Startup Kenya

As we all know by now, at SKY TRUST we are all about youth empowerment. After my inspirational moment in my last post (your welcome), my attention was drawn to the evaluation of the Kenyan job market and its limits towards young people. Thanks to the restrictive requirements from employers and lack of application feedback, young people are being limited in the job market, they are not being provided with the support (at least none that I know of) they need to transition from education to work.  Lack of transparency in recruitment processes and a failure to tailor interviews for people who have no prior experience of work limits young people from accessing employment. Young people are caught up in a 'vicious cycle' as individuals without access to work opportunities as they are turned away from roles requiring experience. This factor prevents business from benefiting from a diverse pool of talent. So could it be a case of mismatched expectation? Its seems to me  that too many

More young people are idle than ever before.  This answer those who have been wondering aloud how bases such as outside Hilton hotel are sometimes packed to capacity with humanity  (n o, most of the people are not picnicking ).  Just walk the streets of Nairobi, and you will find idlers  outside offices, hotels, stalls and restaurants.  One thing that sticks in my mind is mainly the psychological effects of youth unemployment. We all know how frustrating and boring it is to be idle. Not only does it crush your self esteem, you end up feeling worthless and uninspired.  While y oung people go to school, finish and expect to join the job market in order to  meet  their obligations and expectations towards society, they later on discovered how without a job how unforgiving society can be. After a long period of absentee paychecks and diminished savings, a deterioration of the individual begins at the sociological and psychological levels.  Society views unemployment as a sign of fa

Starting a business is not about how intelligent or wealthy one is, but about the practical skills and determination to do what you have to do. Young people in this country need to be show they have skill and talent to turn their lives into something positive.    Many young people are desperate to turn their lives around but find that they are excluded from formal employment because of their background – a lack of qualifications.They find themselves in a deep hole where all options appear to be closed. Personally, I think the jobs market is making a permanent shift and that in future people who can offer their own services will be in the strongest position. The traditional workplace, is evolving and there is already a trend towards more work being outsourced, thus the traditional long-term employment can't be relied on. The only way to be secure is to have the skills and knowledge to create security for oneself, and entrepreneur-ism  is the way to do this. Starting a business

I would like to take this moment and appreciate the goodwill of His Excellence President Uhuru and his Deputy Vice President Ruto for proposing 6 billion worth of funds to women and youth. What intrigues me though is whether youth need more money or more skills. Much as giving young people money to start a business so as to create jobs for themselves, is a great move, priority should be place on equipping them with skills that are needed to empower them in that business.  From observation, it seems that most youth groups, are set up to take out loans because they are available to them, but fail in business, due to lack of cohesion within the group.Because the group was set up for the transaction process (getting the money) its almost impossible for them to make repayments of the loan. Of course not all youth groups go through this, they are some successful stories, but they seem the minority. Kenya's youth need capacity building (skills), especially on the issue of busi

Kenya has, 80% unemployed youth between the ages of 15-34 years old (study by UNDP). Basically this means that more than 1.8 millon unemployed are young people. Youth unemployment is the most pressing issue for young people in everyday life. Promises (e.g., free education,  diverse  economy that is less dependent on agriculture, so that they’re are jobs in other industries for young people, who flock the urban center) have been made to create jobs, including attempts to diagnose and fix the problems causing youth unemployment. T he youth however are aware that the promises are often forgotten right after they have been made. Most have been unable to find full-time jobs, instead resulting to minor jobs such as selling fruit on the roadside. It is one of the informal jobs known as "tarmacking" – walking the streets looking for day-to-day tasks, which are low paid. Were as  there is seemingly good intentions to empowering the youth, more positive impact is needed on th

Its a beautiful Friday morning this side of Africa, the sun is out, weather not as gloomy as it has been the past days. What does that all have to do with this post? Everything.... especially that's its a great day to be alive and getting something going that is helping in making other peoples lives better. While alive (work with me), I recently came across a story about young people now engaging in business deals with prominent business people in order to attain state contracts. How it  works, a prominent dealer, targets a disadvantage young entrepreneur, with the belief that he/she will not be found out because they lack the scent of "obviousness" and the capability to exploit the procurement process, making it quite easy for them to be granted the contract. Why do they do so? Because they are rules that govern the procurement procedure in Kenya, so that dishonest business people don't benefit all the time. So sponsoring young less fortunate people to get the jo

