Hi! Managers: Alchemise your old iron for a good cause

Some years ago I went to visit a boarding house for deaf and dumb children that we had given computers to. The kids had a "sign nickname" for each other … often mimicking a physical characteristic. My sign name either meant they had seen the old US series "Dallas" and recognised me as one of the ladies in it, or that I had big shoulders. Their nickname for the computer was to hold their arms outstretched to the sky like they had been given the world. Connected to the Internet, that is almost the case!

They showed me what they had learned using the computers and I was absolutely amazed. Kids love the very basic but accessible Microsoft Paint, and can draw incredible pictures with it. However, they had also been playing with PowerPoint and Excel and showed me things I had never seen before. "How long had they had these computers?" I asked. "They arrived on Monday," they said. It was Thursday.

In the central rubbish dump in Jakarta there sits a computer centre built to try to help the scavenger kids come from the dump and learn some computer skills to give them a possibility of another life. One young man, who had quite a reputation as a "difficult child", had really taken to these computers. A year later he was supervising the learning for the other kids, and not long after that had managed to get a job as a computer technician.

When I went to the community centre in Klong Toei, with the Duang Prateep Foundation I noticed that all the very young kids were very determined to borrow our telephones. Once they had them it only took them about five seconds before they could work out where the games were and how to play them - and none of these phones were using Thai-language menus.

In fact, many studies have shown that children and adults who have had less advantage have typically had to become more resourceful and confident just in order to get by and, when presented with a computer, are much more inclined and equipped to learn faster in an experiential way.

There are 10.3 million PCs in Thailand and just under half are in businesses. Probably every company has at least one PC. Perhaps nearly 2 million will be bought this year, with perhaps one- third being for replacement. Most would probably want to find a "formal programme" to donate them to, and therefore do not as there are none I am aware of. So just call a local worthy organisation to give them to; many would even collect them from you. Typically they already have their own way of finding people who can help train and fix the PCs, so don't get too hung up on that. Get the PC's to them, and alchemise your old iron!

ANDREW MCBEAN is senior vice president of DTAC. Follow his article every third Monday of the month.