iHRIS and eLearning: A New Direction for Capacity-Building

Kabelo Bitsang, iHRIS administrator for the Botswana Ministry of Health, learned to maintain and customize the iHRIS software through studying documentation online, working with CapacityPlus developers both in-country and remotely, and attending a training in Ghana. He came from a Microsoft Windows background and learned to work in a Linux environment, the required operating system for iHRIS. “I mostly learned from trial and error and just asking as many questions as possible,” he noted in a recent interview.

Many countries, like Botswana, are adopting CapacityPlus’s Open Source iHRIS Manage and iHRIS Qualify software and have successfully modified the software to meet their specific needs. CapacityPlus, along with other IntraHealth International-led projects, provides assistance to several of these countries to install and adapt the software and develop custom reports. As more countries began to independently implement the software, the iHRIS team identified the need to build in-country skills in the information and communications technology required to administer the software.