After 18 months of volunteer work with Pesinet, Lucie joined the team full-time in May 2011. She is now actively involved in the development of Pesinet.

• Lucie, can you tell us about your background? What did you do before joining Pesinet?

I spent my last months as an ESSEC student doing an internship in South East Asia; then I joined Indicta, a French consulting firm. In parallel, I started to get interested in social entrepreneurship. I heard about Pesinet through my cousin who is one of the 3 co-founders of Pesinet, and I decided to get involved. It was a good time for me, and a good time for Pesinet which needed motivated people to help Anne (CEO and co-founder of Pesinet) expand the NGO. For 18 months, I dedicated part of my spare time for Pesinet, before joining on a full-time basis.

• What were your first tasks ?

I started off with Pesinet’s participation in the Convergences 2015 forum in Paris. For the next 3 months, I contributed to the strategic thinking on Pesinet’s economic model, I took charge of relationships with our financial partners, I created a « corporate » brochure for Pesinet and I followed up on technological developments for our health application. Then I prepared my trip to Mali.

• You spent 3 months with the field teams in Bamako…

Yes, it was essential that I spend some time in Mali in order to acquaint myself with the field, to understand the local health context in greater depth, and to meet the local teams. I arrived just when we were preparing the launch of Pesinet on 2 new sites, so it was a great time to be there!

• What did you work on in Bamako?

My main mission was to lead the marketing studies for our “premium offer” project. This is one of the possibilities that we are considering to strengthen our economic model: developing a premium health service that would be more expensive but also more comprehensive than our current health service and would target families that have the desire and the financial means to spend more on their children’s health. On that service, we would make a margin that would improve the global self-financing rate and sustain the service dedicated to lower-income families.

I organized a first series of focus groups that enabled to gauge the interest of families for a premium offer and to identify the elements not included in our current service that would have high added value for families. Based on the results, we built an offer that we are currently testing through a second series of focus groups.

• What are your impressions of the field? Is it very different from what you imagined from France?

I was astonished to see how much activities have developed and improved since my first field visit in February 2010.

We now have strong and motivated teams, and well-structured processes that enable sound running of operations. Things are done well, and in a lively atmosphere! Incidentally, this is something that clearly emerged during the focus groups: subscribing families are very pleased with the Pesinet service, in particular with the work of our agents – their professionalism, their involvement, their joviality.

Moreover, we strengthened our relationships with the local health authorities. Pesinet is now acknowledged as an important actor in the field of community healthcare; and regularly invited to contribute to strategic workshops on these topics.

I am thrilled by those three months in Mali! It was a very enriching experience. I got to develop strong relationships with my colleagues, which will enable me to be fully part of the team, even from France.

• You are just back from Mali. Will you continue to work for Pesinet from Paris?

Yes, there is also a lot to do from Paris to support the development of the NGO and its activities. 2012 promises to be as busy as 2011. On the menu : development and launch of a pregnancy-care service ; investigation of partnership possibilities with mutual insurance structures and microfinance institutions, and preliminary feasibility studies for a pilot site in rural zone. All these projects will give me plenty of opportunities for future field missions in Mali!

In April 2011, Pesinet launched a training program for its teams as well as the medical teams of the partnering health centre. To organize and run these training sessions, Pesinet contracted Jigi – a local NGO with strong expertise on training in the fields of prevention and health education.

Discover the crossed feedbacks of Cheick Mohamed Pano, program supervisor, Dr Cissé, Pesinet referring doctor in the partnering health center, and Nana Camara, Pesinet health agent.

• Cheick, Dr Cissé, what was your training about?

“We took part in a “training the trainers” session, along with two other staff of the health centre – the head of the Child Prevention Unit and the head of the Child Examination Unit. Together, we learnt how to design a training scheme, how to lead training sessions for adults, how to evaluate them…

We were also trained, along with Pesinet’s agents, on CBC (Communication for Behaviour Change) – which is the key goal of the program! This module focused on Essential Family Practices on health, which we need to convey in the families.”

