Have you tried telling a story about someone else? It makes you vulnerable; because stories make or mess. Stories build or break. Stories inspire or irritate. It’s difficult being in the other person’s shoe. Most times, it’s difficult being your own self. But today, I want to tell you short stories about some of my colleagues. Amazingly epic humans. I’ll tell you how hilarious I find some of them. I’ll also tell you how they are relentlessly serving brilliant, young Africa goals. Not only do they have amazing stories, they are epic stories by themselves. A few of these I picked from a train ride to a team building retreat, by observation.
There is Mark Orina, who’ll carry a whole basket of carrots and share with his seat mates on a train ride. But also, I have had the rare opportunity to work with him on an assignment. He is such a joy to work with, brings to life the important value of high collaboration. He is a vibrant communicator and always strives to understand how best he can work with you to complete an assignment. Just that, our assignment began towards the end of the year, and Orina felt like he needed to chew more carrots and take care of his beard more.
There is Esther Mumbi, who on our way back would smile throughout our train ride going through photos that were taken of her. But before tick could tock, she’d fall asleep. She has boss vibes, taking the world by storm as the head of Operations at Jenga School; our first growth ready startup; a professional skills training institution focused on making Africa the engine room of STEM talent. At IAN, we believe that women will be key players in driving Africa’s innovation economy.
“Women possess unique characteristics that make them more effective at nurturing complex people centric systems and startups are the quintessential people centric systems of our day” says our CEO, Mark Karake
We have Zionah: Always loud. If she keeps quiet we’ll all hear ambulance sirens from South Africa. If not, you’ll find her streaming loud music on YouTube. Zionah and I have shared quite a number of classes in the university. She is tenacious. She would always go an extra mile to make our presentations look more beautiful and simpler to understand for the audience. She always goes an extra mile to make stuff easier. And she hasn’t changed a single bit. That is the beauty about changing the African narrative. To make it easier not only for this generation, but the next.
Then there is Joy, who’ll be worried sick about the temperatures being displayed on the train screen and the speed of the train that didn’t match her level of high performance. Or Barasa, who’ll not miss out on listening to his favorite podcasts because it’s a culture that cannot be stopped even by a team building retreat. For a little over five months now, I have been in the company of Joy and Barasa. Of course with the ever blissful Phyllis and Indimuli. And I have been so lucky to be in the company of such a wealthy team. The wealth of experience, love, ideas, warmth and a profound sense of diversity in the field of fundraising. It’s thrilling to be here I tell you.
Or Liona, who’d tell us endless stories of his children- triplets infact. Sorry. Imaginary children(chuckles). But really, Liona tells some amazing genuine stories. His are usually behind the lens. He is part of an amazing visual storytelling team that is constantly telling beautiful, authentic, timeless and timely stories of Impact Africa Network.
With time, and with our amazing story unfolding at IAN, I’ll tell you more about my other amazingly brilliant colleagues, including Zachary who’ll share a whole box of Oreos with a bunch of us. People, Oreos are cookies that have been baked with love. I’ll also share with you how I am learning and unlearning certain things. One of them is simplified in one of our reads:
‘No culture can flourish without the enthusiastic participation of its leader. No matter how well designed, carefully programmed, and insistently enforced your cultural elements are, inconsistent or hypocritical behavior by the person in charge will blow the whole thing up’.
Maybe I’ll also tell you a little bit about our C.H.O, Mark, and some of his power statements that are scattered all through my notebook. Statements like, ‘To lean into the future requires privilege’ or ‘Train your mind to always think next level’ and, ‘Who will you be when money is no longer a challenge?’ - Such a powerhouse.
Africa will not perish. We will live to publish a new dawn of realities. To tell brand new stories about Africa. Changing the African Narrative.Everyone has an epic story: Everyone is an epic story
