Archives For People

People in Africa making a difference…african or not

“Never Give Up” – This biographical documentary highlights Vivek Ranadivé’s inspiring journey from his childhood in Bombay to attending his dream school M.I.T. to founding Silicon Valley based TIBCO Software Inc. In his tireless commitment to never give up, Vivek consistently beats the odds.

Now known by the nickname “Mr. Real Time,” he is an established figure in the business world as a frequent conference presenter and expert guest on real-time computing from CBNC to Fox Business to Bloomberg.

Vivek has been the Chairman of the Board and CEO of TIBCO since founding the company in 1997. Prior to TIBCO, he founded a UNIX consulting company, and held management and engineering positions with Ford Motor Company, M/A-Com Linkabit, and Fortune Systems.

Posted on March 25, 2013 In People, TV
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Reflections with Michael Joseph from Al Kags on Vimeo.

Posted on February 14, 2013 In Business, People, Technology, TV , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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Posted on January 23, 2013 In People, TV , , , , , , ,
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Traction can be seen in the tech accelerator and incubation space

November 19, 2012 — Leave a comment

Launching and running a technology startup in Africa  can prove to be a tricky affair, with numerous challenges facing founders and their teams as they dream big and create solution with the end game of being profitable and ensuring a return to investors.

Now imagine the challenges that face incubators or accelerators whose  business is to guide and stabilize these startups and release them well equipped into the world. Being in the business of startups is challenging and we have seen many initiatives mushroom across Africa, all with a vision to spur innovation and creation of world class companies.

With many having clocked at least six months of existence, the spotlight has been on them to show the “fruits of their labour ”. Two particular outfits in Kenya are seemingly ahead of the pack in graduating their first class of “students”, or at least taking them to the next level of business in what has been an experiment of sorts to test sustainable business models  and creating ecosystems for innovation and entrepreneurship. Continue Reading…

In Business, People, Round n About, Technology , , , , , , , , , ,
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A primer to engaging the developer community

November 5, 2012 — Leave a comment

Information technology seems to be the place to play in with lots of activity in the web and mobile front for both consumer facing services and enterprise solutions. Across Africa a network of hubs, labs and co-working spaces are being created to house the people behind this tech adoption and creation wave. More established companies from mobile network operators to FMCG’s are looking  toward this resource pool for innovative ideas that will help drive their brands and deliver shareholder value.

As we have started on this journey towards the creation of the Silicon Savanna, there is no blueprint to guide how best to engage the different players in the ecosystem for optimal results. Most of the emerging technology hubs are still tweaking their working models, some with funding others bootstrapping. The corporate sector on the other hand seem to be stumbling in the dark, not that anyone would blame them; as larger entities seem to be slow on the trigger, especially on matters that they do not understand well. Continue Reading…

In Business, Mobile, People, Technology
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Research assistant opening {Short term, Part time}

October 1, 2012

I am looking for a research assistant for a short term and part time engagement available to start  immediately. The research work revolves around the hospitality industry in Kenya and will be heavily desktop centric but will require a number of site visits for additional information collection and verification. The duration will be between 2-4 weeks depending on finalized scope

The requirements are simple:

  • Excellent written and spoken English
  • Good online research and data mining skills aka Google Ninja
  • Knowledge of the hospitality industry in Kenya
  • Excellent presentation skills and report writing
  • Access to own computer and good internet connection
  • Motivated and driven {work will be offsite with minimal supervision}
Send brief on why you should be the one to – work@mbuguanjihia.com

 

In People
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The 6 Passages of Leadership and Management { the great leadership & management passages model }

May 16, 2012 — Leave a comment

I happened on a great article by Dan McCarthy who writes about matters leadership, and his latest piece struck a chord. If you have been in the trenches long enough as an entrepreneur, these are learning’s that you will get on your journey, some obvious others not so much.
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Unless you are an heir to a throne, people usually don’t begin their careers leading a large organization. There’s a progression of passages, or at least there should be.

Charan, Drotter, and Noel wrote about six leadership passages in their classic book The Leadership Pipeline. However, they use the terms “leadership” and “management” interchangeably. There’s a big difference, right?

What if we took a simplified version of the Pipeline model, and mash it with a distinction between leadership and management?

We’ll call it The Great Leadership & Management Passages Model (OK, so we need a catchier name): Continue Reading…

In Business, People
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The multi-screen content opportunity; where the money’s at in the mobile economy

May 10, 2012 — Leave a comment

“Never underestimate the consumers need for information and entertainment” said one speaker recently concluded East Africa Com conference. Technology’s continuous evolution opens up more avenues for revenue generation, either by way of new market access, lower costs of production, efficient distribution and allowing for business model innovation as new market conditions are created.

One of the industries whose time is right for disruption is that of broadcast; with the costs of internet access having dropped, mobile data going mainstream and a plethora of tools that empower everyone to be a content creator.

The five players who are poised to benefit greatly in this evolving space are traditional players in the media space – think terrestrial tv and radio station, mobile network operators, independent content producers, aggregators who may also double up as platform providers and finally consumer brands looking at more effective and directly measurable engagement experiences. Continue Reading…

In Business, People, Technology
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Developer Economics 2012: The new mobile app economy {research}

April 11, 2012 — Leave a comment

Developer Economics is back for a new research on some of the hottest trends of the developer ecosystem; investigating key themes, such as developer mindshare, app monetization and marketing, as well as regional app economics.

So – kindly take 10 minutes to complete the  online survey – and stand to win great prizes ( a $1,000 Amazon voucher, a new iPad, and a Kindle Fire up for grabs). The results of this survey will be published as a FREE report in Q2

Developer Economics 2012 – Key themes

This research revolves around five main themes:

  •  Developer Mindshare
  • App Store Fragmentation
  • Making money from apps
  • App Marketing
  • Apps supply vs. demand per region

 Why are these themes important? Let’s take them, one at a time: Continue Reading…

In Business, Mobile, People, Technology
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You cannot innovate by committee. Because there’s always someone on the committee who will slow things down

April 8, 2012 — Leave a comment

How did we innovate? We had a department of innovation, which encouraged free thinking. People could come up with any whacky idea, it dindt matter. And we had a process called the gate process, where a committe made a decision – “ok that is too whacky”, “proceed with this lot” or “gi do some work on this lot and then come back”. And we had a process for taking new products through a quick cyle of six months gestation period or less. But in the end, only one person made the decision; and that was me. And that is how you innovate. You cannot innovate by committee; becuase there’s always someone on the commmitte who will slow things down. In the end, if you want to innovate, you need to have a single decision maker – Michael Jospeh {2011 interview}

In Business, Misfiring neurons, People
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