• Nana, can you tell us more about the training module on Essential Family Practices ?

« This session, wich was followed by all Pesinet health agents, dealt with identification of symptoms, common child diseases prevention practices, as well as advice to give to families. In order to be more efficient in our advising role towards subscribing families, we learnt communication techniques for behaviour change – i.e. how to talk and behave in front of a group of people so that your message comes across effectively. It is also part of our work! »

• After this training, what is your general feeling ?

Cissé: « This training is a big plus for me. I had some gaps in methodology: how to prepare
a workshop, how to lead a workshop, how to identify and formulate objectives. I already had
the medical knowledge. Now I also have the educational techniques that enable me to pass on
this information. »

Nana: « I learnt new things on health topics. In my past professional experiences, I never
took part in any nursing or midwife activities; therefore, I had maybe less knowledge on
breastfeeding or nutrition issues, compared to the other agents. With this training, I learnt a lot
on family planning, child nutrition and prenatal care visits – for instance.

I also liked the practical workshop we did on counseling. We formed groups within which we shared ideas and experiences – in the same manner as during educational talks. It was a good way to learn how to lead participative talks with Pesinet subscribing mothers.»

Cheick: « This training was indeed a necessary process! It was necessary for our agents, so that they can develop activities in an autonomous manner. We all needed this training! As far as I am concerned, those sessions were the opportunity to acquire additional knowledge and skills, notably in team management.»

• In your opinion, what were the strenghts and weaknesses of this training program?

Nana: « It came a bit late. It would be better to have it at the beginning, when one starts working for Pesinet. As for the strength: the behaviour change communication techniques! »

Cheick: « I can’t think of any weakness. For me, everything was very positive! A strength : the high level of competency of Jigi trainers. They made us effectively assimilate learnings. They succeeded in mobilizing the team to take active part in the sessions – for example, they got the agents to overcome their fear of speaking in public. They managed to give them self-confidence! »

• What changes will it bring in your professional life?

Cissé: « As a doctor, I am aware of Essential Family Practices. But I found it very interesting to approach them through training and education techniques! I feel better equipped, it gives me useful tools. »

Cheick: « As for me, I already knew some training and communication methods. The training gave me the opportunity to refresh them and complete them with new – sometimes more efficient – techniques. For instance, I learnt a new way to prepare and lead the weekly team meetings. It is important to renew your panel of techniques so as to avoid monotony.»

Nana: « I changed my work habits and processes. Soon after the training session, I organized a talk with my mothers. I managed to talk in front of them, be convincing, and they listened to me. We exchanged ideas and I even made appointments with some of them. The training changed my way of sensitizing them. I put into practice what we learnt during the practical exercise. I feel more at ease and confident. I think I could talk even in front of the Health Minister now!

I learnt how to bring up my discussion topic with the mothers. In general, when you arrive, it is often not a good time – there might be bickering going on. With the training, I learnt how to avert those situations and talk about my health topic, without getting involved in their personal matters. Before, I was sometimes ashamed. Now, I say what I have to say! »

• In your opinion, what will be the impacts of the training on the program ?

Cissé: « The impacts can only be positive – notably for agents, as they constitute the link between the mothers and us doctors. If they put into practice what they have learnt, they can effectively inform and sensitize mothers. It will have a positive impact on children’s care, because if mothers are better informed, they will bring their children early to the health center and we will be able to better treat them. »

• What are the future prospects?

Cissé: « Cheick and I have jointly worked on the implementation of a continuous training program for the agents. We will co-run regular training workshops, using techniques learnt during the « training the trainers » session. Once every two months, we will discuss a health topic with the agents, and they will have the opportunity to talk about their field experiences. »

Cheick: « We will indeed pursue the process that was initiated with those training sessions. As a matter of fact, we have already held our first agents’ training session, which focused on Acute Respiratory Infections. We opted for a participatory and thematic approach. We started with children diseases in general, and then gradually focused on ARI. The field experiences of the agents served as the discussion basis, and we exchanged around practical situations. »

Cissé: « The next topic we plan to tackle is nutrition. The idea is to give them the theoretical content. With the communication techniques they learnt, they now master the form. Now, we bring them the content so that they can hold the talks by themselves.»

