In autumn, the members of the Management Board Moritz Kolbe and Julia Schubert visited the PROJECT-E Hospitality Institute (PEHI) in Addis Ababa again. They here report their impressions and give a general view of how PROJECT-E works.

Most of you will be aware of the development of PROJECT-E’s students and the project itself. However, we rarely discuss the details of how our organization functions.

Basically, PROJECT-E is organised in two teams: Team Addis and Team Europe. While the team in Addis is responsible for the daily operation of the PROJECT-E Hospitality Institute (PEHI), the European team works on the general development of the organisation. The work in Europe is a great team effort, overseen by the Management Board, which currently consists of Julia Schubert, Nadja Frercksen and Moritz Kolbe.

The cooperation and coordination between the two teams is extremely important. In autumn 2016, Julia and Moritz visited the PEHI in Addis Ababa to get a first-hand impression of how the project is going. It was a trip filled with hard work as well as the joy of experiencing PROJECT-E’s impact on our students’ lives. Since both have spent several months in Addis before, it was also a great opportunity to meet old friends and colleagues.

During the time at the Institute, they met up with our former partner organisation Selam Children’s Village, which took over our secretarial science project in October 2015. They discussed the development of the project under the new management ensuring that our standards are met as well as future collaborations. Furthermore, they planned the PEHI’s budget for the upcoming two years and used the opportunity to discuss and resolve different challenges on the ground. Overall, their stay was highly productive and formed stronger bonds between the teams in Addis and in Europe.

Written by Moritz Kolbe.