Tech enthusiast and man of many talents, Chris Bruchhausen is the founder & CEO at Strove – an activity-based mobile rewards application that empowers organisations to inspire their employees, clients and members to live a healthy and active life. No stranger to the benefits of an active lifestyle himself, he is a high-level triathlete and Ironman competitor.
Chris shares, “We built Strove as a platform that we are offering to companies with the primary purpose of helping them improve the physical and mental well-being of their staff. The idea was born a couple of months into COVID, when we realized that there was going to be increasing pressure placed on employers to make sure that they were taking care of the physical and mental well-being of their employees. Given the work environment that we find ourselves in with people working from home, there’s no real distinction between work and personal life anymore. Generally, for the most part, people kind of deprioritised taking care of their well-being. Obviously, that has a bunch of spillover effects at a company level. What we tried to do is offer a product to companies that they, in turn, can offer to their employees that attempts to drive them towards the right kind of lifestyle behaviour on both the physical and mental fronts.”
With two major partners, one being The Delta which is a venture builder, Chris was able to take Strove very swiftly from the idea phase into commercialisation. He shares, “That touches on a variety of things – everything from software development to product management to marketing to growth. There’s a variety of things that come with that. So it really helps you to fast-track taking a product to market and commercialising a product. To try and hire software engineers and a whole team and convince people to leave their existing companies to join a start-up without even having a product in the market would have been incredibly difficult. So the easiest route for us to go was to partner with a company like The Delta.” This helped him to make headway in a very short period of time.
The other mutually beneficial partnership that Chris struck up was with YoYo, integrating the solution onto their platform. Sometimes entrepreneurs are hesitant to share their ideas with others, arguing that there will be more financial rewards later down the line if they were to build it out internally within their team. On this topic, Chris says, “It generally takes an army to build a start-up from scratch. So, to take the approach of keeping everything to yourself is probably not the best way to go. But, with that being said, you obviously don’t just want to go and tell every person on the street about the business that you’re wanting to build, because it is possible that you tell someone who has the capability to go and build that business themselves. You really need to use your own judgement. I do think that partnering with people or companies that could enable you both as a person and as a business to create a lot of leverage, is a favourable route to go.”
“For instance, there are a number of companies now with a primary product in the market that is just infrastructure and API’s (Application Programming Interfaces). So you can go and partner with these companies and take off-the-shelf products and integrate them with your product and set up a fintech business in a matter of weeks, as opposed to having to build out a complete infrastructure yourself. So that’s what we did with YoYo. They’ve got a rewards issuing and redemption engine that we integrated with, and it enabled us to offer rewards to our users from a whole bunch of different retailers and merchants based in South Africa.”
Recently having raised four million rands in a seed-funding round to scale the company, the inevitable questions come up – what funding do you need to seek out? And at what point? Chris remarks, “It depends on the kind of business that you’re trying to build. If you’re building a software product, for the most part, you can probably bootstrap at least until the MVP stage. If you don’t have the ability to do that, I don’t think it’s worthwhile going and raising capital before you’ve got a functional product in the market. If you don’t have a product, it’s going to be very difficult to raise money. And if you are able to raise money, you’re going to be giving away a lot more of your business upfront.” Furthermore, Chris highlights that raising capital takes an immense amount of time out from your day – as you constantly speak to investors.
On the topic of figuring out how much money to raise, he notes that you’re putting together a large amount of data, collaborating financial forecasts and so on. “In my opinion,” he says, “If you’re doing a seed round of funding, try and plan to at least have the capital for one-and-a-half to two years, and then, at the end of that period, you’re going to look into a series A round of funding. I think that timeframe format gives you enough time to integrate and really push your focus onto your business for 12-14 months.”
Along with that, it is also important to validate what you are busy with. “Early validation is super powerful,” Chris states, “And by that, I mean building a product, and getting people to pay for it. As soon as someone is willing to pay for your product, that’s a ton of validation in and of itself. Especially on the B2B side of things it generally takes a lot longer to get a client on board and to get them actually paying for your product.”
In Chris’ view, there is no step-by-step methodology or science to starting a business.“Every business is so unique. But there are obviously common themes amongst all the different businesses. One is making sure that you hire the right people internally, especially at the early stages. The first 10 employees that you bring on board will shape the culture of your company for the foreseeable future. So it’s really important that you make sure that you bring the right team on board. In conjunction with that, if you’re going to raise capital making sure that you bring the right investors on board. If you bring in an investor who isn’t aligned with the vision of the company and is going to be difficult to work with, it’s going to make things far harder for you because you’re going to have someone breathing down your neck all the time, trying to dictate how you should run the business. I would say that the focus needs to be on the people and making sure that you’re bringing the right people on board – and everything will kind of flow off the back of that.”
When asked if he feels his age is a factor that works out in his favour, Chris says that he believes that it does give him an edge: “For the most part, I would say it’s an advantage. Maybe not necessarily in the eyes of other people, but from my own personal perspective. At my age, we generally have less life responsibilities, so we can focus entirely on just building the company. Someone who may be a little bit older and has a family has obviously got other responsibilities.” Along with perhaps fewer life responsibilities, he says, “I think some people would have a preference for working with younger people because you bring in a younger energy, you’re willing to work long hours. A bunch of positive traits come with that.”
