Not everyone can be a business person right? Not when you are in Zimbabwe

There is a debate on the social media currently raging among Zimbabweans regarding the shocking policy announcement by our Cambridge educated Professor Mthuli Ncube our Minister of Finance announcing the return of the Zimbabwean dollar. I have my own views about this and I am remembering the words that my former MD Mr Carlson Chiswo used to constantly tell me during our weekly Client Management meetings at Zimant Lion Insurance company in Harare between 2004 and 2005. Mr Chiswo would tell me, “Mr Kanyoka, you can’t continue doing the same thing and expect to get different results!”. We might have one of the most educated finance ministers who among other things once owned his own asset management company, once taught at Wits Business school, also taught at University of Oxford and previously was the Vice President and Chief Economist at Africa Development Bank. What the government has done fits with the definition of insanity, it will simply not work.

If you are in Zimbabwe and you only rely on your salary, I sympathise with you. We are going back to Mugabe Economics of the period 1997 after the fall of the Zimbabwe dollars up to 2009 when the government was forced to ditch the Zimbabwean dollar. For you to survive in Zimbabwe you need to be doing an income generating venture even something as basic as keeping chicken and selling. The salary will always lag inflation as what is happening now where a civil servant is earning less than US$30 per month. Despite the fact that the government has banned US$ and South African Rand, the prices of almost everything will be pegged to forex. If you have something to sell, you will always be able to increase your price and as time goes on, your venture will be more than your salary.

Those professionals who have a chance to leave the country, please do so. There is no point in being despondent and getting into depression, remember you are not a tree you can move. Eventually the market will prevail as the market is more powerful than even the nuclear Bomb, just look at the once mighty Soviet Union which was brought down by market forces.

The current mess can be traced back to 1997 when the Zimbabwean dollar devalued massively after Robert Mugabe’s government gave in to the demands of the War Veterans and awarded them unbudgeted gratuity of Z$50 000.00 each . That was a lot of money and it was equivalent to my 2 years salary as a temporary teacher then. Some of us who were studying with foreign institutions we saw the changes immediately as we could no longer afford the fees. The government tried to cushion us by subsidising price of fuel for the next 4 years. Some of my friends, workmates and my cousin saw the signs early they left mainly for UK, Canada and New Zealand.

Inflation started to bite and one’s salary could not keep up with inflation. I started to do projects. By 2007 it became worse inflation had entered record books, according to the Cato Institute, Zimbabwe recorded the second ever highest recorded inflation in history in 2008 where inflation topped to 79 billion % an equivalent of 98% daily.

By 2007 many people stopped going to work as it made sense to work for yourself. Professionals skipped the country for mainly South Africa. Many people ended up working as waiters, domestic staff, farm workers, truck drivers. By 2007 I was the Bulawayo Branch Manager for Zimnat Lion what sustained me where benefits such as the use of the company car, subsidised accommodation and the fuel I got from the company. As a middle manager my salary was always an equivalent of R1 000.00. Due to high prices in Zimbabwe the R1 000.00 did not buy as much as R1 000.00 in South Africa. I was being paid less than a farm worker in South Africa. I had been running my own general dealer shops in Macheke and Mutoko where my sales averaged R20 000.00 to R30 000.00 per week. I was driving weekly to Francistown, Musina and Johannesburg to buy stock for my shops. It no longer made sense to continue working. My wife had already resigned beginning of 2007. I started serving my three months notice after the Easter Holidays in 2007.

Then US Ambassador Christopher Dell was quoted having said that with such high inflation levels Robert Mugabe risked being toppled due to the runaway inflation. The government unleashed a price control blitz and arrested shop owners as well as directors of retail and manufacturing companies. I lost tens of thousands of Rands. I remember some of the stock I had bought in Gaborone were sold for less than 20% of our cost price and my manager was also arrested and taken to court. She was charged for trying to bring down the government by way of increasing prices in the shop. Shortages of all goods from meat and groceries became the order of the day and queues became the order of the day. I had always said I would never leave Zimbabwe but this was not the Zimbabwe I had in mind. I applied for a work permit to come to South Africa.

