The motivation behind the ‘Tell Your Story’ series was to find a way to motivate our entrepreneurs to take heart despite the trying times and we thought, “What better way to do this than to get their role models to come and tell them how they are coping with the situation?”
Following our agreement on the future implementation of this idea, we then went on to ask our club members which entrepreneurial personalities they would want to hear from so as to reach out to them and curate sessions whereby our members would have the opportunity to personally hear from them in fairly interactive sessions as well as ask them whatever questions they might have had for them. One of the entrepreneurs whom our club members largely requested for was Ms. Olive Gachara who is the Founder and CEO of Couture Africa Ltd among other ventures and she indeed did end up being our first guest for this series. We held this session on Friday, the 15 th of May and there were a number of key takeaways from the session namely:- Olive described in a lot of detail how she rose to the heights which she has reached; and her story was largely inspiring for a lot of our attendees.
- She also explained a number of challenges that she has experienced in her entrepreneurial journey such as ill talk and ingratitude from naysayers and clearly articulated the optimistic attitude with which one must approach these issues.
- Over and above that, she gave a number of pointers on how entrepreneurs can cope with the challenges that the pandemic is presenting such as by building a structured routine into their lives, spending a lot more time on strategizing on how they will resume their operations post-COVID in a manner that is likely to guarantee success as well as reading and increasing one’s knowledge in pertinence to the sector of business in which they partake.
- In addition to this, she also encouraged women in business not to look at the entrepreneurial field as one which is inherently oppressive towards them but as one in which anyone can make a name for themselves. She insisted that such an attitude was likely to bring about a lot more success as well as opportunities.
- She gave us very useful tips on making a good business pitch (being a judge on the KCB Lions’ Den TV-show) such as:
- Know your idea inside out.
- Be precise and go straight to the point.
- Lay emphasis on how the idea is going to generate a desirable return for the investor etc.
- Lastly, she gave us insights into the current state of the fashion industry as well as what was needed to survive within it. She made it very evident that a lot of international players in the industry are now looking towards Africa as well so this would be a great time for one to make a name for themselves within the industry.
Our entrepreneurs all in all largely appreciated the session and I must say it went quite smoothly and according to plan. The recording for this session can be found on our YouTube Channel.
