PMC staff gathered at the 2017 work retreat
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Looking to the Future: Population Media Center Staff from Around the World Gather

Nov 14, 2017

Meetings started on Monday, October 23rd after resident representatives had arrived in the United States from Guatemala, Nepal, Burundi, Nigeria, Haiti, and others. It was the beginning of a week to plan strategically about improving operations and expanding the impact of Population Media Center (PMC). PMC is a nonprofit organization headquartered in South Burlington, Vermont that works internationally to change lives with entertainment, and the organization is looking to triple their annual global operations and impact by 2025.

PMC creates TV and radio shows all around the world that address deeply entrenched issues related to the rights of women and girls and environmental protection. In Nepal, for instance, one of the top issues PMC addresses is child marriage. In every country of operation, PMC hires all local teams that are then trained in PMC’s methodology. PMC’s resident representatives are the in-country director of the local staff creating and producing the shows. All but one of PMC’s resident representatives were able to attend this past October, combining with headquarters staff for a total of 23 PMC team members.

“The opportunity to gather as a whole team is a unique opportunity,” said Bill Ryerson, President and Founder of PMC. “This meeting was an opportunity to discuss and strategize collectively without challenges like different time zones and internet reliability. We were able to clarify objectives and explore operational improvements that can help propel us forward and enable PMC to impact more people.”

PMC’s Vision 2025 plan identifies 35 Focus Countries chosen according to health and environmental indicators, media landscape, and partnership opportunities. The goal is to be working in 30 countries by 2025 – nearly three times the current size of operations.

The retreat began at PMC headquarters office in South Burlington, VT where small meetings were conducted on Monday and Tuesday addressing various specific topics, such as research, program implementation, finance, administration, marketing, and fundraising.

On Wednesday, the global PMC team traveled offsite to be immersed in the next three days of strategizing as a large working group. The retreat resulted in rich discussion and concrete next steps for how PMC can align its resources to reach the ambitious goals set forth in PMC’s Vision 2025 plan, and how to improve current operations to achieve increased efficiency and greater impact.

“This was a great moment of very useful sharing and learning for the conduct of our mission on the ground,” said Gabin Kifukiau Mabanzila, PMC Resident Representative for Democratic Republic of the Congo.

ABOUT POPULATION MEDIA CENTER (PMC):

Population Media Center is a nonprofit leader in entertainment-education, dedicated to women’s rights and empowerment, population stabilization, and the environment. For the past two decades, PMC’s entertainment programming has promoted social and cultural change and has helped 500 million people in more than 50 countries. www.populationmedia.org