AIESEC in Central America South EB 2010 application form LCP of AIESEC in UTP
Name
Alexandre Benavides Silva
E-mail Gchat MSN Skype Mobile
alexandre.benavides@aiesec.net benavides.silva@gmail.com kid_alexander@hotmail.com chandexxx (507) 6404-26-75
AIESEC eX Perience Posit ions Position Exchange Member OCVP Logisitc PR
Entity LC UTP LC UTP
Date 2009 2009
Regional and Int ernational M eetings Conference JUMP M@X
Role Delegate OCVP Comm.
Place Panama Costa Rica
Date 2009 2009
Academic, pr act ical and pr ofessional eXPerience Studies Career Electronic & Telecommunication Engineering
University Universidad Tecnológica de Panamá
Date 2003-2009
Key learning Team work; Helping others helps their selves; Teaching improvements.
Work Position Assistant Professor
Employer UTP
Date 2008-2009
Key learning Improved responsibilities leading a group of students; Improved my tolerance leading with students temper.
General Questionnaire 1. It is the middle of your term and due to financial restrictions you need to do a cost cutting exercise. How would you do the cost cutting exercise? What would be your approach? Please argument your answer.
I would call all the EB members for a meeting to discuss the activities plans for the current and the next quarters. We would
analyze
the activities that would take place and their
importance, and then we as team will decide to not realize the less important events or/and cut investment in others activities. In case the activity is crucial for the member’s development, it would be reasonable to
change the strategy
in areas like marketing,
encouraging the “on-line” campaign instead of the usual. We would tell the OC members to use materials used in past activities so it would not be necessary to buy a new one. Also, I would start a fundraising plan to help the investment in LC activities, ensuring that they would take place. This plan consists in selling merchandises designed by the Marketing team. If some activities with no profits will be realized, like “AIESEC Week” that is looking for the LC external propaganda, then I would ask the OC and the TMVP to make this activity loss reasonably, trying to make a profit out of it.
2. What, do you think should be the Local Focus Areas for your LC in 2010? Please Argument your answer.
The 2009 LC had as one of its goals to create a solid and functional structure of areas, so each one of these would grow next year, but unfortunately some areas like “External Relations” never had the chance to be solidified making areas like ICX in “Exchange” going down with it. So, I would focus mainly in the
initial
development of “ER”
and
keep
their
members
motivated all the time, be all the time by their side, follow the HI and KPI fulfillment and their CRM performance. Since the new VPs of those areas might be members without any big experience, the most logical thing to do it will be have a
CEEDer in the committee to help their development. Financial sustainability was one of the LFA the past EB had planned but things went wrong, and our situation is nos yet stabilized. The areas of ER and ICX must work together in other to raise TNs and find EPs for them. It was proved that this in essential to pay all our debts. Sinergy between areas. I was witness of the problem we had working with another area, many times a single area was responsible for doing task that are not theirs. The Coffee Talks did not have a TM member all the time, exchange made marketing
campaigns by their own means, these are some examples. So we must get organized and work together as a team. 3. According to your strategies as LCP 2010, how would you increase the growth in Exchanges (ICX-OGX), Pipeline and Organizational Culture?
If our goal is to increase the number of exchange experiences we deliver, we must look for the right people at the right place. I want to create a campaign together with all the EB members to motivate the EP since the moment he enters the organization. I would like to increase the ER performance by developing a support campaign similar to “The Sales Team”, and to ensure that this project give us a plenty of TNs, partners and future contacts. This will not only increase the growth in ICX and ER, but also highly develop the self-esteem of our all ours members. I want to increase the interest not only in EPs, but also members have in living an exchange experience. This campaign would increase the interest and acknowledge the members have regarding their AIESEC cycle, and their responsibilities in becoming change agents. Now LC UTP is entering his second year of existences, it’s time to embrace the exchange committee status into our culture so we can growth and strive into excellence. 4. For you, what do goals in AIESEC mean? Please propose concrete goals that will help you to have a great term.
