Many entrepreneurs are dropouts; even more are involved in businesses that have little to do with what they studied at school. However, this does not mean they are ignorant; they are the type of people that are continually striving to learn new things. We are living in an age of snooze, you lose.
To avoid being obsolete, and to stay ahead of the pack, African entrepreneurs need to keep up to date with market trends, new technologies, and automation systems that can expedite productivity. Without doing this it will be difficult to remain relevant.
Today, the need for the accumulation of knowledge is more pressing than ever before. What you know now is likely to be out of date within a few months.
With this in mind, it is important to ensure you gather all the information you can as often as possible. Without this, you cannot improve your business – and if you are not getting better, you are getting worse.
Competition is voraciously getting better. Whatever business you are in now, you must offer more a year from now to stay competitive.
It is crucial to note that acquiring information alone does not change anything; otherwise everybody would be rich, happy and healthy. Information on its own won’t suffice; it is what you do with the information that will help you achieve your goals.
There are different ways to keep learning, such as short-term training, on-the-job training, long-term training, reading, or sharing ideas with experienced people. Keep in mind that education is not a one-off experience, rather an ongoing process.
Successful entrepreneurs attach themselves with individuals who either know more than they do or understand things that are in a different field to what they know.
Most entrepreneurs are from the school of hard knocks. We learn through trial and error, from experiences that helped us develop the fortitude to face market-related challenges with unequivocal courage. It builds a spirit inside of us that we use to assure ourselves we will make it no matter what.
According to Brian Tracy, you need to be exposed to new information six times to absorb it at a subconscious level. Once there, you’ll use it automatically.
Mark Lamberti, Founder of Massmart and CEO of Imperial Holdings, has a library at his house. When you talk to Lamberti, he’ll tell you his dedication to learning has been an asset in growing three major African companies, Massmart, Transaction Capital and Imperial Holdings.
Lamberti is not alone. If you visit the wealthiest entrepreneurs in your country, it is likely that each one will have a library at their home. It’s the same with the wealthiest men in the world; Bill Gates and Warren Buffett have an enormous appetite to read.
So, here comes the billion-dollar question: did most wealthy entrepreneurs become successful then buy books, or did they buy books then become successful? I think we know the answer.
One thing I find fascinating about the top entrepreneurs is that they love reading biographies of other successful people, whether in business, sports, politics, or entertainment. Those stories are of great interest to them as long as the person succeeded in spite of the odds stacked against them.
Today, we have a plethora of seminars and conferences – it is useful for an entrepreneur to frequently attend sector-specific events to increase your knowledgebase about your field.
Formal education is often focused on theoretical concepts, instead of being task- or problem-solving orientated; business schools need to work around this. The best institutions invite business leaders to be guest lecturers, or take students on fieldtrips to the best companies that their modules and courses cover.
Continuous learning is key to giving your business an advantage over others. However, true success lies in applying what you have learnt faster than anyone else.

Entrepreneurs and The School Of Hard Knocks

It was a move to South Africa and the boredom of being an employee that spurred Asher Bohbot to head what is today a $1.4-billion information and communications technology company, Enterprise Outsourcing Holdings, popularly known as EOH.
Born in Morocco, the 61-year-old chief executive moved to South Africa at the age of 27.
He had been living in Israel at the time when a friend suggested they travel to South Africa for two weeks.
“I asked what is South Africa. I didn’t know about South Africa at the time. I came, but he didn’t come. He dropped me at the last minute. I knew nothing about the place [Johannesburg]; that two weeks turned into longer than that,” he says.
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“I behaved for the first week or so as a tourist in Johannesburg. I took a bus down to a museum and there I saw this girl who shared a flat with me in Israel. I didn’t know she was here.”
They took the bus to her home where Bohbot met her husband. A few minutes later a friend of theirs came to visit. He said he came from Israel to recruit industrial engineers for his business. Bohbot went for the interview and decided he’d work there for a short while. He worked at Laminate Industries (later to be part of the PG Group) as an industrial engineering manager in 1981 and started moving up the ranks, becoming General Manager and later Executive Director of Distribution of the main board of PG Bison.
Throughout his career, he was exposed to general business leadership, business systems and supply chain logistics, but the work became unfulfilling and boring for a man in his late twenties. He had had an affinity to system processes and this spurred Bohbot to start something from scratch.
The business idea came at 3AM one morning. He drew a picture charting how he thought this company would work. That drawing lies in his offices in Bedfordview, just outside Johannesburg. At the time, he wanted his business to bridge the gap in the information technology sector. EOH has stuck to its foundation.
But Bohbot doesn’t see himself as the classical entrepreneur, especially since he worked for the same company for 17 years before starting EOH.
“I don’t believe entrepreneurs reside only as little start-up guys working from a garage. Entrepreneurs exist within a company where they can influence capacity, to do things greater than an individual or entrepreneur can make on life or society,” he says.
“The notion that a corporate is anti-entrepreneurship is wrong. It’s the culture and nature of the business that dictates it. But we somehow take it that the corporate is the opposite of entrepreneurship.”
This chief executive says that EOH tries to embrace both. He says it’s worked so far and he believes it will similarly work like that in the future.
“Entrepreneurship, in our definition, is the ability to have one head and one brain that manages demand and supply.”
EOH is a firm with offices in cities in South Africa as well as 30 other locations across the continent. The business provides consulting technology and outsources solutions from the continent and Britain, operating in infrastructure, software and services segments.
His first client was his employer at the time, PG Bison, and 17 years later they remain so.
The business is one of the largest IT firms in the country and is set on growing. It listed on Africa’s biggest bourse, the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in 1998. At the time, the listing was done to create more awareness rather than making money. Today, EOH is a $1.4-billion company with revenues around $610 million, and employing over 8,000 people. The company is making good progress in expanding elsewhere in Africa and now has a presence in 29 countries. Its success can be attributed to its winning formula for acquisitions which has been carefully structured.
“We want to grow, be bigger and we want to develop. The bigger we are, the more influence we will have and also have a positive impact on our environment. Growth is paramount for us,” he says.
In 2014, Bohbot was named Business Leader of the Year at CNBC Africa’s All Africa Business Leadership Awards (ABLAA’s) for his success and bold contribution to solutions-based business and IT strategies. Over the years he has also won numerous awards which he says are merely recognition for the work EOH does.
Had Bohbot not gone to the museum, he could have boarded a different bus and led a different life.

