After training school teachers, the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Indore will now train around 14,000 women self-help groups (SHG) of Madhya Pradesh to sharpen their entrepreneurial skills. IIM Indore has tied up with the state education department to design video-based training modules for women self-help groups to enhance their entrepreneurial as well as team management skills.

As part of Madhya Pradesh government’s initiative of empowering women SHG, around 14,000 groups working with school education department will stitch 1.2 crore uniforms for almost 62 lakh students in a time bound manner. The cost of the project is around Rs 360 crore. Professor Himanshu Rai, director, IIM Indore said, “We are going to train women SHGs through video-based training modules. These modules will focus on leadership and team management skills, development of entrepreneurial attitude, basic accounting and management operations.”

The training module will include sessions on enhancing leadership and team management skills, sharpening entrepreneur skills, account keeping in the stitching center and management operation

Rai said developing these modules will be challenging because the target group may be poorly skilled or barely literate and the pedagogical tools have to be selected in accordance to target group. He said these training modules will be uploaded on a portal where beneficiaries will be given the right to stream it. The training module will include sessions on enhancing leadership and team management skills, sharpening entrepreneur skills, account keeping in the stitching center and management operation.

RK Pandey, controller, Rajya Shiksha Kendra said, “The basic idea was to make SHG’s economically empowered. Proper training and upskilling of SHG’s will sharpen their skills and also add value to the final product we get from them.” Officials said, the experience of the project this year will be the guiding principle in formulating a long-term policy for SHG empowerment. SHGs were roped in by the state school education department to stitch uniforms in the year 2018/19.