Nana: « Those regular training workshops with Cheick and Dr Cissé are a good thing for us agents. With our field experience, we are confronted with new diseases and new situations that we don’t know how to handle. With those trainings, we can discuss those topics and learn about them. Once every two month – it’s not too much !»

• The last word… ?

Cheick: « Thanks to the training, we implemented a new framework for exchange among the Pesinet team. The mission of the agents evolves, not in terms of job description but in terms of quality of work. They will know how to counsel families and better respond to child diseases. It is up to us to fuel the dynamics and regularly discuss health issues as well as their experiences. We must not forget to re-invent things. I have good hope ! »

>> See pictures of the training session

Cheick Mohamed PANO joined Pesinet on January 1st to fill the role of supervisor. We asked him about his background, his plans for the program and his first impressions.

• · Cheick, can you tell us about your background before coming to Pesinet?

After one year of studying legal science at the university, I entered the National Training Institute for Social Workers (l’Institut national de formation des travailleurs sociaux, INFTS). I enjoyed these studies very much and immediately I felt that I had found my way. The internships that I had throughout my schooling made it possible for me to discover different organisations in the social and sanitary sectors, notably the health centres and the organisations in charge of child welfare and their reinsertion into society.

I gained my first work experience in the NGO Save the Children from 2005 to 2006. I was the supervisor of the Zinc programme. Zinc is a micronutrient given to children from 0 to 5 years of age suffering from diarrhoea. My sector was the Bougouni District and my job consisted in supporting the community representatives in their communication efforts to change people’s behaviour, raising awareness about family planning and setting up initiatives for preventing malaria, acute respiratory infections, diarrhoea and other illness that threaten children’s survival.

From 2006 to 2008, I was social assistant at the Douentza house of corrections. Working in the prison environment deeply affected me. I was particularly drawn to the issue of imprisoned children. I participated in establishing an agreement framework with the Douentza health centre for addressing health problems.

After that, I worked in Social Services in Ansongo, a district in the Gao region, and was responsible for mutual health insurance plans. My mission consisted in supporting and advising women involved in the management committee of the mutual system. I also trained them on how to run meetings and manage the health insurance plan.

• Did you know about Pesinet or did you apply by chance?

In 2009, I enrolled at the University of Languages, Humanities, Arts and Human Sciences where I did a training programmein Education Science. I looked for employment opportunities everyday and I discovered Pesinet through the ANPE (National Employment Agency) website. I consulted Pesinet’s website and I felt that it fit with what I was looking for. I liked the mutual health insurance aspect and the innovative use of Information and Communication Technologies. This is something that can be very effective in a country like Mali. The agents visit the families and the information appears on the doctor’s computer. It is very innovative.

• Can you give us your impression since arriving at Pesinet?

I appreciate the seriousness with which things are organised as well as the training opportunities I had in accounting and management. I am discovering a new work culture as a social worker in an entrepreneurial project.

The managing teams, in particular Pauline Dupont, the international volunteer who trained me, have high expectations, which is very good for me because I must make a habit of checking what I do, and reflect on my actions. I also really like the fact that I have a great deal of autonomy regarding the strategies we take as an organisation and that I can make decisions. I present my recommendations to the management and we discuss the feasibility of these strategies.

• What are your plans for Pesinet?

My plans for Pesinet: involve the communities and parents of the children in the project in a truly participative way. One of the first meetings took place on Saturday, February 5. It was mainly for the fathers of the children enrolled in the programme. I wanted to show them why Pesinet is important for their children and involve them in monitoring the collection of subscription fees. One of the things that I have noticed is that the parents of the children enrolled are not used to paying on time. My idea was to set up a 3-person commission comprised of community leaders whose children are enrolled in the project to help raise awareness, collect fees and manage potential conflicts.

