CEFE is a combination of SME management/entrepreneurship skills training and a methodology of delivering that training. It has been designed by CEFE International and used successfully in 85 countries, most of them developing economies like Malawi’s. It recognises that adults don’t learn by being lectured to. They don’t learn by reading the course notes after the training. If they don’t absorb the lessons during the training, within weeks any benefit is lost. That’s the nature of memory.

What CEFE does that is different is use “experiential learning” – which is a fancy training phrase for “learning by doing.” Lessons are drawn from using class exercises. For example, in Building a Tower exercise, participants are divided into groups and each group is given the same materials and the same instructions: build the highest, freestanding tower you can. The exercise demonstrates that it is not what you have but how you use it that makes a difference. That’s why we see successful people start with nothing and succeed, while wealthier people can fail easily. The activity and the subsequent explanation are memorable, far more so than the old-fashioned lecture method.

This method is geared to adults who have been out of the classroom for sometime. Because of the action focus, literacy is not an issue although most courses do require an understanding of English. Some presenters offer the courses in Chichewa. It also makes use of the experience and skills that participants already have.