At our shops people started coming asking to pay in forex, we also started to do batter trade for groceries with maize. During the night I would load a tonne of maize drive through Marondera and avoided police road blocks on our way to Mayambara in Chitungwiza where maize was now being sold in Rands (during that time maize was a controlled product). A tonne of maize was paying about R700.00 that was a lot of money then. I did that for weeks and we started to rebuild. On 22 August 2007, I collected my 5 years quota work permit at the South African embassy in Harare. Ma Nyoni and I left travelled for our home in Bulawayo that night. The next morning we travelled to Pretoria and started to looking for a job and I started working on 1 September 2007 and started to rebuild again.

I hope this can work as the government is saying but we have been through this before it is the same script and more or less the same actors so we know how it will end. Right now in boardrooms of companies in Zimbabwe they are busy strategising how they will not only survive but prosper in this economy. We must do so as farmers, small business owners and individuals. You have to deal with what is on the ground. Life goes on, please recover quickly and wake up to the reality.

If you run a business in Zimbabwe you deserve an honorary MBA as you experience in a year what other businesses will never experience in a life time.

I know it is easy to criticise without offering solutions. My suggestion is that Zimbabwe adopts the South African Rand for a few years. We do not need to join the Rand Monetary Union all we need to do is to informally adopt the Rand like we did with the US$ in 2009.

http://kanyokad.blogspot.com/2017/12/why-zimbabwe-needs-to-discard-bond-note.html

God bless our Zimbabwe.

THE POWER OF INTROVERTS

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0KYU2j0TM4

https://www.ted.com/talks/susan_cain_the_power_of_introverts

I did not know that I was such an introvert until I came to South Africa almost 12 years ago. I am so blessed in that I got a job in the insurance industry within a week of arriving in South Africa. I collected my work permit at the South African Embassy in Harare on 22 August 2007 and that evening maNyoni and I travelled overnight to our home in Bulawayo to collect my certificates and our clothing. The following morning we left for Pretoria. I started job hunting and went to a couple of interviews and signed the contract on 31 August 2007 and started the job the following day.

By that time I had been working in the insurance industry in Zimbabwe for almost 10 years. In Zimbabwe you could not become a manager until you had passed or at least made an attempt to complete the Insurance Associateship examinations. After I joined Eagle Insurance Company in 1997 then a subsidiary of SA Eagle, I concentrated on my insurance studies. At the end of 1997 the Zimbabwean dollar fell sharply making it difficult to raise the foreign currency required to pay for my studies. I persevered with my studies. At the end of 2002 just before I qualified as an Associate, I got a job as a junior manager in an Insurance broking firm. I got to meet many important people such as CEOs of private companies, parastatal heads, Vice Chancellors, Deans of universities, politicians, senior civil servants, successful business people etc and I related with them very well.

In 2003 I completed my Associateship exams and landed a job as an Underwriting Manager for Zimnat Lion Insurance company starting January 2004. Zimnat Lion then was the second biggest insurance company in Zimbabwe and was also listed on the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange. I initially doubted my abilities as I did not consider myself to be adequately qualified. I got a lot of support from my direct boss Mr AZ Shoko who was the AGM and head of our department and I was his 2IC and he let me run the department and I did many tasks including recruitment. Also every week we had a client management meeting with the MD where I learnt a lot and my confidence just grew.

In 2005 I completed my fellowship exams and I even enrolled for the MBA degree before dropping out. The following year I was appointed as the Bulawayo Branch Manager and this was even challenging. I was looking forward to enrolling again for the MBA and hopefully rise to an AGM post. By mid 2007 the economy in Zimbabwe was fast deteriorating and a few guys who had reported to me started applying for South African work permits and they would ask me to write them recommendation letters and I obliged. I never thought that I would leave Zimbabwe. I had stayed put between 1999 to 2000 when my friends and my cousin left for United Kingdom. Eventually I realised it was time to move. Before my permit came out, I started applying for management positions in South Africa for posts such as Head of Claims, Head of Underwriting. The feedback I got was if only I had a permit they would have called me for an interview.