With the youthful energy, Chris highlights how other life experiences can translate into entrepreneurship – drawing on his mental fortitude in endurance sports “If you’ve learned how to really push yourself for an extended period of time, being super, super uncomfortable on a physical level, your ability to withstand some level of discomfort will be translated into business. Obviously, you would never ever experience that level of discomfort sitting at your desk, but a similar principle and concept applies – especially when you are constantly feeling like it’s an uphill battle.”
For those who are excited to define their own life goals and start a successful business, identifying the right niches, understanding when to seek funding and how to go about that, along with being able to validate your products/services becomes invaluable. This is where the USB-ED Young Minds Programme comes in. This programme is tailored to help you create your own career opportunities, with guided life direction, while equipping you with the necessary business skills required to become a highly successful entrepreneur. To find out more about this programme, click here.
To watch the full interview with Chris Bruchhausen, click here.
Sinenhlanhla “Sne” Mthembu is a truly inspiring woman. As the founder and director of Passcara & Partners, based in Kwa-Zulu Natal, she is quite possibly one of the youngest women to ever start a law firm in South Africa. If that wasn’t enough, you’ll also find her creating content at any opportunity she can – as this YouTube queen has over 40,000 subscribers tuning in for lifestyle and beauty vlogs on her channel! Sinenhlanhla is an individual who is both shaping the future of South Africa, and inspiring others to do the same.
When starting her firm, she outlines the direction that she decided to take it in. “When I was still employed, I did a lot of criminal work,” she says. “It just wasn’t sitting well with me. So when I started my own practice, I decided that I’m not going to go the criminal route. Instead, we focus on civil matters – divorces, drafting of contracts, deceased estates, and so on.”
Running a law firm, as well as having released over 70 YouTube blogs – one of which has over 140,000 views – Sinenhlanhla doesn’t see herself as an influencer. Rather, she prefers the title of digital content creator, saying, “I share lifestyle content and I love communicating with my followers and subscribers. I enjoy getting a feel of what they expect from me, and engage with them.” With both of these commitments, she shares her favourite hacks for managing her time. “I’m optimistic,” she says. “But my profession pays my bills, and naturally I’ll gravitate to focusing most of my energy on it. But I also love vlogging, I love content creation. It’s literally something that I can wake up and do every day, without a doubt. What helps me the most is that I jot everything down. Literally, every night before I go to bed, I need to know what I’m doing – both on the legal side, and on my content page. I do work with brands now, and brands have deadlines. They want you to produce certain content at a certain time. I’ve then got my clients in the legal department that I also need to get the files for, go to court and so on. So I need to be prepared the night before, outlining what I’m going to be doing legally, and what I’m going to be doing social media-wise for the coming day.”
Such organisational skills were honed in the variety of side hustles which sustained Sinenhlanhla in the time leading up to starting Passcara & Partners ranging from a makeup company to an events company. “To be honest, I was fumbling through the whole thing – I didn’t know what I was doing!” she says frankly. “But I think it helps to start young, because you generally make a lot of mistakes as an entrepreneur, and then you’re going to learn from those mistakes.”
“One thing I learned was patience,” Sinenhlanhla continues. “You need a lot of patience in business. It’s not going to happen tomorrow, it’s not going to happen next week – whatever you want is not going to happen immediately – which is something that I struggled with a lot. I think most of us want to make the money, and we see “Oh! Sne is doing this – let me also do this!” without doing the proper research to find out what it is that you can and cannot do. And then there is discipline. I think my events company was the one that taught me a lot of discipline. Working with a lot of people teaches you discipline, and it forces you to be patient.
So, indirectly, the mistakes that I made landed me where I am. I’m still making mistakes, but it’s just that I’ve learned from my past ones, and I’m not making the same ones that I used to make.”
Common mistakes that Sinenhlanhla has seen young entrepreneurs make involve the need for instant gratification, and instantly making it big. She shares, “There’s nothing wrong with starting small. And there’s nothing wrong with dreaming big – I’m not saying you shouldn’t dream big. But what I’ve seen is that so often we want to start big from the get-go. I feel like we set unrealistic goals for ourselves, which leads us to disappointing ourselves.”
“For instance, when I started with Passcara and Partners, I started during COVID. I already had this fancy office that I was renting out, but then with COVID happening, I realised that I wasn’t going to the office anymore or utilising the space but I was still paying the rent. It got to the point where I realised that if I rented out a one-room office, it was still going to be fine. I could’ve started small, and I wouldn’t have wasted so much money on office space.” Now Sinenhlanhla works mostly from home, and has a dedicated consultancy space which she rents – and for now that suits the company’s needs. “ I feel like I’m in a position that I am comfortable. Everybody’s gravitating towards working from home, but I feel like the type of business that I am in will, at some point, require me to go back to an office full time. But I will do that at my own pace and my own discretion – when it makes sense for me basically.”
On the topic of female entrepreneurship in South Africa, Sinenhlanhla shares that, “Even currently, there’s not a lot of us trying to do it – but it’s better than what it was years ago, especially in the position that I’m in. It’s still a struggle. We are still looked down upon slightly. It’s very rare to find a female-owned firm. But now, people like us are showing the people that follow us that if I can do it, you can definitely do it. It gives others that insight. We engage with people, and we tell them how hard it is, and how worth it is in the end. It gives others that push and that drive to say that I also want to do that. And it’s limited to reaching just those people who follow – I remember sitting in an ENCA interview and having the interviewer tell me ‘You know, I’m in my 40’s and I am being inspired by someone who is 25.’ So it does not necessarily mean that you’re inspiring and pushing young people – there are also certain people, especially older people who at a particular time felt that they could not do it. They now see younger people doing it, and remember the dream that they had in the back of their minds, and they’ll dust it off and put it into realisation. I think it’s a matter of people realizing that if these young women entrepreneurs are doing it, then definitely I can also do it.”
