On the other hand, organizations have the need for integrating in IT departments new technologies often using cloud services and other ways of direct access to the web. This pressure for IT departments to give…

On the other hand, organizations have the need for integrating in IT departments new technologies often using cloud services and other ways of direct access to the web. This pressure for IT departments to give…

On the other hand, organizations have the need for integrating in IT departments new technologies often using cloud services and other ways of direct access to the web. This pressure for IT departments to give…

On the other hand, organizations have the need for integrating in IT departments new technologies often using cloud services and other ways of direct access to the web. This pressure for IT departments to give…

On the other hand, organizations have the need for integrating in IT departments new technologies often using cloud services and other ways of direct access to the web. This pressure for IT departments to give…

I think every entrepreneur at every phase and at different times is inspired by different aspects of who they are and therefore is manifested differently at each point, most South African social entrepreneurs start their organisations driven by the need to solve a problem and often times they don’t really have a success metric in mind other than manifesting the idea and concept. Some start because they find themselves unemployed or unfulfilled in their employment and therefore will be driven by the desire for independence, freedom, legacy or to meaningfully contribute in a manner they feel unable in present conditions. Others start with the goal of being acquired or making a billion rand and it really all depends on the environment, socio economic conditions and in a South African context race also plays a part in shaping and manifesting different experiences. Which ever point of departure an idea is formed and environment it evolves will impact the evolution and personal and organisational goals and therefore perception of success.

Perception of success will therefore be different at all times through this evolution and intersections of the personal, environmental and organisational factors that the entrepreneur operates in. There were times in my journey where success was defined through the lens of the community I serve where I was willing to put everything on the line including my personal and financial well being to see the change I had envisioned. This at times meant lowering prices to get more scale and reach more schools and therefore seriously hampering financial sustainability and profitability of the organisation or simply going above what was paid for and trying to solve issues that impact the desired outcome even if that fell outside our scope and budget which sometimes included paying for and providing teachers for schools that found themselves without key teachers, paying for school internet for schools that were out of funds out to ensure we are able to get data analytics and sometimes even getting facilitators to work with and train teachers who were ill equipped and inexperienced. All of this was done, and we were willing to compromise and deprioritise every other aspect of the organisation because success for us was seen only in the lens of improved performance and impact.

Other times success was defined by my team and their survival and ability to thrive, these were the people who have given their lives to make our vision a reality and over time one learns the impact not only on them but their families when they are not made a priority. That weight can also at times shift your success metric and the sustainability particularly salaries of you partners force you to rethink what success looks like and therefore the priorities and decisions made shift to enable that. For me that shift came in a form of tragedy when two of my partners passed away within a year of each other through car accidents, they had no life cover, medical aid or savings to pass on or leave for their families, they were both fathers and for me no amount of impact or support we provide of those 3 kids and their families will ever make up for the fact that I had created a company that did not give them the means to create those structures. Because of that how I view success and growth particularly is often in terms of my people and their ability to thrive and set up those structures to be able to get a bond, take care of their mental health, have medical aid and life cover, etc and I pay particular attention to the value that is added in a person’s life if they are working with me and make it a point to have these often difficult conversations.

Early on in my career I paid particular attention to the accolades, external recognition and validation we received, vanity is something we all struggle with and to see the world accept and fall in love with your creation not only helps boost your confidence, but it also reignites your spirit and reaffirm that you must be doing something right. Because everyone was telling us how great we are on our travels across the globe, speaking in conferences and getting recognised by people you would have never dreamed ever getting an opportunity to know and have them know and speak highly of you can be intoxicating and in a way you start believing that you are really doing great when reality contradicts it. The external perception of success isolates you as people’s expectation also gets inflated creating a reality where you have to “fake it while you make it”. Because of all the traveling, the PR and all the awards you often find it hard to ask for help, you suffer in silence and worry as you smile and inspire and it doesn’t stop with the outside world as even with family and friends you systematically get more and more isolated as everyone assumes you’re doing well eroding the very ecosystem you depend on for financial and emotional support.

I particularly remember a time when I went to an all expenses paid trip to Sir Richard Branson’s private Island after winning the Virgin Unite’s most innovative start up in the world award and spent a week with him, Simon Seniek, Van Jones, Russel Brand and a lot of billionaires who kept telling me that I inspire them while I was worried that I was 2 months behind on rent and was most likely going to get evicted when I get back home. I can only imagine how much Virgin Unite must have spent on a private jet, flights, accommodation and entertainment not to mention it costs over $100 000 per night to stay at Necker Island and I was there for a week. Beyonce and Jay Z had been there a week before and there I was without much clothes, my first smart phone which was given to me by Further through Red Bull and behind on rent which was at the time R2 000, then having to come home to the media interviews and everyone assuming Richard Branson must have given me money or invested in our business. These are the kinds of realities that lead to depression as you further and further isolate yourself in confrontation of this image of success. Part of why I became a mentor and have honored to be part of and co-create this community of entrepreneurs is on top of everything else is that we are able to have these conversations, and in reality, not many who have not gone through it would ever have the context to even understand or know what questions to ask. We are real with each other and break through the fluff and the perception of success to ask “how are you, really?”

At times business progression in terms of revenue, sales and investments raised have also at times taken centre stage and like all things can also get a lot more complicated and confusing while seemingly successful, there were times when we were scaling our business in 4 provinces with over 200 000 students on our platform and having big corporate clients and getting great impact but were not profitable and instead we were surviving by expanding and doing one rollout after the other and because there was a lot happening at a very big scale we thought we were successful even though the reality was that the metrics were not making sense however we just kept growing and building thinking the bigger we get the more we will be able to attract and somehow things will fall into place, after all we were making a great impact. Then Covid lockdown of 2021 came and humbled us by forcing us to face reality, we had build a great and highly successful and scalable impact organisation but never a sustainable business. There was a time when we raised a significant amount of money “on paper” and we seemed very successful even we thought, this is it but then we were not aligned with our funders in every way and instead were spending time and resources ticking their boxes and getting frustrated by their overall politics, unrealistic expectations, unwillingness to support and overall attitude towards our work and entrepreneurship in general.

Though all of these and what was perhaps the hardest lesson I had to learn was to see success through my own financial security, piece of mind and mental health. Often we take care of everyone and everything else and forget that we are human, we break and we need to give space to be just that, human. We take on too much and hardly prioritise our own personal development, deal with our traumas and build authentic and fulfilling relationships. We spend so much of ourselves trying to inspire and lead that we feel we don’t have the right to be vulnerable, lose hope, get discouraged… we lead with our heart’s, feel everything and take on so much and not give room and create supportive spaces to also do the same when we break. I have had times in my career when all I lived for and was inspired by was the kids, the teachers and schools we support. But there has also been times when I’ve completely lost faith in the work and the people I wanted to serve and since we are human, learning that you go through those phases and learning to find yourself again and take care of you so you can show up to the people you love and those who love you at your fullest is to me success.

Therefore, I think success is purely defined by the mission given by self at different times and will shift, grow and evolve as you do. Even though there will be a lot of content and experts telling you what success looks like or should look like, developing models and metrics in different contexts. What one should rather focus on is creating balance and figuring out at each point what that balance and therefore success is for you. If you constantly strive to learn and live in your truth that balance will constantly shift and I don’t really know if you can ever fully get it right but awareness and pursuit of it in your most authentic self not only creates great life experiences, businesses but also creates great people with yourself self being your greatest creation.