Today has been a busy but very productive day.  I promised on my last entry to provide more information on what I am actually working on. 

To explain my work, I will need to draw a quick picture of the different entities that are involved in the project.  The real aim of the project is to improve visibility withing the Ghanaian Public Health Sector's supply chain and really make health commodities available whenever needed by the citizens.  To improve the logistics system in the region, the Ghana Ministry of Health has partnered with the USAID|DELIVER PROJECT (http://deliver.jsi.com/dhome) to design a new system for delivering health supplies.  IBM is partnering with USAID through the CSC program to bring our expertise in developing a plan for the Ghana Ministry of Health.  And finally, IBM has partnered with CDC Development Solutions who is the implementation partner.

We have local liaisons from CDC Development Solutions who have been with us from the start of the project to help facilitate the logistics and also assist with getting the right resources from the various stakeholders who need to participate in the project. 

It is exciting to be part of something that can really have an impact on people's lives and  help increase people's speedy access to health commodities.  The Ghanaian government agencies whom we have interacted with so far, all seem to be very committed to improving Healthcare access and  building a sustainable system.  The commitment by the government is really refreshing and has impressed the entire team.  We are all determined to deliver something useful and that we can be proud of at the end of our project.  Hence, the reason why it has been a busy day and I expect that it will only get busier in the upcoming weeks.

Although there are 12 of us, we have been subdivided into three teams made up of 4 people.  My subgroup is focused on the technical requirements that would be needed to implement a system.  Below are some pictures from our first working day.  The first picture is with all of the attendees, made up of various agencies from the Ghanaian Ministry of Health, IBM CSC members, USAID, John Snow International and CDC Development Solutions (CDS).

The entire group

Technical subgroup

End of the day.  Picture with the IBM CSC team.

Akwaba means Welcome

Hello everyone, it has taken me longer than I thought to write the first issue of my blog.  I will try to make the following ones more frequent.


So, I started this blog to share my experiences while I am in Accra, Ghana, participating in the IBM Corporate Services Corps program. 

The Corporate Service Corps was launched in 2008 to help provide IBMers with high quality leadership development while delivering high quality problem solving for communities and organizations in emerging markets. The program empowers IBM employees as global citizens by sending groups of 10 - 15 individuals from different countries with a range of skills to an emerging market for four week community-based assignments. During the assignment, participants perform community-driven economic development projects working at the intersection of business, technology, and society. 
 
My particular project, is in Accra, Ghana and my group will be working with the Ghanaian Ministry of Health.  

Ghana is located in West Africa and was formerly called the Gold Coast, because of both the Gold in the country and the slave trade.  It has a population of 24 million and 4 million live in Accra, the Capital.  Accra is on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean and the weather is tropical; hot and humid generally.

I arrived in Accra, Ghana on Saturday, April 14.  Unfortunately, I came down with the flu while visiting Nigeria right before my arrival in Ghana, so I did not get to meet the rest of the Corporate Services Corps team on Saturday.

On Sunday, April 15, I was able to meet with my team when we went on a short tour of Accra.  I plan to upload some of the other pictures in the upcoming days.  But there is a picture of the entire IBM team (12 in total) from all over the world.

The team is made up of a Brazilian from Sao Paolo, a Chinese from Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, 2 from India, 2 Americans (myself included), German, Irish (by way of Australia) and 2 Australians.  We all have various jobs within IBM, ranging from marketing to finance to project management.  Everyone is so excited to be in Ghana and to work on the project.  Also we are working with CDC Development Solutions (CDS), who are the implementation partners and are helping to coordinate all the logistics.

So far, I have found the Ghanaian people to be very hospitable and easy mannered.  They are so willing to help and they are very proud of their culture.  The food is great and spicy; I will discuss food in more detail on my next blog.  I need to get some pictures to add to it.

IBM Ghana 8 CSC team and Maeve from CDS (on your far left)

Drum making shop in open market called Arts Center.