Her advice to young entrepreneurs is simple: “I always say just go for it! And if you don’t take the risk, you never know. You’re basically never going to know if you don’t take the risk, and you have nothing to lose if you do take the risk. It’s about time that you take your plans that you have in your mind and put them into realization. If you don’t, somebody who’s already got that idea is going to use it before you do and then you’re going to feel like you shot yourself in the foot. So you might as well just start. Something to consider is to do the research. I always, always, speak about research. You can have all the money, you can literally have all the funds to start a business, but if you haven’t done the research, it’s not going to work out.”
Furthermore, making use of what one already has is invaluable – even if it is a following on social media. “I’ve created a community with my followers, especially on Instagram I engage very well with them. They trust me and my judgement on certain things. And in return, I can capitalize on that – because at the end of the day I think everybody’s out to make the money. If you can use your community. And then, indirectly capitalize that or use that similar technique in business, it’s definitely going to help.”
Being able to take calculated risks, learning from your mistakes and keeping your goals in mind are all invaluable skills to becoming a successful entrepreneur. The USB-ED Young Minds Programme is tailored to help you to create your own career opportunities, with guided life direction, while equipping you with the necessary business skills required to become highly successful. To find out more about this programme, click here.
General manager, Carl Erickson had studied at a few institutions over the years. Enrolling for the Senior Management Development Programme (SMDP), he notes that while he had been fortunate to have experienced speedy progression in his career, he felt he had not allotted enough time to grow into his new roles. This, he says, “Left a few gaps in my knowledge base which I was eager to fill.”
He continues, “When the world was suddenly brought to a standstill by the COVID-19 pandemic, I realized that there would be a significant shift in how leadership plans, communicates and leads. After much research I felt that the USB-EDSMDP offered the tools I required to level up as a leader.”
“The USB-EDSMDP gave me the tools to think strategically within my role while capturing a global perspective. It has broadened my view on teamwork and team development which is imperative to apply in the new age of leadership of our human assets. It encompassed a career adaptation shift from an African-continent-perspective to a global one.”
He continues, “The SMDP helped in providing me with a zoomed-out world view by introducing me to relevant and impactful aspects of business and leadership. The class structure and invigorating workshops produced practical references with opportunities to develop a sound understanding of what is required from leadership during the unchartered pandemic period and beyond.”
“The most rewarding lesson for me was being afforded the experience to engage and nurture dynamic relationships with a myriad of diverse individuals,” he says. He had many highlights on the course, but mentions two that stood out for him. The first, he says, was “The vast, real-life, and global knowledge and experience shared. And the program team of administrators, coordinators and professors were simply world-class!”
The second, he shares, was “The advanced and practical leadership knowledge and personally enriching experiences with classmates encouraged me to want to share this experience with others.”
Upon completing the course, he found that he had not only gained applicable depth of knowledge, but also a more global approach. “The real-world success and practical dissemination of the shared information made the SMDP a tremendously enriching experience,” he says. “The group and class diversity – not only in terms of culture and background but also in industry and leadership experience – made it all the more possible to explore advanced and practical business knowledge. This was a leap in personal development for me.”
In conclusion, he shares that, “The SMDP has sharpened the spearhead of my personal and professional growth while also increasing the hunger to take the next step on the path of learning. USB-ED stands out to me for the knowledgeable and experienced team of administrators, coordinators and professors.”
For further information about upcoming SMDP courses, click here.
“Innovation is a seed to economic development. You have direct jobs being created by entrepreneurs and startups – and these contribute significantly to our GDP. One of the things that don’t get factored in is the indirect jobs and the new markets that they create.” – Daniel Novitzkas.
Without a doubt one of the most experienced young entrepreneurs in the country right now, Daniel Novitzkas is the founder and Managing Director of Specno – a group of innovation specialists, who assists founders with turning their ideas into industry-leading companies. Recently recognised as one of South Africa’s top app development and user experience agencies, they have scaled from two to thirty employees within two years.
As part of the Young Minds series, USB-ED spoke with Daniel about his journey. He shares: “After taking a trip to Silicon Valley and realising you know how much innovation was coming out of a small 25-mile radius, I began to look at what the key ingredients were that made up the valley – and recognised that South Africa has so many of those key ingredients here. We have the potential to start high-level growth tech ventures. But I think one of the main things that we’re missing is the knowledge gap and then obviously the execution gap that comes with that. And so, Specno is what I like to call a venture capitalist where we essentially help entrepreneurs start their ventures, and then have built-up frameworks for success that take them from A to Z.”
When asked if there is a step-by-step formula to creating a successful startup, Daniel acknowledges that “There’s no cookie-cutter approach, but there are certain patterns that you can pull out when looking at what makes a successful startup.” Within Silicon Valley, Daniel says he noted that, for the most part, it operates in a “fail-fast” approach. “They’re pumping a bunch of money in and they’re seeing what the founders can do with that growth. Then they’re giving their attention to the ones that show the most potential. But if you can capture those lessons along the way and open-source them, then I believe that you can set up guidelines for success. Ultimately, it is on the founding team to ensure that the thing will be successful. You know, people like to say there’s no such thing as a bad idea – but it’s really the team at the end of the day that will take an idea, and pivot it until they find a product-market fit. And then from there, you should be able to build a company.”
