Other Feedback & Quotes

One of the most memorable events for me during the workshop was the group presentation and criticism of the proposals. My group working on the case study for Village B had pointed out that part of the problem of the village was caused by the neglect of the village by the national government. But, during the critique, we were advised to be apolitical in our stance so as to get the support of the host government when writing proposals. The training has impacted positively on the way I relate with people in my organization. I understand motivation and team work much better. The knowledge from the training also was very useful when I participated in the State Strategic Plan 2010-2015 for Abia State in Nigeria in November 2009.
  --Rev. Ikpo Ugbaga, Deputy Director, Presbyterian Community Services and Development (Aba, Nigeria) [2009 DME course graduate]

Thank you for the training held at Arusha for which I will be forever grateful for helping build my capacity in proposal writing and evaluation. What stood out was the practical work on proposal writing. I and my group worked for long hours only to learn during the presentation that we missed the "need" of the case study. But the good thing is that we leaned a great deal. . . . The facilitators were also supportive and very engaging . . . Since I left the training I have a totally different approach to program and project design.
  --Susan Maina, Project Officer, Young Widows Advancement Program (Nairobi, Kenya) [2009 DME course graduate]

GHA courses are not what one can miss if one has a choice. I actually know my capability before and after the GHA Accra [2007 course in Ghana], I am happy to tell you at this point, that my fast growing NGO started after the Accra course. My first proposal writing gave me some money to start off. Thanks to God and GHA for their lectures on proposal writing. It did the magic.
  --Uzoakama Uja [2007 DME course graduate]

I really do not know how to show my gratitude to you people at the Global Health Action. My life and career have been drastically transformed by my studies at GHA. The changes in me are visible to everybody around me. I am in more demand in Nigeria than I can cope with. I spend a lot of time on workshops and seminars training people for transformation in management and leadership. The two courses, ‘International Health Management Course’ and ‘Community Health Services in the Rural Areas’ gave me in eight weeks what I would not have been able to learn in ten years if it had not been for GHA. I learned a lot from you people at GHA. Above all, I learned love and respect from you. And that is why I will forever remain in love with you.
  --Okechukwa Kalu Iro, Civil Society Consultative Group on HIV & AIDS, Nigeria [2001 International Health Management course graduate]

During my course at GHA, I learned to apply management skills critical for health services, including: planning, monitoring and evaluation for health programs; human resource management, quality improvement techniques, social marketing, projecting, analyzing and controlling costs and understanding organizational behavior and change.
  --Jamila Hamudu, Nursing Manager for Muhimbili Medical Centre, Tanzania [1999 International Health Management course graduate]

In 2009 -2010 I led my center to improve projects management of planning - budget - report - approve - implementation and evaluation. I encountered many difficulties in these processes, especially the difficulty related to the unmatched ideal and abilities from colleagues, managers and leaders. After the training in the United States about theory and practice in funding project, I have more profound understanding on project management and realize to effort on every process. Now my present work is gradually rationalized, and will be more standardized.
  --An official with China’s Population and Family Planning Commission [June 2009 course graduate]

[Taking what was learned in the course] I established an evaluation system for our marketing and education work. I learned the importance of establishing assessment during the GHA training. It is an important issue for our marketing and education work to assess its effects. Not doing so has been a long-term problem for us. After the training, I cooperated with other leaders to strengthen and assess our marketing work, such as  producing promotion materials, doing a questionnaire survey, and making evaluation visits with a sampling of citizens after one program, The feedback has been positive.
  --An official with China’s Population and Family Planning Commission [June 2009 course graduate]

The "leadership and management" training emphasized that leadership skills should vary according to different willingness and ability level of the subordinate in different work. I learned that a leader should not use the same management with different subordinates. I have one officer who has been working for two years in my office. I felt frustrated with him and that he was doing a poor job because he couldn’t complete any task without my specific detailed explanations, and he also always asked for my instructions. After the GHA training, I realized he is a kind of officer who cannot have too much authority to complete a task independently, or he will be very confused. Now I work with him early every month to segment tasks, confirm deadlines, clarify targets, and notice attention points. I have found that with this specific guidance, this officer can do his job well.
  --An official with China’s Population and Family Planning Commission [June 2009 course graduate]