We would like to take this opportunity to thank Harry Karanja, for donating his blog to Startup Kenya Youth Trust SKY TRUST, as the French would say it, "merci beaucoup" . As highlighted in the previous post, Startup Kenya Youth Trust - SKY TRUST is all about helping talented Kenyan young entrepreneurs achieve their potential, by giving them economic empowerment through business seed funding.   Startup Kenya Youth Trust Creating Economic Opportunities Took as a minute to come up with the logo, but eventually it came to us, as in a video, as in a drama (smiles). While starting out, the twist to it, is SKY TRUST takes a more exciting and engaging approach as opposed to boring and rudimentary process, normally associated with charity activities (or not??). Either way expect to be intrigued by our daily growth and experiences.You will be kept on the loop of all the magnificent events/activities that will be unfolding. Of course you are also welcome to be engaging, as

The last post as Harry Since 2006 I have enjoyed your company and patronage as I put down my thoughts in black and white on this blog. I started this blog to share my experiences in entrepreneurship but I also ended up learning, making new friends and developing my own ideas on what I really wanted to do. For a long time I have known that the knowledge and experiences I have been fortunate enough to acquire must not be confined within me, but must be used to generate wealth, success, and fulfillment for others. Today I therefore wish to announce that I will be donating my blog and twitter handle to the charitable trust Startup Kenya Youth (SKY) Trust .  I look forward to continuing our engagement under the banner of SKY Trust. A bit about SKY Trust. SKY Trust was founded in 2013 by Harry Karanja. SKY Trust's goal is to act as a catalyst to entrepreneurship among people under the age of thirty Harry started his first business when he was fifteen, retailing bread and biscu

Since the presidential elections and its petition ended Kenyan's have gotten their politics fix from discussing possible appointees to the first cabinet under the new constitution. President Kenyatta and Deputy President Ruto have reportedly spent the better part of their first weeks after elections deep in consultation about who to appoint. Last week they gave us the first hint that their cabinet appointments would not be business as usual when they unveiled a government structure of eighteen (18) ministries which is four less than the constitutional maximum. This was a clue that they were more keen on delivering on their manifesto than rewarding of friends. Today they went further and gave us a good taste of things to come when they revealed their nominees for the ministries of: ICT, National Treasury, Health and Foreign Affairs.Have no doubt, it was no accident that these were the first nominees unveiled. It is clear that the digital duo consider these to be the most important

Like me, I'm sure you must have election fatigue by now. To be quite frank, I have sworn off local media until after I vote. I had also resolved not to publish any more election related posts, but then I read Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. The concept of objectivism fascinated me greatly and got me thinking about some of the policies being spewed by candidates for office. As a capitalist nay a compassionate one, I am wary of any politician promising redistribution of wealth. The begging culture (harambee) sadly is a national culture and it is important that we break this habit through our policies and politics. It is for this reason I have decided to share my endorsements for candidates for Nairobi county as this is where I get my bread and butter. We start with governor, a powerful new executive position. I will consider the three leading contenders: Kidero, Waititu, and Mbaru. Among the three Kidero gets my endorsement, yes he is haughty but he also has the best combination of s

The last few months in my toastmasters journey have been a whirlwind. Since December last year I have delivered four speeches and taken two roles. Of all these yesterday's speech was the most exhilarating. I spoke on a topic which I am deeply passionate ( EVA ) and its potential to generate wealth in rural areas. The speech was also special as it was delivered as part of the International Taped Speech Contest for Toastmasters. I was humbled that despite very worthy contestants also giving speeches the judges awarded my speech as the winning speech. Here is the full text of the speech below, titled Walk My Path. UPDATE : You can now see the video here or at the end of this post. Almost 60 years ago, my grandfather at the behest of British colonialists was forced out of his central province and found refuge as a miller in the Rift Valley town of Njoro. It took independence of our nation for him to find a chance to move his family back. 30 years ago, my father left a cushy gov

With slightly over a month before the first general elections under a new constitution, I have assessed the candidates for Office of the President of the Republic of Kenya, and I have no doubt in my mind in my selection of Narc Kenya's Martha Karua as my choice. Martha Karua always had a head start in my mind's eye, as early as February 2011, I registered under her Narc Kenya party because she appealed to my vision of a candidate. I nevertheless withheld making my endorsement for the 10 months following, giving other potential candidates the opportunity to surprise me. And while there were a few surprises along the way: Raila's embrace of Kalonzo, or Mudavadi's surprisingly good interview on BBC's Hard Talk, Peter Kenneth's flawless launch for presidency, and even Johnson Sakaja's brilliant defence of the Jubilee Alliance, none of these were sufficient to sway my vote. On March 4, 2013, I therefore intend to cast my vote for Ms. Martha Karua and here

Is humour important in business? Oh yes certainly! Humour is a great way to break the ice, get people to relax, and build rapport. These are very relevant to salespeople as well are always meeting new people during sales pitches, conferences, cocktails or other events. This week I made an attempt to see how funny I was in front of an audience... luckily it was the very empathetic group of fellow toastmasters and not the Apollo theater. However there were a number of CEOs, senior executives, and businessmen/women there so the jokes could not be that pedestrian. This was my first time to try the jokesmaster role, and I intend to keep taking it up more to polish up on my punchline delivery and deadpan face (Martin Freeman from office UK is my role model and suits my geeky self). If you would like to know more about toastmastsers and how it can help improve on your communication and leadership skills visit the website  or attend a meeting

