 Hello and welcome to the U.S. State Department's second interactive web chat in our larger Entrepreneurs Exchange Series. Today's web chat, Networking for Your Business, will focus on the importance of networking and ways you can build and use your network to help your business. My name is Brett Hamzick. I am an Economic Policy Advisor for the U.S. Department of State and today I'm joined live here in the studio in Washington, D.C. by Anna Birch, who as the founder and CEO of Adventure Links can share her experiences regarding the role of networking and how it relates to entrepreneurship. Anna is a successful entrepreneur based here in Washington, D.C. While growing her company, she has pursued her passion as an executive facilitator and experiential trainer. This pursuit has positioned Anna in a global community of entrepreneurs facilitating executive retreats, moderating leadership summits and delivering dynamic hands-on education to startup companies. In addition to impacting thousands of entrepreneurs each year, Anna leads forward focused trainings for executive teams such as for organizations such as the World Bank, Discovery Communications and Fannie Mae. In 2007, Anna found out about Entrepreneurs Organization or EO. It is a connected and global community of more than 10,000 entrepreneurs. Through her many years of experience, Anna discovered some transformative tools for networking and entrepreneurial leadership. So Anna, thank you for being here. Thank you. I'm happy to be here, participate in the web chat. I look forward to having a very interesting conversation today. Thank you, Anna. So much about becoming a successful entrepreneur depends on building the right networks. And with a global alumni community of over one million people around the world, you can be sure that there are many other entrepreneurs out there with whom you can share success stories and challenges. A special thanks goes out to all of the alumni of U.S. government-sponsored international exchange programs joining us from around the world. We are also lucky to have two alumni and a viewing party joining us virtually from the U.S. Embassy in Accra, Ghana. We will go to them shortly. We hope that this web chat will provide a forum for our alumni viewers to connect with one another and other entrepreneurs in order to work together and better achieve your entrepreneurship goals. To participate in this web chat, ask questions and connect with other alumni. Please use the hashtag, entre exchange, or log into the chat space next to this video. We also have Graham Marsden from EO joining us in the chat space. He will help to answer any questions that we are not able to get to on the air. So let's get started by addressing one of the questions that we've seen asked frequently online and that every entrepreneur out there can relate to. What is the best method of networking for your business? And I hope Anna can give us some insights. Thank you. I think it was a real shift for me in 2007, introduced to Entrepreneurs' Organization, a real mindset shift of seeking out relationships and was more successful when I shifted from trying to solve problems or give someone advice or seek out something for myself but rather listen for resonance and listen to understand and connect. That was a big shift for me both in the way people reacted and the way I listened. What do you mean by resonance? Really looking for that connection of where I faced similar challenges to other entrepreneurs and building of a trusted peer network. A trusted peer network. I think that's something that a lot of the entrepreneurs joining in on this program can certainly relate to and certainly desire. So thanks Anna. We also have Kojo and Francesca. Kojo is the founder of Brownstone Capital, an investment and advisory firm, and Francesca is the CEO of Solution Oasis Limited, a company that manufactures and markets natural beauty products. So Kojo and Francesca, can you tell us a little bit more about your businesses and what you think the best method of networking for your business has been? Okay. Hi guys. Good day to all of those who are joining us virtually all over the world. My business is an investment and advisory service firm. Essentially when the business of raising private equity money to capitalize and to set up companies here in Ghana and hopefully in other parts of Africa. And for us networking is a very big deal because principally you need to do a good business case and get all the numbers making sense. But beyond that, if you're looking for the money or you're looking for the right deals to put that money in, or most importantly, you're looking for the technical advice or an ear to listen and give you help and guidance on whichever industry or area at which you're going, networking is a major backbone that determines whether or not you succeed. Fantastic. And Francesca, could you introduce yourself? My name is Francesco Poku. My company's solution awaits us. We own two natural beauty brands here in Ghana, UT Secret and Givenchy Naturals. Our business is to work with basically cooperatives in rural parts of Ghana. We use natural oils and herbs and butters to make a line of natural skincare products, which we market locally and also internationally. So definitely for a small company like ours, trying to go global, networking becomes very important. It becomes kind of like a social capital from which you can, you know, withdraw to