Kampala Monday/Tuesday, Feb 17/18

So here I am once again catching up on my postings.  The Country Manager meeting began on Monday at 9:00 am with a very full day of presentations focused on accomplishments and current/future objectives.  I spent much of the meeting trying to multitask and complete my own presentation for Tuesday. The real challenge was the internet, or rather, lack thereof.  My goal was to initiate a cloud based management accounting and reporting system for all Country Managers by Crop Budget.  To be successful, each local office would have to have a consistent internet speed that would allow for smooth data entry and retrieval. It became evident by the end of the day that it would not work in nearly half of the countries. I should have considered the possibility, especially it being African countries, but I didn't. So, plans had to change.  Fortunately, there is an alternate solution and I adjusted the presentation to accommodate the new direction.

After the meeting broke up at 6:30 pm, I met Gene and several HP people by the pool. We ended up tasting, okay, drinking, some very good single malt Scotch. I'm not much of a Scotch drinker, but I do have to say it was a very pleasant way to fritter away over three hours (and almost 2-bottles of Scotch).  I still had prep for my presentation for the next day, and finally finished up at 2:30 am.  The alarm at 6:45 on Tuesday came way too soon. But my presentation went very well today -- I was on for over 4-hours. It was decided at the meeting that training on the new system should take place the week of April 7th in Dubai, UAE.  That gives me a little over a month to prepare the training material for the expected 20 or so management and staff that need to be trained.  Dubai seems to be a pretty central location for everyone to get to, and visas are pretty easy and quick to obtain.  I'm actually very excited as I've never been there and know it will be a great experience.

Tomorrow is our field trip day that our host, Anna-Marie Ball, the Ugandan CM, has arranged.  She calls it from field to plate and we'll follow the path the OSP (orange sweet potato) takes from planting to the dinner plate.  We all received knit sport shirts with the Harvest Plus logo to wear.  Ugandan TV and press will be with us to capture the event.  Should be an interesting day.  Gene and I presented everyone with a Seattle Seahawks ball cap in honor of their Superbowl victory.  They were quite a hit despite the fact that almost no one had any idea of who the Seahawks are, or what American football is.  And not to be outdone, the CM from Bangladesh presented everyone with both embroidered knit shirts and HP embroidered ball caps, both highly detailed and customized to promote the rice he is breeding.

I know I've promised to post pictures, and I will keep that promise, but not just now.  The time is late and I have to rise early for tomorrow's field trip.  When I get back tomorrow and on Thursday, which should be a fairly slow day for me, I'll have time to select pictures for posting.  Until then, goodnight --