I’m also thinking about another complementary strategy: through the weighing agents, identify mothers who are willing to organise talk sessions at their homes over a cup of tea in a friendly atmosphere to share information and ideas about the project.

A new training manual for Pesinet weighing agents’s weekly check-up has been designed. It explains through images the key steps of the health check-up and data collection process. Discover the images drawn by Tanguy !

On June 26, an information meeting was organized in front of the District Chief’s  house for inhabitants of Bamako Coura. Families of the district had been invited via the town crier and the local radio.

The objective of the meeting was to explain in detail the Pesinet service to the families, describe how it was working in practice, the advantages and benefits of subscribing to Pesinet in terms of decrease in health spending, health follow-up, access to examination and treatment.

After the speeches of the counsellers to the District Chief, Pesinet’s Managing Director explained the orgin of the program, its objectives and key data about health situation of under 5 in Mali.

Mrs Kanté, volunteering as animator with Pesinet, gave a inspiring speech and strongly stressed the added-value of Pesinet for the families of Bamako Coura, which has been chosen as the pilot district for the initiative.

Cheicknè Coulibaly, program coordinator, explained then the service in depth and answered families’questions.

Families already enrolled in the program also had an opportunity to give a testimony and to answer other mothers’ questions.

At the end of the meeting, populations expressed their hope to see the program develop beyond the pilot district, to benefit more populations very soon.

Some pictures:

On January 9th 2010, representatives of various organizations working on  healthcare and development in Mali, executives from local healthcare structures, elected members, representatives of the local district and families living in the area gathered in the healthcare center’s courtyard for the official launch of Pesinet’s activities in the district III of Bamako. The ceremony was chaired by the Malian Health Minister, Mr. Oumar Ibrahima Touré.

The Mayor responsible for Healthcare in District III, Mrs Djire Mariam Diallo, opened the ceremony with a welcome address during which she expressed her satisfaction that the District III had been selected as pilot zone for the development of an innovative project using Information and Communication Technologies to improve healthcare.

The representative of the Pesinet Association in Mali, Antoine de Clerck, then took the floor to present the founding principles of the Pesinet service, its objectives and its functionning. Two films in French and Bambara, were shown to explain Pesinet service to the audience. Ms. Coulibaly testified about her expérience as a Pesinet subscriber. She has been subscribing to the service for 1 year to follow-up on the health status of her child Aboubacar.

Antoine de Clerck warmly thanked all project stakeholders and in particular the partners of the association in France – Antropia, the Alcatel-Lucent Foundation, the BNP Paribas Foundation and Medicament Export – and in Mali – the Ministry of Health and its e-health agency, the Regional Health Department, the healthcare center in District III, the Orange Mali Foundation, the BNP Paribas subsidiary in mali, BICIM, and the Malian communicaiton agency DFA Communication.

The doctor responsible for managing the Health Center in District III, Mrs. N’Diaye Hawa Thiam, and the representative of the Pesinet association in Mali then officially signed the agreement, which formalizes the commitments of the association and the health center in the joint implementation of Pesinet’s health monitoring program for children.

Mrs. Diawara Aminata Kamian, Managing Director of the Orange Mali Foundation, expressed her pride to support the Pesinet Association. She reminded that the foundation had been a founding partner of the project in Mali. “Indeed, the project meets the objective of the Orange Mali Foundation, which is to implement sustainable actions that will bring lasting structural change for a maximum number of people.

Mr. Daouda Fall, Associate Director of DFA Communication then took the floor to explain the why his company had chosen to support the Pesinet Association. The communications agency offered to organized the ceremony and created for free communications materials for the event.

The Minister of Health closed the ceremony with a supportive speech. He stressed that Pesinet was “an appropriate response to child healthcare problems, since it allowed to” raise families’ awareness of the concept of medical follow-up. ” The Minister said that Pesinet is a” major innovation “. “As a paid service very affordable, it helps to educate families about prevention”, he added. Read the speech of the Malian Health Minister.

