African Businessman

I'm going to give you a profile of one of our champion agents, and one of the people that makes me believe Zambia can make it and that I should be a part of that. You are reading this from your "Ivory Towers" in cities of your respective countries, not understanding what it's like to be here and do this work. I can say that without offending and with full confidence of it's truth because I live here and work with him and people like him every day, yet only get glimpses of "what it's like" which make me realize how much I don't know. I had a meeting with him today and was intending on ripping a strip off him for poor performance, partly because he dropped the ball on a few things, but largely because I had forgotten the good things he's done and what it's like to be him for a day. By the end of the meeting I was holding back tears and had resolved to help him.

He doesn't have the tools and skills to get what he needs. I called his manager and asked, "Why can't you give him a bigger float?" and he replied "What gain will his business make from this investment? We have limited money to invest so we have to put it where we get the biggest returns" I responded to him that we will make a proposal and get back to him. When I hung up I knew exactly what kind of proposal was needed to get money. My friend had no idea. This isn't his fault but is the result of only completing gr.12 in a shitty education system. Does anyone want to invest in a small business? Loans in increments of $100?



This is Edwin Nglube. He got a job for a mobile finance company and was sent to work in Katete, which speaks a slightly different language than he knows. He thought he was going for 7 days so packed his bag accordingly. When he sat down on day 1 a manager said "If these guys are going to be here, I want them to be here, not constantly running back to Lusaka to see girlfriends". We replied "No problem, these guys will be living here and are here full time, isn't that right Edwin?" Could you imagine what it's like to get that shocker, two pairs of underwear, one pair of trousers and you're now in your new home. What was his response? "Yes". Did he complain after the meeting saying "Oh shit guys, I thought I was going to be here for 7 days, I still have all my stuff in my rented place in Lusaka"? No. I didn't know he thought he was coming for 7 days until 2 months in. He picked up the different dialect and worked his ass off in the field, 6 days a week, until he was told (not really asked) that he was no longer going to be a field worker but was going to take over the Katete agent shop. He loved field work, but took this job because he had to. He signed a new contract decreasing his pay from 800,000/month to 500,000/month. My hefty volunteers stipend is 2,300,000/month, just for reference. His decrease in pay is partly due to paying off his loan on the champion agent shop. He paid off 250,000 of the 15,000,000 owed. I sat down with him and asked him how long it would take at that rate to pay off his total loan. 5 years. He just got married and owes 3,500,000 as a marriage fee to her parents. He took out a 500,000 loan from me and has repaid 133,000/month out of his 500,000 salary to me for the last 2 months. Of course he's not just an agent doing regular stuff, it's Zambia and we're a start up so he does a lot more, without being paid of course. When shit hit the fan with a project, he was fielding calls from the customer company staff, who visit him instead of the actual agent next door, he also got calls from the real agent and from me. When it was resolved I got thanks from management for a job well done and he got thanks from just me. During this, completely on his own initiative, he got on the back of a bike taxi and journeyed to the prison, not a favourite location for Zambians to visit, and plead with the police, not great people to plead with, to let him talk to the guy who was supposed to be running the agents shop. After several trips he managed a miracle and the police brought the prisoner (aka voucher agent) to the shop to let Edwin try to work. Until then Edwin had been operating remotely out of a restaurant in town. I told him to go around town and source all the food in the voucher package and get back to me. He did that very well and was able to act as the secondary voucher agent, only to find out that we added him as a voucher agent and removed him as a regular agent, oh yeah, he's a regular agent too, so he called us and we fixed his status, then some beneficiaries came and he used his 1,500,000 cash float to run around buying salt and flour for these guys and then redeem their voucher which were supposed to be worth 104,000 but were still only 100,000 which is less than it cost to buy all those goods... He deposits money for other agents, trains voucher agents, trains other agents, pays local casual workers and distributors, rides a bike taxi to the bank 5,000/trip and about an hour of his time, then photocopies his deposit slip, comes back to town, scans it at the computer shop (for a fee) and emails it to South Africa to get the money credited in his account. Then waits at a broken ATM that sometimes has 800,000 limits and pays 10,000/withdrawal to get back to his shop full of angry customers who have been waiting for him, only to process their transactions which empties his float sending him back on the same journey again.



I'm not saying this is a terrible situation and we're in the wrong, I'm definitely not saying this is a good situation. I'm just saying that this is the reality for our key people and it's very difficult. To me it's no wonder he invents ways to make his business work like borrowing money from people or other agents (but instead of being rewarded, he's worried about being caught for doing something he shouldn't have to do in the first place). I've worked with him since March. He's 24, newly married, hard working, smart and trustworthy. He told me he almost quit when he found out his new pay was 38% less than he was getting for doing something he enjoyed more. It sucks that I could easily imagine him stealing his float and running away. But he won't.