THE HAITIAN DILEMMA

YES IT CAN BE FIXED.
Do we enjoy chaos, because of its predictable nature, but we all know pretty much the end results, it is going to lead us to failures.
Do we refuse to acknowledge our failures and our weaknesses, are we taking the same path that have caused us so much heartaches and sorrows, and loss revenues . A company or a politician, nowadays cannot operate without a web site. For the naysayers, the answer is probably the same , Haitians people do not use the internet, or they do not need electricity, the poors have candles and the rich use generators and power inverters. Very often you hear those remarks. If we follow the example of the Immigration and Homeland security Services, formely known as the Immigration and Naturalization Services we will find a very different story. Whenever one had to go to the immigration, despite the facts that the offices will open at 7:AM, people will be there at 2:am, 3:AM, to be conservative, so they could be seen first. InfoPass was created, a computer program that allows you to set up your appointment, and show up at least 1 hour before your time,therefore diminishing your waiting times, and long lines most often portrayed in communist countries. There was no mention of people that wanted the services were immigrants, most of them probably illiterate, that would never use the system. Speaking from experience the system has been a source of revenues for multi services allowing them to set up appointment for a fee and so on, and a stress free for one with an appointment to the services. If the telephone was able to carry voices over, the internet is 10 fold that, it carries voice, data, images , all at the same and millions of people can have access to the same news simultaneously , becoming a very powerful medium. What the internet does is projecting an image outhere, that you are a very transparent company, it goes both for countries, I'm longing for the time I will be able to email an Haitian minister, an elected official a Senator, and so on. Progress has been made , the Haitian Embassy in Washington has web sites, but I do not know the response upon sending electronic mail internet. A web presence says that you are open 24 hours, you are welcoming people's comments, complaints, whatever it might be. It also gives you an international presence and the exposure is beneficial. But you do need some one at the other end to respond to those email. Do you know how much revenues the airlines industry has developed in internet presence, ticket sales after hours, the rent a car industry, the government, just to name those few. It is forecasted by 2007 the paper ticket will become obsolete.
People get praises when they associate themselves with smarter people and create profits . Welch, of GE, said during an interview, "we have money, what we need is ideas". Have we come to worship failures, and has it become so acceptable in our cultures , has the political turmoil in our homeland affected our business decisions even abroad , despite our exposures to the best business models. Most of us were raised , if we were hungry to refuse foods at the neighbors houses, not to show our houses to our schools friends. We want the next door neighbor to perceive us as having money, and things are going well even in our death bed, therefore decreasing our chances of survival and good helping hand, and perhaps, that is why our country has not been able to get the help or expertise needed, too many intellectuals, engineers, doctors , but not enough businessmen and women , constructions workers, field technicians, carpenters, mechanics or shoemakers. Being in the auto repair business at one point of time, my mechanics would tell me , when they decided to learn the trade , they lost a few friends, just to find those same people later one, begging them for money. There is a long list of non respected trades in our culture. I would not name them, for I will give exposure to the insanity. There was a saying growing up in Haiti, whenever we had money we will spend it in one day, buying things for our selves and our close friends. "tomorrow should bring his own money", therefore savings was not emphasized.
Do we rather bring the company down instead of having to bring others on board that can do the fixing. It has affected the creation of many Haitian companies abroad where, there is no job description, no plan, no hierachy,no hiring process. Decisions are being made right after a dream or a nap.
We create companies with no legitimate titles where every body is everybody and every one can bring their advices and expertise , or
calling themselves experts and want a paycheck for it.
You find yourselves having bosses that you did not know existed.
People coming with no formal introduction to one another and all over sudden you find yourself being supervised or they want you to do this .
Every one is turning into circles and nothing concrete is being done, I call it the street corner talk mentality, where everyone discuss thing for several hours, with no documentation, and each goes their separate ways. The worst thing that can happen is to surrender those companies to foreigners, sometimes because of skin color, with the fact that Haitians people will respect or trust the business if the management is of farer skin color. I would often hear people say, "I would start a business wether in the US or in Haiti, but I have to have a light skin person ,short of a white person, , I would stay in the shadows, cause without this stamp, this sort of presence, the business will not be validated or respected". There was this joke of this Haitian man of light skin color, after spending some times in the US, went back to Haiti. He traveled with an interpreter, making believe he could not speak the language, he got himself the best treatment, and won and broke quiet a few hearts. In Haiti today you will find kindergarden named " The little Canadian", or you find parents with two kids, one born in Haiti, the other born in the US, or Canada, France, gets all the praises, finding the need to make distinctions. Meanwhile no sensitivity for labor laws, with sweat shops mentality, no cultural sensitiveness, and no real paying jobs for the population they serve,no hiring process.The mentality of shooting first and ask questions later. These individuals are doing real damages to their communities by surrendering their businesses to other individuals,not that I'm saying that we can not work together,we welcome their expertise just as they have welcomed us when we first enter this country. Most of us had to find work, but very often it was not with our own people. But when it is time for us to create businesses, we should be at the decision making level,have a final say in the hiring and the pay process .
We want businesses to thrive, when we lack the basics of starting. Rule # 1, business involve risks and incertitude.
We still have not created a hiring process, let alone staffing companies within ourselves. Is there a safety net for the new comer, a guiding light upon encountering the culture schock. Haitians businessmen spend most of their times talking instead of listening, not taking any advices, hardly scheduling meetings among their associates, therefore missing importants tips.
Business is associated with risks and unpredictability, what we can only control is our customer service base area, our employees well trained and respected ,
to provide the service that we have opted to provide, from A to Z . Payrolls is not a weekly and bi weekly thing. You can be taken for a ride trying to collect a pay check from an Haitian business. We need to focus on the improvements of our services, and receptive to technological advances, that it can only save us from our next failure. I have a long list of companies that have taken the leap, and this article would not be enough , I will name just a few:

www.kalsonwouj.com, www.fouye.com www.metropolehaiti.com www.port-haiti.com www.unitransfer.com www.commonmortgage.com www.uhhp.com www.carlfombrun.com www.everythinghaitian.com www.haitibuzz.com www.sakapfet.com www.sweetmickey.com, www.zwaveradio.com www.amh.com www.haitibooks.com www.haitipressnetwork.com www.pvscom.com www.haitinetworking.com www.airdayiti.com www.uhhp.com www.lakaymagazine.com www.kiskeyaherald.com www.haiticonek.com



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