get people do things for you that you could otherwise not have done with your very limited resources. So having come in touch with all these alumni of the AWEP program, it has given us that trickling effects because it has led to other networks and it has actually opened lots of doors for us all over the world, especially here in Africa. Thank you very much, Francesca. And I think clearly there's a lot of experience directly from the entrepreneurs we have here in the United States and in Ghana about networking and it's clearly a relevant topic for entrepreneurs in their everyday business. So thank you Francesca and Kojo for volunteering your time and joining us today. We look forward to hearing more from you as we work together to answer the questions coming in. So it looks like we already have a lot of questions coming in. So let's go to a question from our online audience. An online viewer, Marwan, wants to know what is the best way to effectively build and maintain a network? So Anna, what do you think is the best way to build and maintain a network? I'll tell you how I felt I built my own, was really to find, I feel that I'm one or two conversations away from who I need to be speaking with and have experiences over and over like that and to maintain those relationships so that I may be talking to someone who I can help, they can help me and we may not do business together, but I know they'll turn around most of the business I get and the networks I get invited to are someone having talked to me. So maintaining that and keeping the relationship kind of central to that and knowing that I could assemble not to make the same mistakes. There's no new problem when you have a large network. Somebody's been through it. Interesting. Are there specific experiences that you've had recently or maybe in the past when you first started as an entrepreneur that building and maintaining a network of peers was really important to you? I remember kind of making the shift and going to a lot of events that were focused on networking. One was even a speed networking training, which didn't work very well for me. I talked to one person at that training and wasn't following the instructions on how to move around the room quickly, but I still do business with that person today. She still sends business my way and I built that relationship. The speed networking didn't work for me. I found somebody that I really connected and resonated with and they became an advocate for me in the business world and getting to events and telling my story. So it's not speed networking. It's slow networking and investing the time in the relationships. That's interesting. Perhaps Kojo, you can share some personal experiences with us about opportunities you've had to build and maintain a network of peers. I think I like what Anna talked about. Essentially, you either join or you build a network of stakeholders that are relevant to the business in which you are. I participated in the IVLP, a new beginning, 2013, and one of the things we were introduced to was what we call Forum, where you get into a network of like-minded people, that circle of trust where whatever issues you are confronted within your particular business, you can actually open up and talk to other people around the table about and they can, in good faith and with a great sense of honesty, give you some perspectives on how to get out of it. Here in Ghana, we don't exactly have a similar group, but what I try to do is to build and invest in relationships with people who are either suppliers or who provide markets or who provide decision matrices in my industry so that on a regular basis, the kind of conversations we're having, the kind of leads they are giving you, the kind of advice or market options they are giving you are guided in the business decisions you make because you obviously cannot on your own, even just sitting in your boardroom with your colleagues, figure it all out. But in a circle like this, you're able to get the necessary information and ammunition to take the right kind of decisions. So you have to get out there and interact with your network is what you're saying? You do. You do. And we're using various tools such as, I mean, something as simple as my phone, I'm on a WhatsApp chat group with, you know, people in some of the groups that I belong to, and sometimes you have a problem and you throw it out and you have a chat with them and people come up with ideas that you would have to play a consultant for. Sometimes it's just online. Sometimes it's a phone call away or a Skype call away. But you have to stay in touch with these networks. Okay, great. And Francesca, how about your own experiences in building and maintaining a network of peers? By nature, I'm very, I'm a very interactive person, but I didn't really understand the benefit and value of deliberately networking until I got to know that through one of the training programs. I was a member of the Madagascar Women Entrepreneurship Program and IDLP 2012. And it happened to be one of the largest classes I'm told we had a class of 40 women. And from what I learned, I actually did form some strategic alliances. I picked out people in areas or in countries from which I thought they could help do placement for me. For my kind of business, one of the biggest things I normally would look at is the ability to penetrate other markets at the lowest costs. And so I have learned sense and