Introducing Hassan Sherif
- ellenarnison
- May 1
- 2 min read
Hassan has been delivering image-based training in Sierra Leone since 2016
Hassan Sherif has worked with AWISH delivering the image-based business training programme to disadvantaged communities in Sierra Leone since 2016. He is enthusiastic about his work.
“First, we are trying to build the capacity of participants,” he explains. “Trying to transform them into local entrepreneurs, and trying to increase their awareness of running their successful businesses.
“It’s been very good for them. We’ve had a lot of stories about women who have transformed their lives and, today, they now run successful businesses.”
But there’s far more to Hassan’s work than simply delivering the training programme in a community. Much of the impact depends on identifying a suitable community and working with key people in that community.
He says: “If it’s our first time in a community during the survey and mapping period, we have to go to the town chief and other authority figures locally – including the youth chairman, the women’s leader. We engage with them to tell them why we are there and what we are looking for.
“Whilst that is happening, we are also getting answers to survey questions, asking them about the total number of community people, the potential participants, the facilities available, the mobile network and local services…”
This leads on to negotiations about what participants can expect. Some communities have experience of NGOs which offer direct financial support which is not how Prosper operates.
“We are trying to reduce the expectation of NGOs giving money through our skills training. We have tools to set the expectations of our participants, like the River Code Game. We have been doing this for a number of years, and we know how to navigate around the participants of the community and stakeholders,” he says.
This negotiation includes helping the community to encourage young women to participate, and what the benefits for the whole community will be.
“It’s true some women don’t speak up in public in communities. So, when we conduct our surveys we talk to the local chiefs, the women’s leader who represents the women, the mummy queen has to be there as does the youth leader who has to talk to those young men who have already married young women who participate.
“We say ‘we will be coming to register women between the ages of 18 and 35 and to you, the men, we expect you to allow them to come for the training because if they learn the skills they will help you in the home. Once they have the training, they have a different perception of how to manage the home, how to manage those little resources you give them and that will help you as husbands, brothers and fathers’.”
He’s passionate about persuading communities to support their training because he has seen the benefits to so many women over the years.
“Sometimes people will come to me maybe a couple of months after the training and say ‘Hassan, I enjoyed that training. When you left, I changed my business to this one. The product I used to sell, I sold nothing but today I’m selling a lot.’ I love these stories.”