When asked what role companies play in shaping the future of our country, Daniel sagely states: “Innovation is a seed to economic development. You have direct jobs being created by entrepreneurs and startups – and these contribute significantly to our GDP. One of the things that don’t get factored in is the indirect jobs and the new markets that they create.” Using Apple as an example, Daniel shared that he sees them as just a high-growth tech startup. Illustrating the impact that such startups can have, he reminds us of the hundreds to thousands of people who were employed by them to create the iPhone when it was developed.
Not only was there job creation, but there was also market creation – something that meant that millions of developers, all over the world, could create a business from their garage to tap into. “In the past, people were scared that this whole Fourth Industrial Revolution was going to destroy jobs. But it’s disrupting jobs, it’s creating jobs, all the time. If you rely only on corporations, some factors are slowed down by bureaucracy, and you’re going to see tiny amounts of innovation being released. But entrepreneurs move at a different speed, and so they’re able to leapfrog over problems, barriers to entry, and regulations. Most of the time entrepreneurs release innovation.”
“Until you actually launch to the market, everything is just an assumption,” shares Daniel. “But the more information that you can gather before you launch, obviously, the better the design solution is going to be. And then after you have that down, then it’s a case of how quickly can you build out an MVP or a prototype to actually test this traction – while at the same time, realising that after you’ve proven your traction the only way you’re going to succeed in a high-growth tech venture is to have your next steps already planned out. With each step of the way you almost need to be thinking of the next leg of the journey.” Utilising this frame of mind, Specno was able to grow from a team of two, into a team of approximately thirty employees in a very short space of time – a mere two years.
“One of the things that I did get right from a very early stage of starting was recognising how much more there was to know – and just being vulnerable with the fact that I was starting out, that I was young, that I was looking for help,” he shares.
“I would contact my biggest competitors, I would speak to their CEOs and I’d be like, ‘Look, I’m really struggling, can you give me some pointers?’ I’m always blown away by what people are willing to share with me, even knowing that I’m a competitor! I think people are incredibly generous with their knowledge, especially when it’s just like older-mentor versus younger-apprentice. From that perspective, age is certainly a door-opener that you can definitely use to your advantage.”
“Another one of the major things was finally picking up a book,” he shares. “I had gone through my whole life without ever being willing to read a book. And then, when starting out, I realised how much I don’t know. For the first time, I was like ‘Wow! Reading is amazing!’ I can figure out so much about the future just by reading about what other people have gone through. The books were allowing me enough context for an engaging conversation with somebody, which was teaching me how to grow a company. Before I started, I never picked up a book and never read anything.”
“Then when I was starting, one of the big things was that I moved in with my co-founder. At that point, typically, I was a bit of a late-riser. I would go to bed after midnight and I would typically try to wake up after nine. My co-founder convinced me that we should be hitting the gym at six, so that we can get to the office by seven, and then we can do our graft before any of the other staff come in. That way we would have some quiet time that could be put towards learning or doing some work. Waking up at six became a key part of my learning and my routine because I would search for a sort of a topic that I was wanting to upskill in and learn about – typically it would be an area of business that I was nervous about. Due to my inexperience, it meant that I was going to make mistakes. So before I even started the book, I knew that I wanted to listen to the book – I’d read the summaries, and so that morning routine became part of the information I was consuming. So either at the gym, or in the evening while I was washing the dishes, I realised that that was when I could plug in and listen to content.”
Feeding your mind, and continually learning is something that Daniel advocates strongly for. Ultimately, knowledge is power. By increasing your knowledge, you are able to create steps to turning your business idea into a real business. Coupled with asking for assistance to ensure that you surround yourself with the right support, you set yourself up to turn your entrepreneurial dreams into your reality. The USB-EDYoung Minds’ Programme is tailored to help you create your own career opportunities, with guided life direction, while equipping you with the necessary business skills required to become a highly successful entrepreneur. To find out more about this programme, click here.
“As a country HR manager for the organisation that I work for,” shares Quinton Tike, from Woolworths, Division 5 Botswana, “We had found it fit to further develop and equip our management. We looked around for training that would be a big value-add in terms of content and tenacity to develop our managers in this robust retail industry. So we shopped around, and we identified the USB-EDManagement Development Programme (MDP) as a programme that really met our needs. We made contact and everything went smooth. From then onwards it was blissful, no hiccups, nothing. The service is excellent.”
The key things that drew Quinton to this course revolved around what was covered in the syllabus. “While looking at the programme content from USB-ED, we saw that it had finance in it – which is very key for any manager in any organisation. It had the technology, in terms of system integration or smart systems. And that, for me, is definitely what I was aiming for. In this ever-changing environment, technology is at the forefront, and finance is also at the forefront because we all want to achieve more with less.” Knowing how to do this was among one of his key takeaways from the programme.
He goes on to share, “After the training, there were some noticeable changes in terms of how we carry ourselves as the management. We are more critical in terms of questions. We analyse reports further – we no longer just brush over them. Especially finance records, which for me, is really the main item that came up. So we are now analysing that in-depth. We now have an understanding of what goes on in the budget, we know the cost analysis and so on. So with everything that’s working in our organization, we are more critical. And for me, that’s been a really great takeaway.”
Apart from seeing these noticeable differences, Quinton enjoyed the syndicates and group work within the programme. “The highlight of the MDP is obvious for me – it was the collaboration which we did. The syndicates, the topic, the work that you put into it, the diverse culture of people that you have to make a group with, and come up with a plan for that topic that solves a particular problem – that for me was the biggest highlight of the MDP. And obviously, our group was the best syndicate!”