The ceremony was successful in publicizing the program Pesinet among people and public institutions gathered on the occasion. Many Pesinet subscribers were present and played as ambassadors and the service among other families in the neighborhood. The event was broadcasted on the National News, and also relayed in the local press. To read some articles published, see the press review for January 2010.

Watch the report broadcasted on national TV (in French only).

Pesinet is a not-for-profit organization headquartered in France with representations and employees in operating countries.

Officers and Board of Directors

Pesinet’s Board of Directors has 6 members, including the three co-founders of Pesinet who are the officers, and  gathers individuals passionate about Africa, with experience in international development, social entrepreneurship, marketing, venture capital and healthcare.

Officers

Click on their picture to read their profile

Anne Roos-Weil               Pierre Carpentier             Antoine de Clerck
Managing Director           Chairman                        Treasurer, Representative in Mali

Board of Directors

Dr Line Kleinebreil, Medical practicioner, Vice-President of Université Numérique Francophone Mondiale
Jean-Claude Charlet, Founder and CEO of  Le Carré des Simples
Patrick Sevaistre, Consultant in economic development in Africa

Honorary President

We are also pleased to have Michel Rocard as Honorary President of Pesinet. A former French Prime Minister, he founded in 1999 one of the first French venture capital organization investing in Africa, Afrique Initiatives SA. He brings to the team his knowledge of international development and his connexions in African administrations.

Employees in Mali

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Cheick Mohamed Pano   Fatoumata Doumbia       Assetou Niambelé         Adjaratou Fané
Program Supervisor        Weighing agent               Weighing Agent             Weighing Agent

Sira Doumbia                  Nana Camara                  Dr Cissé
Weighing Agent              Weighing Agent              General Practitioner

Volunteers in France and Mali

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Lucie de Clerck               Saran Kanté                   David Allais                     Gabriel Brunnich

Dr. Brigitte Olivier           Matthieu Millot               Nadège Druzkowski       Joel Ntsondé

Christel Terrasson         Capucine Toulemonde     Antoine Chiquet         Etienne de Clerck

Advisors

Marie-Chantal Messier, Senior Nutritionist at World Bank
Dr Cheick Oumar Bagayoko, Expert in Medical informatics

Anne Roos-Weil, Founder and CEO

Anne, 28, is the co-founder and Secretary of Pesinet. She currently leads the organization on a full-time basis thanks to a sponsorship of Ashoka, an international social entrepreneurs’ fellowship program.

After working on social issues in NGOs and international organizations (education, migration), she spent three years at Alcatel-Lucent, coordinating and managing sustainability projects. She then worked as Corporate Engagement Manager at The Environment Council, a UK charity specialized in facilitating dialogue and engagement on sustainability, where she has been trained on facilitation techniques. She has developed strong project and human management skills, especially in cross-cultural contexts.

She has been central to the launching and development of Pesinet that she led to the international finals of the Global Social Venture Competition in Berkeley in 2009.

Anne holds  a Master of Public Administration from Sciences-Po Paris and an ESSEC MBA with a major in social entrepreneurship.

AREAS OF EXPERTISE : social entrepreneurship, management, development, facilitation

Pierre Carpentier, Founder and Chairman

Pierre, 39, has been working for 10 years on development-related projects in Africa with experience in funding and economical aspects of development.

After a few years’ experience in consulting positions, he started as investment officer at Afrique Initiatives SA, where he was responsible for identifying participation opportunities and for managing capital holding in Senegal, Mali, Burkina, Niger, Madagascar. He then set-up his own company, Cap Juby, a company specializing in development aid project design, especially public-private partnerships, and evaluation of cooperation programs and held the position of Associate Director.

A graduate of engineering and management schools, he has been working since 2006 as Investment Officer for “Investisseurs et Partenaires pour le Développement”, a private equity company investing in SMEs and micro-financing institutions in Africa.

