Launched in 2017, Institut Helix expanded MSC’s services to French-speaking markets through the support of the Mastercard Foundation. Institut Helix builds on the experience of MSC’s Helix Institute with its proven track record of delivering public, in-house, e-learning, virtual learning, and blended learning to digital financial services practitioners.
Institut Helix provides innovative learning solutions tailored to your learning needs. With more than eight available courses that can also be offered via à la carte options, our trainers deliver the courses both face-to-face and via e-learning to serve your learning needs anywhere. We also offer learning tours in French to both English- and French-speaking countries. Our subject matter experts develop the training courses and work in research and technical assistance throughout the continent to ensure that the content is updated and relevant for the training participants.
To date, Institut Helix has delivered training sessions to more than 500 participants from 19 francophone countries representing banks, governments, telecom, microfinance, FinTechs, and startups. Our work has resulted in improved agent networks, more relevant products and services, and advanced knowledge of managing risk in the digital age.
The UNCDF MicroLead Expansion program is a six-year, USD 23.5-million program that engaged MSC to create a toolkit for service providers on linking savings groups with financial institutions. These service providers included banks, MFIs, and related service providers, MNOs, and FinTechs. MSC worked in Benin, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, and Uganda for the project.
The toolkit provides insights on how to work with savings groups effectively and create sustainable commercial linkages that create value to savings groups, group members, and banks. It focuses on the types of savings groups, linkage models, and the steps to follow when initiating linkage services. The toolkit also examines the role of digital technologies and digital financial services to link savings groups effectively.
The toolkit contributes immensely to expand financial inclusion through capacity-building of banks, MFIs, and FinTechs that work with informal groups, especially in rural areas.
The “oral” segment comprises individuals with limited or no ability to read and understand numbers. MSC collaborated with My Oral Village in this assignment to assess the literacy and numeracy capabilities of typical Indian users, as well as how they related to a range of icons that are key to smartphone user interfaces.
Based on this, we were able to design the first ever wallet prototype for the oral segment. We developed the prototype based on insights on the cognitive ability constraints of this segment. After multiple iterations and testing of the user interface, the project resulted in the creation of MoWO—mobile wallet for oral.
The MoWO product now informs the design of applications for several digital finance providers and FinTechs in India.
MSC helped CASHPOR Micro Credit (CMC), a leading MFI in northern India, to induce financial behavior change among its clients. The project helped the MFI enhance its non-credit financial services.
MSC developed a financial education program for rural women based on principles of behavior change communication. This helped the women to choose financial products wisely from among the options that CMC provided them.
MSC’s efforts led to the increased uptake and usage of CMC’s savings and pension products and services among their clients. In pilot branches, there was an 89% increase in the number of savings deposits and 233% increase in account opening.
This assignment required MSC to nudge financial behavior among the beneficiaries of the Strengthening Women’s Ability for Productive New Opportunities (SWAPNO) project in Bangladesh, who receive payments through the mobile financial services (MFS) channel. MSC’s engagement was in the context of UNDP’s tests on a digital payments platform that would replace the physical delivery of social security cash benefits to SWAPNO participants. We assessed behavioral aspects of digital cash transfers to identify opportunities to change financial behavior.
MSC devised program design elements that can induce behavior change and identified behavioral change indicators for a randomized control trial (RCT). Our intervention helped UNDP to identify and incorporate behavioral change indicators in the overall design of the RCT. At the time of writing, the SWAPNO program was in the second phase of its implementation, with 1,296 women receiving payments through MFS and DFS channels as a pilot project.
MSC delivers regular training on product development at Boulder Institute of Microfinance. These events see attendance from CEOs, COOs, and senior management team members from operations, product development, research and development, and other relevant departments of financial institutions and central banks. These financial institutions include banks, cooperatives, and MFIs. They use the insights from our training sessions to develop or refine products and services for their target markets.
Our training equips participants with the skills and resources to:
- Examine options and opportunities to gather data on client needs, aspirations, perceptions, and behavior through secondary and primary research and behavioral analysis tools;
- Use a robust and systematic approach to product development and implementation;
- Design and implement pilot tests and roll-out to minimize risk and maximize success.
Over the years, MSC has supported more than 150 financial services providers to develop and deliver over 250 products and channels that now find use among 50 million-plus people.