He shares his reflections upon completing the programme. “The USB-EDMDP is a superb programme for upcoming managers with the need to have rounded insight on what goes into being a manager of good reputation. The programme equips you with a broader financial understanding, critical analysis skills and project management skills – all of which are highly essential skills to have as a manager. I am a more attractive manager for Growth Opportunities within my organisation as well as prospective employers all thanks to MDP Programme”
To anyone thinking of doing the programme, Quinton says, “I’d say to prospective participants – enrol! Do not think twice. USB-EDMDP is the best programme you can do if you want to nurture yourself as a forefront leader, or a forefront manager, or someone who wants to really make a change in an organisation. It will capacitate you with everything that you need, from finance systems, and the general analytical ability of projects in the organisation. Your level of thinking starts to develop in a way that is unsurpassed. For that, I am grateful to have done MDP and I recommend the programme to everybody. It’s excellent!”
For upcoming programmes, find out more information here.
“In order to support the entrepreneurs we worked with, I spent the first 5 weeks of lock-down working 14-hours-a-day, 7-days-a-week to get the business up and running. We launched on the 1st of May 2020 with 75 different products, a warehouse space, an inventory management system and an automated delivery model,” shares Sebastian Daniels, founder and CEO of Ground Culture. With an insatiable drive and focus on linking the formal and informal sectors in South Africa, he undoubtedly pushes the boundaries of the stereotypical image of an entrepreneur. “That’s really where my passion lies,” he says, “In looking at how we transgress the informal economy into the formal economy without changing the informal economy.”
But it wasn’t always like this – having attended a Model-C school, Sebastian initially was taught that the townships are a dangerous place. But with both his parents being journalists, he grew up watching the news every day and attending protests on the weekends, which planted the seeds to his open-minded approach. Instead of seeing doom and gloom, he shares his inspiration, outlining how the anti-Apartheid activist, Steve Biko, put things across: “We need to believe in ourselves, you need to believe in a future, and once we do that, we will be unstoppable.” That’s what triggered him to get out into the township: “I’m going to figure out what the next movement that we can create is, because we’re so pessimistic about South Africa. But the only way we’re going to move forward is if we do so inclusively. What I think we are ignorant of is the fact that we kind of think the world out there is the “formal sector.” But then you realize the informal economy is like 80%, 70% of that. So it really needs to be making an impact. That’s when I decided to go and check out the main spots.”
“It’s a very safe atmosphere, and you start to realize that African culture actually just wants to protect the people that are coming to visit. I think that’s my biggest learning and the informal economies. People are very prominent, it’s a booming, efficient system that people don’t really understand – and that scares them. But once you go into the informal economy, people welcome you with open arms, they will teach you about the way they do things and the success stories. Understanding where the informal economy exists, and figuring out how we formalize it in a way that doesn’t change it is important. African systems are beautiful, and I believe that by having a way we can formalize them is a way of changing the world – within it, everyone supports everyone, and that’s what the world needs. We tend to be more individualistic, but I believe the informal economy – especially African systems as a whole – have a way of teaching the world about looking after each other. That’s really what inspires me.” As a practical example of this, Ground Culture aims to reinvest 10% of their profits back into the entrepreneurs that they work with, pioneering a new system of doing things in the process. “The idea behind me investing reinvesting profits,” says Sebastian, “Is actually more to build a fund that allows entrepreneurs access to an inventory capital that they can then repay.” Oftentimes in the informal sectors, there is a lack of initial capital to kick things off. By creating a system that inherently meets that need, with the understanding that the funds will be paid back by the entrepreneur in the future when their endeavours are reaping rewards, develops a far more circular and sustainable model.
“The reason I focus on profit as the most important aspect,” says Sebastian, “Is because you need to have a sustainable way of giving back. You know, we’ve seen over the course of COVID and through lockdown the amount of NGOs that have had to close because they’ve lost their funding. That’s been detrimental for society because a lot of people have come to live and survive on the handouts of NGOs and from the government. But that’s not a sustainable way of building anything. What we need to start doing is finding ways of identifying key township initiatives, identify entrepreneurs, and we need to find a way to redirect our profits to them, so that they can go and they can build businesses that create jobs and create systems that support and inspire healthy living. This can push cash into a new economy.”
Using the example of Ground Culture, Sebastian explains the importance of creating more circular systems that are able to sustain their efforts – and focusing less on the older, more outdated systems that are currently in place. “We need to be finding ways to build cyclical systems that make sure that the money invested in the informal sector comes back to the informal sector. That’s the thing with our team, since we’re helping these entrepreneurs, their businesses are going to grow their products, and they’re going to improve their brands, and that’s all going to help us as Ground Culture – because our success is hinged on the fact that we have good quality products, great entrepreneurs and great stories. And by reinvesting in those entrepreneurs, we are effectively investing in ourselves. And that’s why I say, focus on profits.”
“Social entrepreneurship can be misguided sometimes. I think people get too much onto the side of an NGO or hand-out based approach – becoming too obsessed with the social factor of social entrepreneurship. But when building a social business, you really have to focus on profit first and then people, and then the planet. Because without profit, you cannot build a business.”