AREAS OF EXPERTISE: international development, venture capital and private equity

Antoine de Clerck, Founder and Treasurer

Antoine de Clerck started its career at France Télécom in 2000 in the US R&D labs of the Silicon Valley, as a business analyst on the mobile Internet and e-commerce markets. In 2002, he joined the Long Distance Network Division of the company in France as a marketing product manager, where he designed a portfolio of innovative services for international operators’ interconnections. As of 2005, he was project manager at the Home Division of France Telecom, in charge of the development of broadband Internet services in the emerging markets. In particular, he initiated the launch of the Livebox and Voice over IP mutualised services in the subsidiaries of the Africa, Middle-East and Asia area.

Antoine’s work is oriented towards the design and management of specific innovation tailored for the emerging markets and low income populations. Since October 2007, Antoine has been the VP Marketing of Orange Mali, based in Bamako, Mali. Antoine de Clerck is co-founder and Treasurer of Pesinet. He is also the representative of Pesinet in Mali.

Antoine is a graduate in telecom engineering from the Institut National Polytechnique de Grenoble, and an MBA graduate of HEC Paris. Antoine is 36, he’s the father of three.

AREAS OF EXPERTISE: marketing, telecommunications

Back to “Our team” >>>

Dr. Line Kleinebreil

Doctor Line Kleinebreil is a primary care physician with a special interest in diabetes and chronic diseases who is also a master of mathematics.  She has been involved for many years as a board member on a number of the major French patient associations for both adults and children and is an active member of the World Health Organisation.

Dr Kleinebreil is a member of the faculty of the Johnson and Johnson Diabetes Institute. She is Secretary of UNFM (Université Numérique Francophone Mondiale), which develops training programs for primary care personnel in Africa and is a member of the Network of Telemedicine in Francophone Africa RAFT.

Line has been working at public hospitals in Paris, developing strategies for medical records and using IT as an educational tool for both patients and professionals, and headed the telemedicine unit at Georges Pompidou Hospital, Paris.

Line brings to the team her experience of health and training programs, her expertise in healthcare and her connections with a broad range of health organization worldwide.

AREAS OF EXPERTISE: Healthcare, Medical Informatics, Africa

Jean-Claude Charlet

An eclectic and fervent entrepreneur with both a literary and business background, Jean-Claude is a graduate from ESSEC Business School (1989), the Sorbonne University (1993) and holds an MBA from Stanford University (1998).

Following an initial experience in humanitarian work in Cambodia, Jean-Claude then worked for Le Seuil and Hachette publishers. In the late 90s, he participated in the development of one of the first on-line French travel agencies (anyway.com), after which he directed an on-line music sales start-up company financed by Bernard Arnault (mzz.com). In 2003, he left the internet to launch a new concept in the retail business and created a modern herbalist shop, “Le Carré des Simples” which he continues to develop actively.

Along with his endeavours as an entrepreneur, he created the CPI (Creating Innovative products) course, a joint academic program of leading engineering, business and design schools in France which focuses on demonstrating through 6-months work by students on companies’ projects how innovation can be a vector of cross-disciplinary approaches, open-mindedness, progress and societal utility.

Jean-Claude brings to the team his entrepreneurial experience, his creativity, his ability to think “out of the box” to help a project grow.

AREAS OF EXPERTISE: Innovation, Entrpreneurship

Patrick Sevaistre

Patrick Sevaistre began his career at the CNPF (Conseil National du Patronat Français) as Africa representative, after which he joined the Tetra Pak Group as Director for Francophone Africa.

After serving as Chief Administrator for private sector development in Africa at the OECD and then as manager of the European program for promoting investment in Southern Africa (SADC) in Brussels, Patrick served as Director-General of Afrique Initiatives SA, an investment and African entrepreneurial support firm created and chaired by Michel Rocard.

He is currently a consultant specialized in private sector development in Africa and associate researcher at the Thomas More Institute.

AREAS OF EXPERTISE: Development economics, Africa