OmniBank has organised the 3rd of its SME Clinics for 2017 at the British Council in Accra.
The clinic which forms part of the Bank’s SME Education activities is to equip small and medium enterprises with the knowledge they need to effectively compete in the marketplace.
The clinic, on the topic ‘Innovative Financing Options for Businesses’, is to help the SMEs identify the right financing opportunities available for their various businesses.
According to Head of the OmniSME Clinic, Godwin Ansah, “a typical SME when they approach a bank, is looking for a loan but there are a number of financing options they may not be aware of… so in furtherance to that, we have brought in some equity investment companies who will engage with these guys to explore these options”.
He said the clinic generally hopes to build the capacity of small and medium enterprises adding that “we measure success of what we do through the results that our participants are able to garner so at the end of the day we expect that they will be able to expand their knowledge and skills in this area”.
Godwin Ansah noted that after every SME clinic, the bank conducts follow-up checks on participants to ascertain if they are applying what they learnt and the effect of that on their businesses.
Participants of the clinic had the opportunity to engage some mentors in group sessions where they received more insight into the best practices for their businesses.
For facilitators of the various groups, their focus is to equip participants with the needed skills to be able to take bold decisions for the success of their businesses.
Leader of the team of facilitators, Andrews Ayiku who is the West Africa Manager for E4Impact Foundation said they hope to equip participants with all the innovative financing available.
He said, “The training is just supposed to give the SMEs the chance to understand key things you need to understand when it comes to financing.”
He called on SMEs that are not participating in the session to join the next one on the 12th of October, 2017 as they stand to gain a lot to secure their businesses.
Though OmniBank serves all customers, including large corporates and individuals equally, it dedicates resources to fix the challenges in the SME Sector.