The Bus That Led To  A Billion-Dollar Business

In a bid to preserve Africa’s customs and beliefs, a fourth-generation clan chief of a village in rural Cameroon, Gaston Donnat Bappa, launched the African Traditions Online Encyclopaedia (Atoe) at eLearning Africa’s ninth conference in Uganda.
Bappa says that Africa has more than 2,000 languages, but a language dies every two weeks in the world and faster on the continent. With this in mind, the aim is to put every single tradition from each country online.
The chief’s project is one of many that were presented at eLearning Africa, which draws more than 1,500 participants and speakers from the information, communication and technology sector across the continent.
eLearning is the use of technology to communicate, develop and exchange knowledge. This has noticeable benefits for Africa.
A combination of education and technology is a powerful driver for growth on the continent. The prospects for African education will increasingly depend on good communication and connectivity.
Harold Elletson, editor of the eLearning Africa Report 2014 says eLearning is making a huge difference, and not only in education.
“It is a key factor in African economic growth and the potential for that growth as well,” he says.
The report includes analysis of the tourism, health and agriculture sectors and a guide to 55 eLearning African initiatives. It says 50% of the world’s population lives in rural areas. In Africa, it is 70%.
“These are the poorest, least educated and most disadvantaged. This population survives nearly exclusively on agricultural activity,” writes Bappa in the report.
“All studies have concluded that rural populations are also those with the least access to ICTs and the advantages they offer.”
Today, many farmers use their cellphones to get information on market prices and are able to adjust their prices accordingly to ensure maximum profits. Nakaseke Telecentre in Uganda introduced an SMS service which works on low-end cellphones and smartphones. The application updates farmers on prices and weather.
“The agriculture sector employs 65-70% of the African workforce. It accounts for about a third of the continent’s GDP. There is a fast-growing regional food market which is being fueled by population growth and rapid urbanization,” said African Union’s Agriculture Commissioner, Rhoda Peace Tumusiime.
Digital literacy campaigns and computer skills training are helping farmers become more efficient in increasing sales, getting bigger yields and managing their land better.
Aida Opoku-Mensah, director of ICT, Science and Technology Division of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, writes that technology has transformed the education sector globally.
According to the 2011-2016 Regional Forecast and Analysis by Ambient Insight, a market research firm, eLearning covers just over 15% of education in 16 African countries with revenues reaching $250.9 million in 2011 and will more than double to $512.7 million in 2016.
Africa must develop its own education content and distribute it to learners. In Kenya, a Kindle for Schools project was launched in 2013. With 3G coverage, solar charged e-readers have helped improve the resources available to teachers.
Governments and private institutions need to work together implementing projects. Senegal leads with an eLearning growth of 30% annually over the next few years. This is due to support from government, businesses and universities.
Ambient Insight states that by 2016, Angola will displace Tunisia as the fourth largest consumer of eLearning products on the continent. Nigeria will be the second largest after South Africa.
This is transforming Africa into one of the most dynamic eLearning markets in the world.

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FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

Entrepreneurs and The School Of Hard Knocks

The Bus That Led To A Billion-Dollar Business

eLearning A Lesson