environment, with little help, stigmatised, Such atmosphere leads them to negative vises in the society.

Empowering these women will protect their rights, but also preserves human dignity that promotes social-economical change in the society. It enables these women to gain respect and be part of the society that can make a big difference in the family and entire community.

We believe this is a unique project that will offer unique solutions of the following reasons:-
1. It will give a chance to vulnerable and marginalised women to come up with an innovation.
2. Ownership - It involves 80% of the beneficiary thinking and participation to present her own skills, talents and innovation - that can be a viable income generating activity.
3. This activities MUST consist of the following recommendations:-

Description                  Recommendation

1. Activity (Idea) - The activity should a skill, talent or an innovation                

2. Raw Materials - The raw materials should readily available within reach and cost effective. in case of farm produce, then value addition is a MUST component.  

3. Market opportunity – The activity should create a demand and ready market within the community. 

4. Human Consumption - High level hygiene and Nutritional value. Safety measures should be observed in terms of packaging and storage. 

5. Sustainability – The activity should be simple and ability for future improvement and growth. 

6. Environment - Eco friendly and a product of clean energy.

7. Cost - Community affordability and price competitive                                

8. Integrity – The activity should promote decent work, cleanliness and general safety. The activity should NOT promote any kind of child labour, slavery, any kind harassment, corruption and form of bribery.

9. Social Impact – The activity should promote growth in job creation. 

This is a new model that we are involving people that we have always ignored in the society and community because we feel, they are not knowledgeable, they are poor, marginalised and vulnerable therefore they have nothing to offer to the table, when comes to the global solutions.

The project aims to make people realise that their MIND is the best tool, that they have and they can utilise it through skills, talents and innovation; to upgrade their lives and create opportunities i.e income, employment and development.

Many people and especially in Africa die poor and early deaths; buried with rich skills, talents and ideas that could have utilised during their lifetime. The project desires to offer a chance to that "poor looking woman" in an African village; an opportunity to come up with an innovation, which will give her a reason to  smile, work, be productive, earn a living, upgrade her family life and participate in the global fight of eradicating poverty.

The project wants to create unique but simple ideas from the women, activities that they will manage and easy to sustain own their own after the project duration comes to an end. 

A recent Dell EMC study proposes that 85 per cent of the jobs that will exist in 2030 have not yet been invented, which leaves employers in a tough spot as they need to consider how they will identify and develop skills and talent for jobs that won’t exist tomorrow. Therefore there is a need to involve everyone in creating jobs and businesses for tomorrow that purely depend on personal skills, talents and idea innovations. In a situation where context is unknown or evolving, it is critical to understand how individuals are likely to respond to and grow within changing environments, which can only be achieved through potential empowerment.

When evaluating the potential of a future leader, these are the qualities and skills HR need to start considering: Cognitive flexibility and innovation; Understanding of big data and artificial intelligence; Presence of a global mindset; Comfort with ambiguity Ability to interact with diverse teams; Capacity to attract, retain and ensuring the success of talent and Capability to coach, inspire and empower teams

An exemplar of this model is Google, which is well known for its advanced people processes that bring much of the future skills noted above to life. For example, in contrast to many organisations where effective decision making and strong aspiration predict whether someone will be promoted, Google prioritises being able to influence through their leadership impact, which enables them to thrive in a flatter, more agile, organisational structure.

The strategic objectives are: To facilitate the provision of a platform for beneficiary led awareness, training and lobbying for the recognition of these woman participation in the community and to provide improved training to comprehensive, quality assured activities that will generate income.  

The main project focus will be on beneficiary led initiatives, Quality assurance and quality improvement, Integration and linkages, Advocacy and lobbying, and demand creation for Identifying and nurturing through the observation components of these women. We shall make use of existing local resources especially community volunteers who will form the backbone of direct implementation of project identification of these women.

Creation and development, and use of personal skills, talents and innovation to create sustainable income generating activities. This will create a viable, strong and productive individuals that will promote economical development.

To elicit maximum community participation and ownership, the project will be emphasised from the onset. Local beneficiary communities will be consulted at all levels of project planning, implementation and evaluation. The project will also endeavour to utilise local resources and available leadership and technical skills for sustainability

Building strong local partnership and Networking with local administration and government, grassroots based organisation, local institutions, local faith based groups, local business community, and other stakeholders will create much needed synergy of action in addition to ensuring sustainability. The above will be our referral network for guidance, counselling and mentorship sessions offered to the women. 

The project will enhance capacity building and provide relevant information and knowledge by developing and adopting intensive, practical and cost-effective training programs that will equip them with basic skills and financial management skills.