Placing profit at the forefront, Sebastian was running a company called Coffee Shop Blues up until February 2020 which distributed 20 locally made products to more than 75 coffee shops in Cape Town. With the abrupt onset of lock-down, all these coffee shops had to close their doors, some temporarily and some permanently. Realising very quickly that he had stock to shift and people relying on him, Sebastian took the opportunity to pivot his efforts – adjusting his pricing on his existing stock, sending his stock list to friends on WhatsApp, and getting a permit to allow him to make deliveries of groceries during that time.
Taking initiative and putting your energies into the execution of ideas is something that Sebastian advocates. “My advice would be just don’t take your startup idea too seriously. Don’t sit there and write a 50-page business plan because it can be a waste of time. Go out and test your products – put a WhatsApp menu together for your products, send it out to your friends and see if people buy it. And if people buy it and run with it, you’ll know it’s worthwhile. But if no one is biting, go into something else, and keep doing it.” Taking such action is not something to be afraid of in Sebastian’s eyes. While it may not turn out as initially expected, you’ll be able to quickly learn and move towards those things that are working. As he mentions, many companies began doing something completely unrelated to what they initially began doing.
This adaptability is something that has stood him in good stead, yet he also highlights the importance of sticking to things and seeing one’s opportunities through. “I think I’ve made that mistake before – where something was growing really quickly and then another little sparkly toy came along and I said, I’m going to try that instead. That means you lose momentum, you know. You want to find something with momentum and stick with it until there’s no more momentum. Then you can adapt your business and look at other sectors.”
And along with the execution of ideas, taking action, creating opportunities and riding with the momentum you generate, one of Sebastian’s most prominent pieces of advice outlines building towards an overall vision, creating something that is sustainable that can be a move towards creating the change you want to see in the world. “This is not something I built for the short run,” he says. “This is something that I see redefining retail and putting the power back in the hands of passionate entrepreneurs that dream of changing the world.”
Having a vision and a dream is something shared by all entrepreneurs. Taking action steps towards turning that into reality is what really makes the difference. Surrounding yourself with the right support and ensuring that you have the tools to carry that dream into your reality is invaluable. The USB-ED Young Minds Programme is tailored to help you to create your own career opportunities, with guided life direction, while equipping you with the necessary business skills required to become a highly successful entrepreneur. To find out more about this programme, click here.
Initially, he felt a little uncertain about enrolling. He shares exclusively with USB-ED that, “At first, I was a bit hesitant and procrastinating, thinking that the programme would be a bit too overwhelming. I was under the impression that enrolling for the SMDP would be at my own expense. This fuelled my hesitation and all these factors made me contemplate. But, with the support of my lovely wife and her continuous motivation, when the time came to act, I needed to ensure that by doing this course, I was not wasting time and that I would grow in my thinking as a result.”
Going into the course, he shares that his main expectation of the SMDP was to broaden his business knowledge in all aspects, establish management theories and a strong leadership foundation. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the course was adjusted to align with the stipulated protocol, and included virtual learning. For Ingo, this format was enjoyable. “The immersive, interactive suite of virtual learning mirrors a classroom experience and the direct, real-time engagement with and personalized feedback from seasoned peers, and course facilitators. The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and related lockdown and physical distancing measures caused not only unprecedented disruption in the provision of education and training but also catalysed innovation in distance learning. Organisations may or may not have the ability to invest in leadership development right now, yet they need effective leaders to stay competitive in this season of volatility. The SMDP remote learning has been an eye-opener into the world of strategic theory, planning, thinking and application to say the least.”
His overall comment on the program was that “The SMDP programme provided a great opportunity to enhance my management and leadership skills, and boosted my confidence. I was able to learn managerial and leadership principles that I could confidently use and tackle work-related obstacles within my workplace. Furthermore, I strongly feel that the leadership and management skills covered during the SMDP have been invaluable in reaching my career goals. They have, so far, provided many opportunities to enhance my employability as well to further my studies.”
“The course made it understandable that leaders need to practice leadership, develop their growth mindset and not just assume the role and title. As such, the SMDP course inspired me. It helped me to break down certain mental barriers in my thinking and gave me a new perspective, while instilling confidence in my approach.”
Ingo encourages those who are interested in doing the course, especially within the current economic and global climate. “Organizations are being exposed to a completely new way of working and learning,” he shares, “And the SMDP will empower you with the appropriate tools to execute various ways of improving operational effectiveness, a deeper understanding of change in terms of complexity and its potential impact to systems and environments and to build more effective teams.”
For further information about upcoming SMDP programmes, click here.
“When I came to Cape Town, I had the same issue that every out-of-town student has – how the heck do I find student accommodation?! It’s so hard!”
Identifying this as a problem that could be solved by matching up landlords with students seeking accommodation, Port-Elizabeth-born Alexandria Procter founded DigsConnect in 2017 – an online student housing marketplace. Since then, the company has raised over R14 million rand to date, and was lauded with the award for the Top Property Technology Company in Africa for 2020 – no small feat when their target market of university students shifted to more remote learning in the midst of the global pandemic!
Born in Port Elizabeth, Alexandria attended boarding school in Grahamstown. Before starting university, she spent a year travelling solo in India, South East Asia, the USA, South America and the UK. Upon her return, she began her Bachelor of Science . “Unless you know someone, or you bump into someone in a lecture, or you post on a WhatsApp group, or you’re looking at posters on walls, it’s really hard to find good, safe accommodation,” she shared with USB-ED. “You get scammed on some dodgy websites, or there are landlords that don’t want students, or you can’t really see what the room looks like or if it has WiFi. On a bigger scale in South Africa, there’s a huge lack of infrastructure and housing on campuses. There are huge chunks of students with no formalised housing for them.”
