OVER 100 entrepreneurs operating small and medium enterprises across the island will be participating in a business diagnostic and technical assistance programme developed by the Inter-American Investment Corporation (IIC), an arm of the Inter-American Development Bank.

The programme is geared at helping SMEs to assess their businesses, improve their overall operational competitiveness and access financing.

The IIC will be partnering with Scotiabank and the Mona School of Business at the University of the West Indies to provide participating companies with an individual diagnostic assessment/review of their business done by technical consultants from the international agency to determine specific areas for improvement.

Having completed a diagnostic assessment in phase 1 of the project, the IIC’s technical teams were recently in the island to launch phase 2 of the programme, which includes providing the technical assistance needed for the businesses. The team conducted a workshop focused on branding the business, improving customer service and service delivery, which was attended by 30 small business entrepreneurs. Patsy Latchman Atterbury, vice-president of small business banking at Scotiabank, said that these workshops have been extremely beneficial to the participants to date.

“As small business entrepreneurs, they often get caught up in the day-to-day running of their enterprise and sometimes don’t get enough time to stand back and assess their business or think about issues such as promoting their businesses and developing their customer base. The workshops, which were aimed at helping the entrepreneurs to identify areas of need, improve their business image, visibility and marketability and increasing their customer base, will in the end improve their profitability and help them to grow their business,” she said.

In phase 1 of the programme, which occurred in November 2009, the IIC team held two energy efficiency workshops in Kingston and Montego Bay. The objectives of these workshops were to highlight energy efficiency measures for SMEs.

The programme has been successfully implemented in Central America and Colombia and was launched in five countries of the English-speaking Caribbean in March 2009. Companies participating in the programme are active in many different sectors, such as agriculture and agribusiness, commercial services, manufacturing and tourism.

In Jamaica, more than 100 SMEs were introduced to the programme at the launch in February 2009. Currently, the Mona School of Business has completed 13 diagnostics and will continue accepting more applicants for diagnostic and further technical assistance.

Thanks to funding from the Republic of Korea, many of these companies are eligible to receive individual technical assistance to assist them in resolving some of the operational problems highlighted in the diagnostics. In addition, all companies will be invited to group technical assistance programmes, which will be co-sponsored by Scotiabank, and will focus on a series of practical workshops on important topics to the companies.