Community mobilisation technique will be emphasised on qualified local women coordinators will be used in the project throughout its life. They will conduct their function and use of creative approaches to handle, communicate and create friendly and trustworthy connections with the women. Upon recruitment of these coordinators into the program, they will make regular follow-up visits to ensure the well being and continued support uptake. They will be drawn from the target community.

Phase 1 (Year 1)

We intend to work in 4 constituencies which are divided into 4 wards each; which makes to 16 wards. Each of the 16 wards has 5 groups; which gives us 80 groups. The 80 groups consist of 10 women each. There first year will have and work with 800 women and girls. This means it will have created 800 new small businesses that can generate income.

The project model is to start phase 1, which upon completion, will have generated the initial amount that will support phase 2. The individual women will pay their loans (well calculated) so that the amount realized will support the phase 2 in another region.

The project intends to work with approximately 4000 women within 5 years. Having developed and helped to start 4000 small businesses.

As organization we believe in collective community engagement, this means involving the community in the projects and allowing then to be part of the solution. We believe that fighting poverty is brave fight that should be fought by everyone, to guarantee victory, therefore our main goal is to make the solutions come from the target community.

The project will enhance and provide relevant information and knowledge by developing and adopting intensive, practical and cost-effective training programs that will equip them with basic skills and financial management.

To elicit maximum participation and project ownership, involvement of the target community will be emphasized from the onset. They will be consulted at all levels of project planning, implementation and evaluation. The project will also endeavor to utilize local resources and available leadership and technical skills for sustainability 

Networking with local administration and government, grassroots based organization, local institutions, local faith based groups, local business community, and other stakeholders will create much needed synergy of action in addition to ensuring sustainability. The above will be our referral network for guidance, counselling and mentor-ship sessions offered to the women.  

Qualified local women coordinators will be used in the project throughout its life. They will conduct their function and use of creative approaches to handle, communicate and create friendly and trustworthy connections with the women. Upon recruitment of these coordinators into the program, they will make regular follow-up visits to ensure the well being and continued support uptake. They will be drawn from the target community. 

Financial : Our main challenge is getting funding for many of our designed projects that are solutions to many challenges that the community faces. Fundraising is very expensive and time consuming, trying to get ready donors to fund the good course.

Technical : To maintain and attract top talent, highly qualified personnel to adopt the changing world on non profits in terms of coming with sustainable ideas and willing to give their service to the community.

Legal : Introducing the the importance of legal issues to the community, in issues of patent protection, including definitions and copyrights and their relevance to them. 

Culture : Adopting to different cultural believes within the organisation and external community. 

Market Barriers : Organization expansion may be hindered with market barriers in different countries; in terms of registration and other legislative regulations, in case we need to expand our community work in other African countries.

Finances: Coming up with viable and sustainable projects that can be easily funded to implement the projects and at the same time support the administrative needs that will create stability to the organizations’ financial structure while we work all our efforts on making improvements to prevent unwanted situations of lacking finances. Differentiating between the essential and less important costs, this will allow better projection on cash flow. Cutting any unnecessary expenses, low-cost transportation, delaying replacements of equipment, or requesting extensions from our suppliers until we have turned your financial instability around.

Technical: Maintaining the technical team is an aspect that is ignored by many young organizations. We believe in creating a good workplace environment that will promote growth for both the organization and the individual staff. Enhance motivation through reward, better pay, and opportunities for training.

Legal: establishing a good and professional legal personnel with a qualification in community work and other aspects of the law. This will give the organization notch higher in training and dealing with legal matters that might arise.

Culture: The organization policy is to use local community leaders in driving the project goals and agenda which gives a conducive environment that the target beneficiaries feel that the solutions are community-based and not foreign. 

Market Barriers: Creating networks and working closely with other organizations and the government will create a viable atmosphere to operate and enable the project implementation to achieve its goals and expectations according to the objectives and the time stipulated.

This solution is an intellectual property of Sportsmith Impact

The solution is a collective development and work with the staff of Sportsmith Impact; we have worked as a team in building and developing the project. We are working on the fundraising; and after approval and we manage to get proposed funds - We will nominate a team that will kick of the project, implement and see it realizes its goals, objectives, and results. This proves efficiency, effectiveness and time management that is coupled by professionalism from widely experienced staff.

This project will have the following persons to work on:-

1. Project Manager (1) - Full time: Head of the project to oversee its start to finish and it achieves its objectives.

2. Project Advisory Assistant (1) - Full time: Supports and daily running of the project, communication and reports documentation.

3. Finance Manager (1) - Full time: Financial management and advice on the project budget. 

4. Ward Coordinator (16) - Part-time: These are qualified community leaders recruited from the community. Each will be responsible to oversee 50 women and their activities.

Our strategic planning approach is participatory and involves all the staff. Our beneficiaries are involved in the need identification process through trainings, meetings, and focus group discussions.

