Casey
Things are ramping up as we get ready for our launch in about 40 days (barring any delays from the tax Gods...). Our Investment Committee met two weeks ago and approved our first two Field Partners. Now we're in the process of putting together all of our plans for training and coordinating with our Field Partners, getting ready for Beta testing of our website, drawing up legal disclaimers and contracts, creating financial accounting systems for our Field Partners, building the Wokai Chapters in Seattle, SF and NYC, researching and writing on China microfinance, and making a video.
After a year of laying the foundation for Wokai, it's exciting that our dreams are turning into a reality. Our team has grown so much over the past six months (starting with me sitting at a spare desk in a friend's office) that yesterday we didn't have enough chairs for everyone to sit in. Here are a few pictures of the team:
Zhang Sheng (Director of Field Partnerships) brainstorming with Kira (Director of Microfinance) on when and how to upload borrower profiles onto our site, get updates, monitor each borrower's repayment and Field Partner Finances. Zhang Sheng left his home in Tianjin and successful advertising career with the mission of giving back to his country. Over the next two and a half weeks, Zhang Sheng will travel to Inner Mongolia with me to negotiate with our first Field Partner, then over 1500 miles south to Sichuan to train our second partner on international best practice financial accounting with Kira, and then back up to Inner Mongolia to begin training their team on profile collection, our website and monitoring. Total train travel: 80 hours - 4000 + miles.
Left to right: Kira - Wokai's fearless Microsoft Excel phenom. In her past life working in investment banking at Deutsche Bank in New York, Kira reached great hights as a professional Excelist. Kira was unbeatable at her crosshanded control + Alt + F4 to function + Tab + F11 cell highlight to cell lock shortcut. Now she uses her natural talent and 100 hour weeks of experience to create new forms of accounting for Chinese microfinance institutions and ingenious multi-colored models projecting Wokai's growth. All joke's aside. She's brilliant.
Adam - Wokai's Marketing Guru. Adam selflessly decided to cut his one year trip around the world six months short to lead the foundation building of Wokai's marketing campaign. Over the past two months, Adam has worked with Courtney to create 150 pages of presentation manuals and chapter guides, coordinated 50 representatives around the US, and initiate Wokai's Drinks for a Better World series in Beijing.
Bick McSwiney - Wokai's self-proclaimed "Web-master". After leaving his post at Ningxia CEPA, a microfinance institution in China's Ningxia province, Bick stepped on a month and a half ago as Wokai's COO. Along with leading all internal operations, marketing, public relations, and fundraising, Bick will also be heading up Wokai's website management as the "Web-Master".
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