Most of us who were boarders in Kenyan high schools would brave the early morning chill to attend prep; a rigorous educational exercise that was mandatory in some institutions. As sleep starved teenagers, this was a herculean effort requiring an almost superhuman discipline. However when one zeroed in on their objective, the task would seem relatively easy. Over a few weeks while I was in form three, I had an objective of which I devoted my entire capacity to achieve, and woke before the crack of dawn on many mornings to bring it to fruition. Sadly it was not an A in mathematics, chemistry or physics. Rather I would wake up every morning, before all my classmates, to sneak to the nearby shopping centre to buy two crates of the freshly baked bread. You see, then just like now I was a businessman. Even in those formative years of my entrepreneurship I understood the basic concepts of demand and supply. Bread in high school is one commodity that has unusually high demand. Apart from the

Welcome to the New Year. It’s the second day of the year and if I was you I wouldn’t be too hard on myself if I had already broken some of my New Year’s resolutions. Keeping resolutions is hard, but when it comes to your business there is one resolution you should make, and you cannot afford to break... If your business is like most businesses in Kenya – bar education or retail – at this time you are facing serious cash flow crisis. Consumer spending is at its lowest after an indulgent December and will only start recovering from mid-February. If your customer base comprises of individuals or small businesses, they are prioritizing their personal expenses over business expenses, meaning your invoices get paid last if at all. Facing a similar January a few years back at our co-working space Genius Executive Centre I began January with a number of offices to fill from tenants who’d left the month before. I had read somewhere that when things are at the worst is when you ad

One Hundred and Forty “Our children may learn about the heroes of the past. Our task is to make ourselves the architects of the future.” One Hundred and Forty “Kenya has become a country of ten millionaires and ten million beggars.”  One Hundred and Forty “It’s the little things that citizens do. That’s what will make a difference. My little thing is planting trees.” One Hundred and Forty These words spoken respectively by Jomo Kenyatta, JM Kariuki, and Wangari Maathai are similar in that they influenced millions. They also have something else in common. One Hundred and Forty. As in each of the statements is less than One hundred and Forty characters. 140 is the maximum number of characters that you can write on the social media website twitter. Kenyans are second only to South Africa in using twitter in Africa, sending nearly a million tweets a month. And 70% of these Kenyans on twitter are using it to monitor news. This is according to a study called How Africa Twee

Back in 1995 there were precious few internet connections in Kenya, and these few were courtesy of Dr. Shem Ochuodho's pioneering ISP. In Nakuru county there were even fewer, 3 to be exact, and one of those happened to be in our house. We used it mainly for email, my dad getting to communicate with mom who was out of the country. We only dialed up every other day as the costs were dear. Being part of such a small community though had its advantages with one of those being that Dr. Ochuodho would send daily emails with a summary of the news of that day as it appeared in the press. This was back in 95 when KBC was the only TV and radio station available in Nakuru and thus the only source of electronic information. Dr. Ochudho's "news"letters were therefore a gem and helped me appreciate just how effective internet communication was in relaying information. Fast forward to 2012 and we have a plethora of ways to instantly communicate. However when it comes to relay

Cars are great. They get us from point A to point B and they carry our goods or personnel to the customer when we are in business. Of course they are also an important asset that any owner would make sure to protect against theft. This article tells you 5 cost-effective ways you can use to do exactly that... Read more about the 5 Cost-Effective Techniques you Can Use to Avoid Your Car Getting Stolen or Carjacked!

It’s that time of the year again, a nasty flu virus has been going around and everybody is walking around with a handkerchief. We all hate getting sick, but what’s even worse is getting sick and being given illegible prescriptions for medication you have no idea about. This article tries to demystify some of those common but illegible drugs we are usually asked to swallow to ease our illnesses Read about those 5 Common Drugs you need to know about

Where do I start? The spread of the internet into every sphere of our lives and the mega stardom of internet wiz kids like Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg or Google’s Larry Page and Sergey Brin has fired our imagination. It’s now possible to believe that with a good idea and internet connection one can have a viable business.  We’re living in the internet age and It’s a great time to own a business but the question is, can you really use the internet to grow your business? People ask me where does one start, how do you find clients on the internet, and can this be outsourced? What is Prospecting? The thing to remember is that the internet is a fantastic tool, it can do several wonderful things but a tool is only as good as its’ user. To really benefit from the internet you have to know how to use it. Just like in a traditional business, the first thing and most important to use the internet for in your business is to get prospective clients. Some simply call this marketing but we like t