Yejj Group

Changes at Yejj. Statement from the Executive Director. February 2012.

Steve Jobs passed away last year. For me he was an inspiring man because he was able to envision what could possibly be and was so focused on achieving it.

In his Stanford Commencement Speech in June 2005 he said;
“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma. which is living with the results of other people’s thinking... And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

With this in mind I wanted to bring you up to date on developments at Yejj.

Yejj has turned 10 years old and, as founder and director, I have been carefully reviewing the current model and way we operate, with a view to putting together a plan for the future.
In considering the situation, I saw the main priorities as having enduring organisations that would continue to be successful and continue to make a social impact, plus ensure that all the Yejj staff team would continue with their careers.
I concluded that there were a number of options, the best being to divide each of the 5 departments of Yejj into their own entity and separate them, so that they can be the most productive and effective in their own way. This would also allow people to realise more of their potential and abilities.

social enterprise


After a feasibility in October 2011, the senior mangers and myself planned the changes, which mean are making some significant changes in the coming months of 2012;

  • Cafe Yejj will stay with the new chef/manager, Adam, overseeing day to day operations. We have refurbished and expanded to a new evening menu and added a bar upstairs.
  • Solar will become a new social enterprise, with Daniel, the current Manager, as owner and myself as an investor.
  • The Web dept. will be run by the existing developer team, who will have a ready made client base from Yejj to continue and grow their own business. We will continue to project manage large client contracts and outsource to them.
  • Hospitality Training Centre with be run by another NGO called Transitions. They will take on staff and develop the training courses under their vocational training called ‘Shine’.
  • Training. The Cisco Academy program is now integrated into the Cambodian university system. Yejj was the founding academy in Cambodia and it has been a privilege to work with all the Cisco team to see the program the success it is today. We are pleased to have ‘done ourselves out of a job’!
  • The Training of Trainers, Learning to Learn and Personal Development training modules will continue to be used to strengthen other NGOs and organisations as part of a new consulting partnership that we are starting.
  • The new consulting partnership will be headed up by myself and Ali Copple, the current Training Department Manager. She will specialise in education and curriculum development.  I will focus on organisational development (especially social enterprise) and business start ups, as well as project manage database development contracts with clients.
  • We will still maintain a strong focus on social impact through the consulting, by assisting and strengthening organisations that are in need, funded by donors. There will be an online organisational development tool on a website that will complement this in the future.

All the new entities will relocate to their own office space, so we will move from the existing office at the end of February.

This all means that Yejj will have birthed 5 new entities over the 10 years and continue with café and consulting. It’s a high point to move forward on.

The Yejj staff team have been supportive and on board throughout the process. Many will stay with the new organisations, some are moving to other work. Sharon, our amazing Admin & HR Manager, is going back to India to be with her family.

Personally, it will give me the opportunity to use my entrepreneurial skills, organisational experience and in-country knowledge to benefit other organisations and businesses.
I’m genuinely excited, especially that there will be so much opportunity to realise and achieve even more potential in the future.

Trevor Sworn.
Executive Director & Founder.
February 2012.

Changes_at_Yejj_Statement_from_the_Executive_Director_February_2012.pdf

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