During her undergraduate degree, she became a student leader on the Student Representative Council and began dealing first-hand with hundreds of students looking for help to find accommodation while they were studying. “Landlords would call me and say they had spare rooms, vacancies, beds to fill and wanted to know how to advertise these rooms to the students,” she shared. “Thus, DigsConnect was born, as an online marketplace to match up sellers (landlords) with buyers (students).”
DigsConnect essentially aims to solve just this one point. While it may seem like a simple, straightforward thing to be doing, when she got stuck into it she found that it was leading into far broader and deeper aspects than she initially thought – something that has motivated her on her journey as an entrepreneur. This is something that Alexandria shares has been important to her entrepreneurial journey – having a passion and a fascination for solving a key issue.
“Just solving that key problem of how to connect landlords to students has become my life’s obsession at the moment! I spend a lot of my time thinking about how to solve this one, seemingly basic problem! But as you dive deeper and deeper into it, it becomes more complicated. As you go deeper and deeper into it, you find so many more problems that you can untap and uncover with this. So essentially, it’s become finding a way to facilitate this experience in the best way we possibly can.”
After outlining the problem, Alexandria touches on the fact that you don’t need to have an extensive range of complex resources to get going as an entrepreneur. Start with what you have, and do what you can. She candidly shares that it was ‘knocked up over a weekend’ with a bit of coding and a purchased domain: “I was originally matching up landlords and students manually but I realised it would be much easier if I just knocked together a little website where people could connect by themselves without having to go through me. Over a weekend I bought the domain and coded a simple website where you could list accommodation and search for accommodation.”
“Another good example of this,” she shares, “Is how Door Dash started in the States. Their entire website was just a PDF. You could download it. That was it! That was the MVP and I love that! It was their site validating if they had a market for this. So I could build a really low fidelity product and start testing it out and start getting some early traction. And this was before I even really understood what these words meant. It was basically just very intuitive. The service is needed, and it’s solving this problem that me and my friends were facing.”
To get things off the ground, after identifying the problem and generating a solution, Alexandria recalls how she went about getting her first clients. “I can very clearly recall this,” she says. I used to go to digs parties and market at digs parties – and I was that person! When everyone was there to hang out, I’d bring out some flyers and ask them if they’d heard about DigsConnect. I even went to Plett Rage to do some marketing, I was shamelessly marketing!”
With landlords, she took a more innovative approach – thinking out the box, she would scroll through the classifieds section on websites and would cold call everyone. Quite frankly, she says, “Cold calls kind of suck, right?! It’s really hard making cold calls! Greg Ramsay-Keal (my business partner) and I would sit there and psych each other up before phone calls and practice with each other. And everyone hates getting cold calls and sales calls. It’s like the person on the other end of the line knows you’re wanting to sell them something. The first few are really hard, and you learn by doing it. That’s the only way. The first ten are going to suck. The first hundred are going to suck. You’re going to feel like an idiot, you’re going to mess it up. People are going to have issues with you, people are going to block your number. But then you get the hang of it. You learn what to say and what not to say. You develop an intuition for it. You learn when to do your value offering, when to do your pitch, when to pull back, when to sell harder. For instance, now, when I do cold calls, I just pick the phone up and I go for it.”
This forms part of the key components that have been integral to her success as an entrepreneur: tenacity, an attitude of “just going for it,” and overall – creating a meaningful life. “I think the important thing is that the only way you’re going to know if something will work is by doing it. Entrepreneurship, and ‘foundership’ in a way, gets so much hype. It’s so glamorized and ‘celebritilized’ – if that’s even a word! There’s this idea around it… Ultimately, all I can say is just do it for yourself. It’s the only way you can do it. It’s basically an exercise in self-awareness, self-learning and self-growth. And if it is for you, great. And if it’s not for you then also great. It’s about discovering what’s meant for you in life. It’s about living life true to yourself.”
“I’ve realised that what would make life more meaningful, beautiful and worthwhile would be to have a life of service, a life of giving, and a life of doing good. Human connection is why I think we’re here. It’s so beautiful and so profound. There is so much human suffering, and I felt like if I could do something to truly connect with people, truly help people. If I could do something to alleviate suffering in a way and do good in the world and connect with people, across every boundary I could – that would seem like a really beautiful and meaningful life.” In this way, even as an entrepreneur, or someone in business, we can both be doing good and feeling good – using our endeavors as agents of positivity in the world.
As a school-leaver, student or young graduate, one can often have the urge to make a positive difference in the world – being driven, enthusiastic and dynamic. But sometimes it can be confusing to know what to do, how to begin forging your path, or what support is needed. This is where the Young Minds Programme comes in. This programme helps you to create your own career opportunities, with guided life direction, while equipping you with the necessary business skills required to become a highly successful entrepreneur. To find out more about the USB-ED Young Minds Programme, please click here.
Playing a crucial role within the pandemic, Neeshan Ramdin, Laboratory Manager of the National Health Laboratory Services at Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital, undertook the USB Executive DevelopmentSenior Management Development Programme (SMDP) in the midst of the global pandemic.
He shares exclusively with USB-ED that he was not in the most energetic state at the start of the course: “I remember the anxiety I felt when I was considering enrolling on the USB-EDSMDP program due to the exhaustion and burnout suffered from the COVID-19 1st wave. I was not sure that I would cope with the responsibilities of work, personal life and studying.” In such a crucial role within the current atmosphere of the global pandemic, this is a valid point to be taken into account. However, the skills and tools learnt on the programme became even more valuable to Neeshan at this time, as they are designed to be immediately implemented in managerial-level positions within the rapidly changing environment that organisations are being exposed to at the moment.