So when I arrived in South Africa with my work permit, I thought I would be able to land a job that matched my experience and qualifications. My experience was this was not going to happen so I accepted it. Most of the advertised jobs were designated employment equity positions and as a foreigner I did not qualify and also most jobs required a South African ID but not a mere work permit. It was a period of disappointment, I could not go back to Zimbabwe as the economic situation continued to deteriorate. Within three months of me joining my new employer, there was an announcement that the company would be sponsoring relevant studies. I then applied as I wanted to get exemptions and then also sit for a few papers and then also qualify as an Associate with Chartered Institute of Insurers (UK).

I was called in for a meeting with the HOD and my manager's manager. The HOD suggested why I had not considered first doing the local Insurance Institute of South Africa exams first and I then pointed out to him that I had completed all the local exams in 2005 and he sounded impressed. He then suggested that they would wait for a few more months before they considered my request. I never applied again as I thought I would go home after the March 2008 election that the opposition had won in Zimbabwe. Anyway the situation in Zimbabwe deteriorated sharply so it meant that we would stay in South Africa longer. Around 2008-2009 there was an internal advert for aspiring first line managers. We first had to write a motivation letter which I did and I was then called in for written assessments.

After the assessments we were then invited for face to face interviews in front of a panel of Heads of Departments and other senior managers. I still remember that interview it was unlike any interview I had attended before. I was accustomed to interviews on the other side having done so for almost 5 years as a manager in Zimbabwe. I failed the interview dismally. I went for feedback with my HOD and he told me that myself and another gentleman from the Actuary department had done very well on the assessment especially the mathematics assessment but I had failed the face to face interview. It was a new culture for me, in Zimbabwe your qualifications as well as your work ethics were very key in management positions and in this interview no one even asked me about my qualifications.
A few months later one of the first line managers resigned, I applied and went for the interview and the feedback I got from my HOD was that I was not visible and I did not participate in activities. The impression was that they were looking for an extrovert. I knew that I would not pretend to be who I was not. I remember one of the major lesson I learnt from my mother growing up in her house- you are okay the way you are!

At the end of 2009 I went to watch the new movie - Invictus and I was inspired. I decided to apply one more time. When another first line manager resigned I applied again. I was called in for the interview. When I got to the interview room the only person who came was the HOD and he started giving me feedback on why I would not make it into management. He asked me which managers I looked up to and I mentioned the first line manager who had recruited me and the next manager whom I had reported to after that. He told me point blank that those managers were not good examples had not made it that is why they had moved onto assessing. They were introverts like me. I was shocked, after the interview I immediately called my very first line manager and told him and he later told the next manager and he phoned me and I confirmed what had transpired. Also a lady who had acted as my first line manager for a long time but was never appointed besides the fact that she had an actuarial degree from a top South African degree and was very good in her work. She also complained that she was being told the same thing, " you are not visible". All three of them eventually left the company.

Some of the guys who got promoted where very visible, they would sing at monthly meetings, crack jokes, reply to chain e-mails and were generally loud in the office. Some of them failed dismally and ended up being demoted. I later worked with two of them after they were demoted and they still failed as clerks and ended up resigning. That was my very last management interview in our department as I never wanted to go through that experience. I was fortunate that earlier on in my career I had very good mentors who taught me that you don;t work for a company but you work for yourself and also the fact that if you do your work very well someone will notice.(http://kanyokad.blogspot.com/2017/09/what-i-have-learnt-in-my-21-years-of.html)

That nasty experience pushed me towards a career change. I had no prospect of rising internally and externally many companies that considered qualifications were not recruiting foreigners. I had always wanted to study accounting. I wrote my first accounting exams at the end of 2009 and I completed my accounting degree at the end of 2014. I learnt to put my head down and concentrate on my work and earned as much salary as possible. In the first half of 2011, I made it into the top 2% of the department and won the Top Perfomers' Incentive for the first time for an overseas holiday with my lovely wife. At that time I had a new manager and he was baffled why I had not made it into management. I told him that the feedback I got when I had applied two years before was that I essentially had to change who I was and I could not do so.

