Now is the Time to Invest in Yourself and Become an Entrepreneur, But First, Lessons Need to Be Learnt
The National Budget Speech, delivered by Minister of Finance Enoch Godongwana, on Wednesday the 23rd February 2022, has been widely welcomed. Ultimately, South Africans will be able to hold on to more of their hard earned Rand with tax relief for businesses as well as individuals, no increases in any of the fuel levies, a focus on economic growth and the announcement of an increased revenue estimate of R1 547.07 billion from the February 2021 budget estimate of R1 365.1billion.
Overall, within an uncertain world as a result of an active war in Eastern Europe, as opposed to a waning global pandemic, the Budget Speech yielded positivity.
With the aforementioned focus on economic growth by Treasury and the accompanying need for growth by the rest of South Africa, the soil for more South African entrepreneurs to flourish, is fertile. With less money to spend and a little more disposable income, we should use this as an opportunity to aide economic growth by injecting more entrepreneurs into the economy.
However, no person is simply born an entrepreneur. You may have the aptitude, accompanying attitude and affinity for entrepreneurship, but many lessons need to be learnt on the journey towards entrepreneurship. You will make mistakes, however, many have embarked on this path before us and they have much to teach. Two such individuals are Stacey Abrams and her business partner, Lara Hodgson, who went on to start three companies together, in professional services, manufacturing, and FinTech.
In an interview by the Harvard Business Review, as part of their Women at Work podcast series, the two shared their insights into what the essential elements are for successful entrepreneurship. Apart from being friends and business partners, the two also collaborated to write a book chronicling their entrepreneurship journey whilst sharing their essential insights, Level Up: Rise Above the Hidden Forces Holding Your Business Back.
The first common lesson they share, is the need for curiosity and learning new things. For any successful business person it is essential to remain curious and continue to learn. It was Albert Einstein who reminded us that “intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death.” A curious business person consistently seeking knowledge has the advantage of being aware of new technologies, best practice and new developments within their industry. As Stacy Abrams puts it, loving to learn new things enables you to understand how things work and gives you the means to make them better. It is what would enable you to find solutions that might make your business possible, if not exceptional.
Many businesses are formed by friends, spouses and families. In fact Abrams and Hodgson partnered in business following a friendship forged after the two struck up a conversation in a lunch line at a conference. However, being in a relationship is not enough for building a sustainable and successful business. Abrams states that beyond her interpersonal relationship with Hodgson, the essential elements for the success of their partnership are honesty and transparency. As she puts it: “Honesty is telling the truth. Transparency is telling the truth before you have to. We don’t wait for the hard question. We don’t wait for the mistake to be uncovered. We get ahead of it. And that helps not only our business relationship, but our personal relationship and our relationships with clients.”
Hodgson in turn highlights the importance of remaining heterogeneous. Diversity of thought is essential as she states: “… Stacey and I always had the ability to approach a problem, appreciate the different perspectives, and then continue to develop those different perspectives by allowing our lives to have some distance.” Diversity of thought is essential, harking back to curiosity, providing room to learn new things and look at problems from a different perspective. Hodgson highlights that in as much as the two partners spend much time together, they have created space to pursue their lives separately, remaining two individuals who experience the world differently and is thus able to bring a different perspective to the table, thus continuously learning from each other. Their mutual respect, honesty and transparency is what facilitates true engagement with differing perspectives.
Self-doubt is a major obstacle for most of us in many aspects of our lives. In business self-doubt may be a hindrance for success and growth. As opposed to the notion of being fearless, Abrams and Hodgson instead reassure us that fear is in fact part of the journey. The key to ensuring that self-doubt and fear does not impede our growth as entrepreneurs is to interrogate it, understand it and in turn harness it for good.
As mentioned from the onset, an entrepreneur is not simply designed. An entrepreneur is forged through experience and learning. Even after decades of continuous intellectual pursuit, no person can be an expert on everything. No business owner can take sole responsibility for managing finances, staff and be the primary implementer of delivery. Thus any business at one point or the other would have to introduce experts to manage certain aspects of a business. Thus Hodgson advises the following: “One piece of advice I would give is to find someone to help you manage the finances of your company and, more importantly, explain things to you in common terms… You need to know the finances. You don’t have to become an expert but bring in someone who can explain it to you in terms that you understand.” This advice extends beyond finances and is equally applicable to human resources, technology, compliance and even the law.
As we emerge out of the ashes of a global pandemic and hear the drums of war beating in the north, it is essential that we all play a role in the economic growth that will alleviate South Africa’s poverty, economic inequality and unemployment. With the State doing what it can to facilitate this growth, we as individuals need to play our part in growing our economy, for ours and the sake of the nation. The starting point would be to broaden our horizons and never stop learning.