Thoughts on Different Societal Issues

A good friend of mine from varsity days was getting married at a beautiful venue about 20 minutes from Stanford in the Overberg. Stanford is a quaint town 23 km out of Hermanus. Since it was going to be an afternoon wedding on the Saturday, we decided to rather drive out of town on the Friday so that we would not be rushed on the Saturday. Come the time to look for accommodation and then something happened which has been gnawing at me for the past days. Although I have been a recipient of treatment which was downright discriminatory, I have always (and still) prefer to deal with each person on an individual basis rather than to work with generalisations or stereotypes. Having decided on the budget and the potential places which I wanted my wife and I to spend the weekend. One Guest House in Hermanus whose name has to do with a ‘place where a certain bird type stays’ did something which appalled me. After I had entered my details online to book a room, with availability having

Yesterday (15 October) we had the privilege of hosting Alan Knott Craig Jnr at the company where I work. He got to share some good insights regarding business and entrepreneurship. Being an upcoming entrepreneur I was very attentive and took some notes as he went through his presentation. Before going into the details, a brief introduction of Alan follows (for those who might not know him). Alan (38) was born on the 14 th of August 1977. He is married and has 3 children. Both he and his wife are qualified Chartered Accountants, they got married when he was 25. Alan is the Founder of World of Avatar which started in 2010 and bought Mxit in October 2011. He also served as Chief Executive Officer of World of Avatar and Mxit Lifestyle. Prior to this he served as Managing Director of iBurst. He was formerly the Managing Director of Cellfind. He used to run iBurst and left in 2009.  Other companies he has been involved in developing include Neotel, Herotel and a recently started non-

Having grown up (literally) in church the story of the widow’s offering is one which I knew by heart. However a few weeks ago during offering, the scripture was read and my attention was drawn to certain words used in the passage which are easy to overlook. Mark 12:41-44 41  Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put   and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts .  42  But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents. In the Oxford Dictionary put is defined as, “ Move to or place in a particular position .”  In the temple there was a specific location where the offerings where meant to be placed- temple treasury. The name itself shows this is a place where treasure was being placed. As Jesus observed the people, what stuck out was the manner in which they were placing the money in the treasury. When many of the rich people came they threw in large

John 16:24 “ Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask , and you will receive, that your joy may be full. ” Many times people go through life operating with a victim mentality. Thinking that everyone and everything is against them. Such a worldview makes a person think they are a victim of circumstances and that they do not have any control over what goes on in their life. Something I have come to realise is that often people don’t achieve what they need to, access what they need to, making the progress they need to, accomplish tasks quickly or get to know what they need to etc. just  because of not asking. This failure to ask can be premised on negative self-talk such as ‘No one would be willing to help me’ or ‘I don’t deserve to be helped.’ Apart from this negative self-talk, one other thing which tends to make people not ask is because of pride . Merriam-Webster defines pride as ‘ a feeling that you respect yourself and deserve to be respected by other p

Being an avid reader and also one who is passionate about business, whenever I come across stories which show creativity and ingenuity- I can't but acknowledge such exploits. 1) Lere's Shoe Shine As a frequent traveller, I get to pass through the airport a number of times and something one never can miss after passing through the security check are the gentlemen doing shoe shine. All the times I see them I am impressed by the simple yet profitable venture. Same way there are quick massage, manicure and pedicure stations at airports, the shoe shine booths are a most welcome addition for mainly business travellers. Today I was even more impressed when I read the profile of the founder of the shoe shine stalls located at the South African airports. Lere Mgayiya owns and runs Africa's largest shoe shining business with a turnover of over R2.5 million per annum. After having dabbled in a number of ventures with different levels of success, he got his shoe :) in the ri

As we go through our day to day lives there are a lot of things which we come across which are inconveniences, time wasters or pain points. What we however do not realise is that in these problems opportunities abound. Take a moment to think about all those things which bother you...it is highly possible that you are not the only one bothered by that same issue. Identify Business opportunities come about from being able to not only identify a problem, one needs to develop a solution for that issue and the solution needs to be implementable (practical and pragmatic). The solutions to problems do not always need to be complex or complicated- they just need to be an answer to the pain point which people have. Develop There is a famous quote attributed to Abraham Lincoln “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.” The issue (problem) can be likened to the tree, the axe is the solution to the problem and cutting down the tre

We recently visited a couple we are friends with and the husband narrated how they met each other...at a prayer group. A close friend of the gentleman also met his wife at the same prayer group. As our conversation continued, I also brought up how I met my wife at a youth group meeting at church. Before some get the wrong idea- church is not a dating club- that's not what this piece is advocating. In all instances, we had all gone to these meetings without any intention that we would meet our life partners. In fact, I had already been part of the youth group for a while and at the very first meeting when my (now) wife came- that’s where it resonated in my spirit and in my heart that there was something special about this lady who I was seeing for the first time...well that’s a story for another day J As the conversation continued, I pointed out something which I always say to my wife regarding the issue of relationships- one needs to ‘go to the well’.  This statement is in r

Most of us have a daily, weekly or monthly alert which comes via email. I get emails for mining industry, industrial development zones, personal coaching, personal health, home improvements etc. Today I was looking at a subscription I have to a mining industry publication which comes into my inbox and it got me thinking...I subscribed for this over 4 years ago when I was doing some research on the industry. Inasmuch I do enjoy reading about news from different sectors, the news was not relevant to the kind of work I am currently doing in the healthcare sector. This line of questioning led me to realise there are many things which we are receiving in the ‘inbox’ of our minds and lives which we might have subscribed to some time ago. At the time what we might have been receiving might have been relevant to the time and season, but it is no longer relevant to where you are. Since you are the one who initiated the subscription, those things will keep coming your way until you ar

  Smartphones Smartphones can be in the hands of many, but not all the users are ‘smart’ with their phones. Data costs are a major headache to some because of not paying attention to the drains which happen. App developers are always fixing bugs or enhancing their apps such that almost on a daily basis there is need to update the apps. By switching your applications to update only where there is Wi-Fi access, you are saving yourself a lot of money. Service providers also charge exorbitant out of bundle rates i.e. R2/MB. It might be their way of forcing consumers to buy data bundles which are priced more economically. If you can’t beat them...join them- it is better to buy the bundles than to be faced with astronomical bills at the end of the month. Most packages come with minutes which restrict you according to networks. These packages also come at times with hundreds of SMS’s which in most likelihood you will not utilise due to the presence of different instant messagin