I was asked to act for two months for one of the first line managers who had gone on maternity leave. Within the first week I regretted why I had accepted to act as it was not what I expected. I still completed my two months of acting. I was happy my team gave me a good assessment and my manager asked me to act for another two months and I declined. My manager then left shortly for Australia with his family. I went on to win the Top Perfomers' Incentive 2 more months. During the time I acted the general manager grouped us into a group of threes and asked us to write a combined report. Two of us were acting managers and the logic was that the substantive manager would guide us. I kept on asking the 'visible' manager when where we going to write the report and he kept on postponing. With only two days to go I realised that nothing was going to come out of this, I had to write the report on my own and presented it in the management meeting. That visible manager did not last long he resigned, up to this day I wondered how he made it to become a first line manager in the first place?

The experience I went through was not pleasant but in some good ways, I refused to become a victim, instead I used the experience to motivate myself. The saying, "Someone's opinion of you should never become your reality", is very difficult to put in practice when the odds are stacked against you, but you owe it to yourself to overcome the challenges. I would work long hours including weekends and I still had to study for the accounting degree and I would write up to 6 modules per semester. Whenever I felt like giving up, I would remember my current circumstances. Also with the good earnings I got I was able to build a home in Zimbabwe and try to start some ventures.
As human beings we are meant to overcome challenges. Where it not for the challenges I met, I would not have pursued all these projects and impacted the lives I did. It helped me to see that I could overcome big odds and this boosted my confidence even more.Years later I am so grateful that I went through what I went through as it made me grow as a person it was more valuable that any degree or qualification that I ever received. To be honest the experience dented my confidence and it took me time to build up my confidence again. I am a survivor.

IN BUSINESS, RELATIONSHIPS MATTER

“Hakuna munhu anonzi haana basa” (every human being is important and has a purpose in life), I once read this statement from an article written by Zimbabwean writer Ignatious Mabasa in his weekly column, Shelling The Nuts in The Herald newspaper. I met Mr Mabasa around 2002 when I worked as a junior manager for Zimbabwe Insurance Brokers, he was a manager at The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe and he later went to work as a Deputy Director at The British Council. He gave me a gift in the form of a folder that I still have up to this day.

Between 2004 to 2007 besides holding a full time job as an Underwriting Manager and later as the Bulawayo Branch manager for Zimnat Lion Insurance Company. I was operating my own general dealer shops in Hoyuyu Resettlement area of Mutoko and Virginia Resettlement area of Macheke. A young man Tonderai Jiri had joined the civil service around that time at the Business Center where my main shop was based, we became friends. I remember a day he needed to go home in Marondera and I had to alter my route in order to accommodate him. That generosity was repaid about 13 years later.

In September 2017 when I reached 10 years in my job in Pretoria, I resigned from my job. I finished serving my 4 weeks notice on 2 October 2017. That evening I boarded the bus home to Harare. My goal was to prop up my piggery project in Zimbabwe that lacked proper management and was not going anywhere despite the thousands of dollars I was pouring into it. At times some of the problems you face in your small business it’s not lack of finance but just lack of proper basic management.

I spent weeks buying cheap maize bran( makireshi) at almost 30% what it used to cost me when I was sending money from South Africa. My advice if you want to do a project in Zimbabwe please visit regularly to find out the situation on the ground for yourself. I would spend most of October 2017 in Mutoko buying maize bran and I managed to get almost 4 tonnes. When it was time to transport the pig feed to the main highway I was looking for a truck to hire, Mr Jiri insisted that I only pay for the fuel and he helped me to load and offload.

By end of 2017 my piggery project expanded beyond my expectations.( Here is my journey as a pig farmer so far http://kanyokad.blogspot.com/2018/09/why-i-no-longer-fear-failure-my-journey.html?m=1) If it were not for the business relationships I have cultivated, my project could have failed long time ago. From my beautiful wife maNyoni Onita Kanyoka the best accountant I know, my father in law, all the guys who have worked for us, my manager Mereka Maruwira,my friends Edith Kayinga, Tonderai Jiri and many more friends and relatives.

For your business to succeed you need to build sustainable relationships that transcend race, tribes, religion, political affiliations etc

Very soon I will blog about my 6 months of self employment. I miss the hustle and the hardwork, I would leave the house at 6am six days a week and would also work Sundays that fell on month ends. I would run almost everyday and I met new friends along the way. My favorite was I could hike cheaply to Zimbabwe and come back the following day.