Starter Kit. Idea 371 of 500. Cluster 18
Mentoring from abroad for the businesses in this list: one professional abroad paired with one business at home
The mechanism, from the book
1.5 million people abroad who know how rich countries work, and who send home money and little else.
The first step
Choose 10 ideas from this appendix that are already running as small businesses near you, and ask each owner the one question they would put to an expert abroad. Then match five of those questions to professionals from a Sri Lankan association abroad and set up a one-hour call for each. If the owners want a second call, and an association will fund the programme, you have a model.
- Who pays first
- A Sri Lankan professional association abroad that wants a structured way to help home and would fund a matching programme its members can join.
- What leaves today
- The working knowledge of Sri Lankans abroad stays abroad while businesses at home learn by trial and error; one pairing moves that knowledge to where it earns.
Ask first
- Sri Lanka Export Development Board. Ask which small exporters would value a mentor based abroad.
Check before you spend
A short written agreement on confidentiality, and that mentors advise but take no share or payment without a separate agreement.
Find out these three numbers
- What question would each owner put to an expert abroad?
- How many owners want a second call?
- What would an association pay to run the programme?
A comparison from the book
Sri Lankans abroad, given a job. Chapter Seventeen
"Around 1.5 million of us abroad, most of whom would help if somebody asked properly"
Give each professional abroad one precise task; small, specific roles are what work.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
From the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? by Dr Maheshika Halbeisen. The idea and the mechanism are the book's; this kit was written for the site.