Part II: Successful Women Entrepreneurs Share Business Rules They Didnâ€™t Follow

What traditional career or business rules are you glad you didn’t follow?
I was raised by a single mom who instilled in my younger sister and me that with hard work, focus, determination, all career paths were open to us…even as African girls. She also encouraged us to take career paths least traveled–for her that meant enrolling us in the best private school in Zimbabwe and excelling (which we did), nurturing our passions and broadening our world outlooks through travel. So I never paid attention to traditional career paths or business rules–but with a strong foundation, I was relentless in following my North Star and what was true to me.

When you first started in the business, what was your biggest challenge/risk and how did you overcome it?
The biggest challenge as with most startups is getting the first customer, getting traction for your business (We thought we needed funding [but]Â bootstrapping humbled us and made us work even harder to get to that first customer.) so we overcame our own insecurities, particularly since we were “new kids on the block.” What sweetened our value proposition was that we knew the African market and could offer great value to brands looking to target that market, particularly online. That was also a big risk–since Africa was virtually an unknown territory to most brands–we worked twice as hard to deliver on our promises for great service because we had to overcome commonly held stereotypes about Africa.

Many trailblazers find themselves making their own rules. What have you discovered you do your own way?
The biggest lesson for me was to control our message–no Africa is not a hopeless continent but one that is on the rise. The challenges you hear about Africa on mainstream media? Those are opportunities because oftentimes, opportunities come dressed up as challenges. And the continent is open for business!