A simple tour of markets, arcades, and agriculture stalls, which form the majority of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises in Africa, will endorse different studies that have ranked women as the most enterprising.

Women comprise a little over half of Africa’s growing population, and their contribution to the continent’s economy is extensive. According to a report by the African Development Bank, they surprisingly also form the majority of the poor.

“This is largely because they make up 70 per cent of the informal sector, where work is unstable, poorly paid, and invisible,” the report adds.

As the world celebrates International Women’s Day on Monday, March 8, and in support of their enterprising spirit, we share in this article some points to empower women on their entrepreneurship adventure.

Take advantage of mentors and incubators.

Africa is blessed with many seasoned entrepreneurs. Anyone who intends to succeed in business should, therefore, take advantage of these gems of enterprise who can offer invaluable advice to help you navigate the murky waters of entrepreneurship.

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Entrepreneurship is a journey of many challenges. If you want to avoid the landmines, you must have a mentor.

Equally, there are private companies and government agencies that run incubation centres, explicitly targeting young entrepreneurs. You should identify one to enable you to enhance your preparedness. Incubators are essential practical avenues to test your business, and they will enable you to avoid mistakes that have led to the collapse of so many companies.

If we are to go by Robin and Timothy (2015), there is evidence that women entrepreneurs who participate in mentoring can maintain strong professionalism, build good relationships, and manage stress well.

Create and tap into networks to grow your businesses

Networks are crucial to business success. As an entrepreneur, you need to profile individuals and organisations and explore how your network will help lead you to potential customers, connect you to funders, and offer ideas or partnerships that will turn around your organisation.

Opportunities are available for you to grow that business; however small it seems today, you must create networks to learn. Annually, Human Capital International (HCI) organises the Strategic Leaders’ Summit, which offers incredible networking opportunities. Through this annual event, innovations, ideas, markets, and other platforms have been created for participating organisations and individuals.

Take the advice of Small Business.com, which says networking will help you get invites to top events, meet angels and venture capitalists and board funders, all of which can help grow your business faster.

Find unique business ideas. 

For your business to succeed, always ask yourself, “Is there a problem I am solving, and am I solving it the right way?”

If you continuously question yourself, you will create a market for your products and services uniquely. Answers you come up with will help you continuously innovate and improve on your customer relations. This will also help in the acquisition of new customers and retention of existing ones.

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That’s why Jared Haw, a member of Business.com, advises that if you want to take a larger share of the market, win clients, and have higher margins, you’ll need to develop your unique product to help you achieve that.

Tame your appetite

As a woman entrepreneur, you will certainly need to meet and interact with your customers as your business grows. However, temptations are high for many entrepreneurs to dip their fingers into business coffers to finance an extravagant lifestyle just to impress their business contacts.

If you do that, know you are bleeding your business. Sooner than later, your business will be history. Keep separate accounts for your business and yourself, and live within your means.

Believe in yourself when you start a business.

The renowned boxer Mohammad Ali once said, “To become a champion, you must believe you are the best”. This principle applies in business too. Your belief and determination will always make you weather challenges without losing sight of your destination.

Believe, dear woman entrepreneur, that this business is very important to you. Obstacles will come your way but believe that you will overcome them.

Stephen Key of the Entrepreneur blog states that there will be so many unknown factors in your entrepreneurship career. But one sure thing that you must believe in is yourself, especially when others don’t.

Happy Women’s Day Celebrations. Continue upholding and nurturing that natural-born enterprising spirit. And together, we can change the narratives of Africa, one enterprise at a time.

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