ProCredit Academy

A two-tier academy system

The key to ProCredit’s success is our employees, who put our positioning and philosophy as a “Hausbank” for micro, small and medium-sized business into practice. Responsible financial intermediation requires staff who are able to establish long-term relationships with our customers, analyse credit risk reliably and provide good service in a competent, responsible and efficient manner. Our investment in training over the years and the resulting ability to respond quickly to changed circumstances has placed ProCredit in a strong position to adapt effectively to the more volatile operating environment which generally prevails in emerging markets.

Given the demands we place on management staff and the specialists who serve our MSME clients, much attention is focused on appropriate training, supported, in particular, by our two-tier academy programme in Fürth, Germany.

The first level of the ProCredit Academy consists of a one-year part-time course, the ProCredit Banker programme. This programme is open to all interested employees and aims to bring together competent specialists and potential managers to learn and actively exchange their views on the company vision and business strategy. This programme is also the prerequisite for the ProCredit Management Academy, with selected candidates being invited to participate in the two-year programme.

Over the years, the ProCredit Academy has aimed to provide training for all interested staff, Business Client Advisers, Private Client Advisers, Credit Risk Analysts and head-office specialists. Staff members are selected for participation based on their bank’s assessment of their performance and personal development. Since the participants include staff from each ProCredit institution, students have the opportunity to undergo training with peers from different cultural backgrounds over a longer period.

ProCredit Banker Academy

The ProCredit Banker Academy is a key component of the modular ProCredit training programme, which begins with the ProCredit Onboarding Programme, continues through advanced courses for existing staff and, for some, culminates in attendance at the ProCredit Management Academy. In addition to fostering the personal and professional development of selected employees who identify with our values and want to advance further, the Banker Academy also helps us to identify ProCredit staff for advanced development programmes and prepare them for participation in the two-year intensive course at our Management Academy.

The ProCredit Banker Academy has developed and sustained a one-year training programme which, just like our banks, has had to adapt in response to the various challenges and changes, be they organisational, economic, political or social, in the environments in which we operate. With this in mind, discussing the ProCredit group’s approach to development and its implementation in the respective markets is an important topic at the ProCredit Banker Academy. We are convinced that building long-term relationships with MSMEs can make a significant contribution to job creation and economic development. Discussion of this business philosophy is a key part of the programme, even outside of the management level. In this context, the ProCredit Banker Academy provides a central platform for conducting this discussion on a broader basis, and helps to promote a shared understanding of what our group means by a values-based approach to banking and how we define it.

ProCredit Management Academy

The two-year ProCredit Management Academy has been in operation since January 2006. The significance of this academy, which is a central component of a graduate training programme for ProCredit staff, becomes particularly clear if one takes into account the distinctive nature of the ProCredit banks and their parent company, ProCredit Holding. What makes them special has both a formal and a practical dimension.

All of our managers have graduated or are currently attending the ProCredit Management Academy. The Academy, however, is not positioned as an elite school for the formation of a management cadre, as it offers the opportunity for personal and professional development to a broad group of employees. This inclusiveness should not, however, lead one to overlook the performance and commitment requirements expected of the graduates.

Bearing in mind that our group of banks has evolved out of a commitment to pursue a development-oriented approach to banking, and that this idea has taken on different concrete forms in different countries, it becomes obvious just how much the group depends on the local staff members who represent that approach in their respective countries.

The corporate culture of the Academy can be summed up in values and principles such as tolerance and curiosity, rational thought and the scientific method, solidarity and friendliness.