“As I reflect now after successfully completing the program, I have a much clearer and deeper understanding of “zooming in and zooming out” and the importance of that,” he shares. Within the programme itself, the curriculum encompasses all aspects of management, from assessing and reporting on financial viability, right through to formulating strategies for customer value creation using design thinking, and developing foresight to navigate shifts in organisational forms. Neeshan shares about the most valuable parts of the syllabus for him: “The lessons learned in the modules on Strategy and Innovative & Design Thinking not only enabled me to implement fruitful changes at work but also changes in my day-to-day life which allowed me to also juggle responsibilities successfully during the program duration.”
These take-aways from the course fructified into tangible successes for Neeshan. He shares that “Re-inventing myself as a strategic and innovative leader to my team and organisation has yielded successful results – based on how my department navigated through the COVID-19 testing during the second and third waves when compared to the shortfalls in systems in place during the first wave. I can say with confidence that tools learned from the SMDP theory and practical’s have played a vital role in my work area and will continue to do so in my future ventures.”Best suited for senior managers from any industry, the USB Executive DevelopmentSenior Management Development Programme (SMDP) is especially for those in management positions who are interested in developing a strategic leadership mindset and acquiring the ability to sense and respond to new business models. In a rapidly changing environment, organisations are being exposed to a completely new way of working. Over the course of 6 months, the training within the SMDP empowers participants with a range of skills.
She shares that she was given the opportunity to do the course by her organisation. “As part of my career progression, our management identified me as an individual that they’d like to develop in terms of talent and they pushed me forward for the MDP course. When I was approached about this, I felt honoured by the fact that I had been identified as a leader. Instead of hiding away from it, I could see that they were wanting to equip me with the skill-set to effectively lead the space – especially in e-commerce. This arena is quite a big deal – it’s where the world is going at the moment. So I needed to be able to manage an entire team, understand them better, and utilise their skillset and place them accordingly.”
Going into the programme, she understood that she was looking to deepen her understanding of leadership and working with others. She shares, “ I felt like I needed to better understand people. I also needed to learn how to utilize and optimise their individual skill-sets. I am obviously on track to become a manager and a future leader, so what I needed to take out of the programme was how to work with direct reports, and how to effectively work alongside people from other organisations. One of my development areas is that I have a tendency to take charge too much. I needed to learn to take a step back and to allow others to do the work. I learned that this is, at the core of it, a trust issue. The MDP really gave me the insight that I needed to understand how to allow others to do their jobs and contribute in more effective and encouraging ways. I needed to learn how to let go more and actually hand over more to give others their opportunities to shine!”
The benefits of the course became evident to her quickly. “MDP has not only added value to my role, it has also increased my growth and development in our business and organisation, and how to manage direct reports. I completed MDP last November. In January I had a growing team of direct reports – and I had to manage them. I found I was immediately putting to use all the skills that I had obtained in the MDP, especially the ones I had had the opportunity to hone in on in the Business Driven Action Learning (BDAL) project. That project one was a big one – we had to run with it on our own, with our team members. Within that project, we had to put in place a whole bunch of spreadsheets with macro calculations and how to effectively manage time and progress overall. Since the completion of the course, I’ve utilised all the models – especially the leadership modules in how to effectively drive results in the retail e-commerce space. And the results have been very evident! The skills I’ve acquired have already been used in both my professional and personal life – which if you’d told me that before, I’d have said it’s crazy. It has overflowed into all aspects of my life, especially being a working female and mother (and added to that with the current schooling methods – a teacher from home!)”
Raeesa goes on to share that while her existing skills did assist her, the major highlight for her was honing in on learning more about implementing people skills. “I’m already in marketing, and I’m also in finance. So the marketing module and the finance module – the stuff that I’d previously been exposed to – was quite a strong point for me already. I could bring that as a strength to our BDAL team, which was a highlight for me. But my big take-away from the programme was the leadership and people skills: mostly how best to work with people, and how to implement soft-skills more effectively… With every type of team there are going to be strong links and weak links and struggling links and challenging links. And having the right skill-set, in terms of people-skills, to effectively manage every single person in that team. I learnt so much from MDP in just those 6 months, it was really good learning for me! What happens some of the time is that you are given the skill-set, but then it’s the implementation of that skill-set that is equally more important.”
As a message to those who may be interested in doing the MDP, she shares that, “This course has the ability to incorporate all types of models to achieve being a leader, as well as grow future leaders. It is an exceptionally beneficial course and I would highly recommend it, simply because you have the ability to become a leader yourself and the opportunity to grow future leaders. That’s really been my focus point. Because stuff like marketing, finance and project management, those type of things you can go and study for and you can learn that. Those are very theory-based and you have on-the-job training. But leadership is different. Anybody can be a manager. But not everyone can be a leader. For me, the MDP has really given me the skill set and the tools to become a leader and to also grow future leaders. That for me was the biggest take-out.” It is with this crucial skill that we are able not only to do things ourselves, but also to ensure that we are able to make an impact beyond ourselves – to empower others and to grow them to also realise their own potential too.” Her biggest take away was the skillset to be able to inspire and activate the essence of leadership in other people, and indeed equip them to become leaders in their own right. “It really gave me so many useful insights and tactics. It’s been an investment into the person that I am becoming.”