As part of our mission, we harness the power of helping the poor, marginalized and vulnerable individuals as well as communities improve their lives in a dynamic manner within the context of the ever-changing socio-economic, cultural, political and religious dispensations through short term and sustainable long term interventions embodied in our organizational objectives.

As an open organization, our staff has gained experience in delivering accountable to donors as well as to beneficiaries. Our laid down organizational procedures and policies ensure that all organizational affairs are conducted in an open, transparent, participatory, and just manner.

With a good measure of experience in implementing donor-funded programs, our organization appreciates the importance of monitoring and evaluation for purposes of accountability and learning. We shall institute a robust monitoring system that will capture relevant data and information including qualitative landmarks in the implementation process to ensure that the project is informed and not only achieves but exceeds the intended outcomes and results, and can be adopted in other regions. 

All our staff come to have many years working with international organizations in different capacities ranging from Finances, project management, legal and sustainable partnerships.

This project will assemble to a dedicated team that will oversee the start and completion of the project that will be duplicated to another region.

Kenya Paravolley Federation - Empowering people with disabilities to engage in productive activities such as entrepreneurship and sports to have their social & economic development.

Nyota Entertainment -  Identifying and training youths between ages 15 to 35 years old, in Art and Cultural community. A strong emphasis given to the slum areas and vulnerable youth. The training is on social behaviour change, Marketing their skills and business activities.

This model seeks funding which will keep on rotating in many regions helping 800 women in the first year to 4000 women by the fifth year. The goal is to empower the women to own their businesses from scratch and promote development by being part of the global leaders fighting poverty. 

We believe everyone has skills, talents, and ideas that can be transformed into income-generating activity/small business. To improve the livelihood of these women afford food, medical, school fees, and basic family needs. The model provides an opportunity for empowerment and improve the living conditions.

They will undergo training in skills and talent management, business skills, customer care, hygiene, and other related aspects that should be observed in their activities. After approval of their proposed activities as per the requirements, they will be given capital for start-up of individual activities but they will operate in a group of ten. The group members will choose their leaders to run the group and individual supervision. 

The capital advanced to every member will be required to be paid back within 9 months including a small operational interest. The group treasurer will collect the money and send it to the bank.

After the nine-months, we expect to see everyone running her business smoothly by enjoying her proceeds and having paid back her loan.

The total amount collected from loan payments, will be put to run another duplicate project in another region, and these will be rotation fund.

Sportsmith Impact, is not for profit initiative, thus we rely so much on building and developing projects, with the intention of fundraising to enable us to implement. 

As an organization we define financial sustainability as the ability to start, grow, and maintain our projects and staff with short- and long-term financial stability. Our path to financial sustainability is as follows:-
 
Donor Funding
It takes money to make money, therefore our main core is fundraising from either local or international donors who are willing to join and be part of the project and the proposed solution towards fixing community challenges of fighting to eradicate poverty through their financial support. For as to develop/implement sustainable projects, keep our staff and daily operations of the organization, will need funding and donations to push and deliver on the project goals. 

To access these funds, we shall apply and respond to proposal calls; direct fundraising, requesting, and application of direct products and services from companies and donations from well-wishers to support one time activities.

self-finance from different activities and events, fundraising, and corporate marketing during our events.
 
2) Self Financing & Profitability
As an organization we intend to self-finance in terms of providing consultancy to other organizations and firms. Organizing activities and events that will generate funds, inviting for a fee. Conducting fundraising campaigns, raffle tickets, etc. The funds realized from such activities will be channeled to the organization and used to promote project development and organization stability.

Financial: Solve can support us financially which will not only propel our organization to greater heights in terms of community development projects but also play a big role in the global poverty eradication process and also addressing other sustainable development goals. Lack of funds hinder ideas being turned into sustainable projects, thus why we believe we have great ideas that can be transformed into community development projects through funding.

Technical: Funding availability will also help us maintain and attract qualified staff, to be the key drivers of the projects, to enable continuity and professionalism. Solve can also give us the opportunity for capacity building through training and educational material.

Legal: We can learn a lot from SOLVE, on the legal issues and especially global standard legal procedures that are practised worldwide. 

Culture: Our partnership with SOLVE, will enhance networking and being able to meet other organizations, build strong strategic partnerships and collaboration locally and internationally. 

Our partnership goals can be summarised as follows:-

1. Increasing funding opportunities
Partnering with an organization with a big network, where we can get involved in all their meetings and proposals to ensure that we are able to make connections for funding and also lead to independent grants down the line.

2. Capacity Building
We believe partnership isn’t just about sharing work but also sharing resources, research, technology approaches, or communication skills. Partnerships always create other new contacts with other organization.

3. Staff Opportunities
Partnerships will help us with opportunities for training of staff, which promotes morale, consistency and staff retention.

