This article is a response to Adema Sangale’s article- Illusion of entrepreneurship: we cannot all be queen bees- published in the January 27th
2019 – Sunday Nation
Whereas I am an entrepreneur and
I wish that all would be as I am, I appreciate that not everyone can nor needs
to be one. As Adema clearly detail in her article the science of
entrepreneurship is that 9 out of 10 startups fail. That statistic is hard to
ignore any way you think about it. Yet many people think that “entrepreneurship
alone” is a solution to our economic problems. I believe that one faithful
employee is able to do more for his family and for his country than nine failed
entrepreneurs. However, there is no shame in failing in an entrepreneurial
venture. And there is no shame in being a faithful employee. Feeding your
family and building the nation with a God given opportunity to earn an income
and create wealth is the object of both the entrepreneur and employee.
The next question is then “how do
we supply the 500,000 jobs a year that Kenyan politicians keep promising us? I
beg to turn this question around and ask; what value are those already in employment
creating for their families and the economy? Many of those in employment are
simply net consumers of income rather than creators of wealth. Here is where I
make the distinction between a faithful employee who understands the power to
create wealth provided him or her by the opportunity to work and those who
merely attend employment to get money. The majority of our employees live from
“salary to salary” with no idea of how to create wealth. They make no savings, no investments and spend all their
money on lifestyle expenses such as rent
and toothpaste. These expenses add no
value to the employee’s net worth and only ensure they retire back to poverty
upon expiry of the employment period.
The heart of the issues raised by
Adema is “employability”. All the bees in the hive are employable from the
queen to the worker. Each has a responsibility to add value to the hive economy
until death. However, many of our people
are looking for jobs, but are not willing to work. The heart of employability
is the character to create value or solve a problem. Unfortunately,
education programs do not teach us this virtue that entrepreneurs understand
fully. Check the lives of Njenga Karume, Richard Branson, Simeon Nyachae, Steve
Jobs, Bill Gates and other successful entrepreneurs. You may decry their lack
of education, but then you will be missing the point. These people were all
willing to work to create wealth. We can
advance this nation much more and much faster with a generation of faithful employees
than an “illusion of entrepreneurship”. If 2 million employees developed the
habit of saving 100 shillings each month, they can pump 2.4 BILLION shillings
back into the economy each year! Instead of occupying ourselves with the
“illusion of entrepreneurship” lets humble ourselves and be faithful with every
opportunity we get to put our hands to work!
Allan Bukusi
Leadership Consultant & Author
of "How to prosper in employment"
27th January 2019
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