For me a goal in AIESEC is a guiding light towards a common end. We use a goal as and end, without it, we would be walking in the dark into nowhere. But not only that, when you reach a goal in AIESEC, we find ourselves involved in another goal. It’s important to write our goals and remember it all the time.Goals: - Effective communication: it’s very important to let our members know what’s going on inside every area, so they can be assured that the LC is doing well or need help. Sometimes a member can find a solution to a problem that doesn’t involve his area. - Treat every member equally don’t matter the position he/she is in. Make us feel part of the same team. Members shouldn’t see the EB or the MC with fear or feel they are superior. - Connect every member with each other, so we can all be friends and avoid leaving someone behind. - Motivate members to take a leadership role. I’ve seen that LC UTP had opened in 2009 many Leadership roles, but few members were interested in taking one, so some of them had to be convinced to
take this role. I would assign a campaign to MKT & Comm to encourage our members to take a leadership XP and make them understand how much this will help your development. We would have a quality Leadership role in this case. - Quality EPs: in order to have a good LC, we must send qualified members to other countries, so our EPs must be real AIESECers and must have been part of a team before he leaves. 5. What is the relation among AIESEC Way, BSC, GFAs, Product Leadership strategy and MoS, regarding AIESEC 2010 and local goals for this year?
This is a very important year for AIESEC, at the end of it we will know if we achieve our goal or not, the ones that were set years ago for this date. The reason why AIESEC exist is defined by the AIESEC Way, this would be our mission; our vision right now lies in the achievement of our goals for the year 2010. The indicator of this success is the MoS (measure of success) the one that must be used as a guide during our period. That is precisely the reason why we must make our BSC based in the GFA (Global Focus Area), so all the LCs and MC had the same vision of our goals. All those thing are linked together and we must understand that in this system, one depend of the other. 6. How do you envision the way to achieve the 2010 goals in AIESEC in your LC?
why
We can’t achieve our goals if we do not understand we need them, or how are we going to handle it. My idea is that all my team have a clear idea of what we are doing, the
importance
of being here, what we represent to our members and to the world outside. I think if we as a LC have the necessary competences we can achieve anything. If we only focus on results we wouldn’t find the meaning in just having a number, we need to think in the AIESEC experiences that we would be offering and lives we would be changing. I want them to feel the AIESEC
values that we stand for, all those
things that we have to memorize but we don`t really know what
they mean. Those values and competences were created to help the AIESECer meet their path and cross it in order to reach his destiny. In conclusion, be faithful to the AIESEC system and following the right steps in other to find our way. 7. Imagine this situation: Retention Rate: less than 50% X: 30% fulfillment Membership unmotivated Contract with your main partner is broken 2 VPs leave their Role What would you do?
I would ask for an emergency EB and MC meeting. We would first answer the question “what happened?”, “Where did it all go wrong?. Every remaining EB member would explain the issues he/she had, how the problem was managed and the way he and his team tried to solve it. Then we would focus mainly in how solve the problem, that would be the main priority. We would forget who has the blame or who to blame, we fell together as a team and we must rise again for the sake of the LC UTP values that we stand for the first time we arrived here. The next step would be call for a meeting with all the active members, the remaining EB, some MC members and I would be great to have an Alumni. This LCM would very well done, including reunification Team Buiding activities, finding a new team identity, motivational speeches and by the end of these activities we would make all the LC come to a solid conclusion. The purpose of this is to motivate the whole LC to face this challenge. In the matter of the lost of the main partner, with the help of the MC, we would rearrange the friendship and rescue our main partner by giving them free marketing campaign for our next activities. This, assuming that our financial status is stable. In order to raise the number of exchanges, it would be ideal to reallocate members into this area or/and make OGX, ICX and ER work together as a team. Like I’ve said before, I would be great to do a similar thing done with the “Sales Team” in 2009.
CAT