4. Marketing the Identity
Partnerships can be a good way to market the brand and identity. This creates trust from other organization, government and the community. It creates confidence, reality, and community presence thus encouraging professionalism and efficiency in the projects.

Locally, we would like to partner and collaborate with the following corporate/organizations; especially towards identity and branding:-

1. Safaricom - It supports a lot of community work and creating awareness in areas of poverty eradication.

2. Kenya Commercial Bank Foundation - Its presence in almost every corner of the country, The foundation supports many projects in the community.

3. Stakeholders - We have many one time donors, well-wishers, and individuals who will be willing to be part of the project by donating either through funding or in kind. Many of them wait to see a smooth take-off of the project and there they gain trust to come in and offer support.

SOLVE Partners & Members

We look forward to partner with your other partners for funding, capacity building, and branding. This will give us a notch higher not only locally but also global community work, putting in mind - we would like to extend our reach and presence to other East African countries. Solve will advise us and give us more information on the approach.

We qualify for this prize because the project will work with the refugees in the following ways:-

1. Identification - Molibizating and knowing their fate, life, challenges and well being e.g living conditions, health and social-economic activities; we'll have a database to keep data on their way of life.

2. Counselling - They will undergo counselling and capacity building under some of the challenges they have encountered in their country and in the foreign land such as:-

• War and loss of loved ones and property
• Sexual Exploitation, Abuse & Harassment (SEAH)
• Gender violence
• Human trafficking
• Slavery
• etc

3. Training - The project will enhance training and give them knowledge on how to handle the way of life in the new land or foreign land, by looking upon the following:-

• Learn to speak and write the English
• How to raise their children and enrol them into local schools.
• How to secure employment and requirements needed
• Securing housing, environment and security.
• How to access services like health, acquiring citizenship etc
• Different modes of transportation and access to different places
• Cultural barriers - Ways to mingle and be accepted in the local society

4. Empower - We shall empower them in different ways:-

• Assist in securing employment from different organizations/corporate and individual who will seek their services.
• Start small businesses by using their skills, talents and innovation.
• Work with especially the youth who are talented in sports and creative economy to secure local clubs and groups to continue with their goals in life.

Build a project that will be geared towards young girls and sensitizing them by access to relevant information, guidance, counseling, and training in different aspects of life through workshops and activities that will impact development into adulthood. The theme for this project is “rebuild, demand and change”

The main aim is to work with young girls aged between 13 – 22 years, who happen to be victims of the following - Early pregnancy, early marriages, prostitution, HIV/AIDS, Alcoholism/drugs, Child labor, physical/sexual abuse, and crime. These girls are bitter with life, stigmatized, they lack confidence and self-esteem, and life, in general, has become hopeless.

Solutions
Engage the parents, church, teachers, local administrators, political leaders, and counselors to join the debate and address the challenges.

Protecting the girls by equipping and offering training, education, counseling, medical care.

Forming peer groups that will enable the girls to stick together and create an environment to learn and voice their minds through organized forums.

Train them in small business start-ups and other placement programs and also work on back to school processes

Participation in different activities i.e Sports and art, to avoid idleness and allow mind growth. This will help them to discover their talents and skills

Teaching and training the girls to stand upon themselves for their voices to be heard in terms of communication and being community advocacy agents.

Start programs and group projects to give information and capacity building which will empower them to get opportunities and good employment as per their qualifications.

The project will enhance and support courses that clearly and have benefits in the following:-

• Economic 
• Social and 
• Environmental

Training will support self-sufficiency, courses that teach cooking, clothes-making, gardening, exercise, natural health care, and meditation all will help to improve the well-being of people. 

The project will develop and promote courses that increase competence, confidence, and general well-being. Ensuring productive in people, because they are healthier, motivated, and competent. will provide learning opportunities, and social interaction, networking, collaboration, and sharing, all of which help the health of the economy and of society in general.

This will have a great impact to the community in the following ways:-

Eradication of poverty

The community will be able to produce productive individuals who will be able to find jobs and start small activities that will generate income, healthy individuals, who can make wise decisions.  

Engagement, involvement and empowerment

Promote and embrace diversity by empowering communities to support themselves. It will promote access to services, including people living with disabilities and those living in poverty.

Safety and security

The project will address the social ills and promote a secure environment from global challenges arising from terrorism, Sexual crimes, human trafficking, cyber-attacks, and general manipulation.

Social networks 
The project will promote community relationships, social engagement, and personal resilience, this will promote healthy debates and opinions by reducing social isolation, encourage inclusion, cohesion, and peace.

Cultural Sustainability
People from diverse backgrounds and age, that will help in building critical thinking, problem-solving, new knowledge, understanding and respect.