even beyond to make sure when I go somewhere to deliberately look at people that I know or think that we could get mutually beneficial if we got talking or if you got communicating. One of the very interesting ones that came out of IDLP, not within the class, but within a network program we were sent to was a professional in my industry who I happened to meet and who I've kept in touch with. And the amount of information and links and network is given me. One cannot even imagine. Probably in the long run we could forge some partnership. But for now he has led me to suppliers, to information, to his own league of friends, to his network. And these are some of the things that sit back in your room or whatever. You can never get access to them. But what I see is that typically you must make the efforts to keep in touch and keep it going. Make sure you also get something back so that the relationship is balanced and interesting. And then definitely it keeps trickling on and keeps building up. Fantastic. So it's not sufficient to just be an outgoing person as I think a lot of entrepreneurs are. You have to take a deliberate approach and tap into your peer network so you can help both yourself and your peers' businesses. I want to go back and ask Kojo and maybe Anna a follow-up question on something Kojo referenced. This thing called FORUM that an entrepreneur's organization does. What is FORUM and what has your experience been with it, Anna? So when I joined in 2007 I was introduced to FORUM. All EEO members are introduced to FORUM on these three cornerstones. One of them is sharing from a position of experience versus advice or problem solving. Another is confidentiality and the third is personal risk or vulnerability. Those three things in a room of entrepreneurs create a safe space. Create a space that entrepreneurs have conversations about challenges either in their business or personally that they just don't have anywhere else. They get connected and more traction. So this FORUM experience has been very powerful to take it. I've used it in sales. I've used it with my 15-year-old daughter to really take the position of listening to understand and listening for clarity versus trying to jump in and solve a problem. It really shifts in the networking space. I remember one event where I went into that mindset of I was just really listening and this person took me around the event. You've got to meet this lady. She's just incredible and it was all about that mindset of just sharing from a place that I wasn't going to solve any problems or give them any nuggets of advice but rather find places that we had connection and resonance and really powerful tool. Well, you know, don't we do that all the time? Don't we listen all the time and isn't this some natural thing that we do? So often, we're listening and what the voice or the conversation in the back of our head is about solving their problem or asking a question or giving them some genius advice versus really listening. So when I work with FORUMs or I work with executives, I ask what is what's going on in the back of your head when someone's talking to you and are you really leaned in and listening and if you are, you'll find those paths that wouldn't be obvious to you otherwise. Interesting. And Kojo, how has FORUM been relevant for you and in your experience? Well, maybe I'll talk of two examples. The first happened, you know, during my IVLP program itself when we participated in one of the FORUM sessions and the facilitator of that FORUM really demonstrated to me what listening in FORUM circles was about. It wasn't about helping me necessarily with an answer to the questions on my mind, but it was listening deeply so that he could hear what I was expressing, maybe not so much in words and what I was really expressing and I can say it openly now was more of fear about some of the opportunities I had of me and what to do. And because this person was openly listening and the others on the table were listening, they were able to help me understand and deal with the fears that I had and to step out to shape the frontiers or the corners of the vision that I was even afraid to dream. And since I came back, you know, to go on after my program, I don't necessarily have a forum here, but the same elements of FORUM confidentiality, vulnerability, but most importantly listening in a sharing environment have helped me a lot. In fact, just this morning I was in a board meeting for one of our investing companies and as the director of the company spoke, applying the same principles of FORUM, myself and another director were able to to understand exactly what challenges that he was facing in the company and help him look at some new perspectives so that he himself could figure out solutions to the challenges that he was having. So the same principles have worked for me, you know, in various places and I am optimistic that as I continue to apply those principles, the relationship in my business world and elsewhere has shifted. That's fascinating and I think it's great that we talk a little bit about that fear because so often in the entrepreneurial community I think we celebrate entrepreneurship as we should and we encourage entrepreneurship, but there's a lot of risk that goes along with it and there's a lot of fear and personal issues that people have to deal with and that's where that support network and building that network over time. As Anna mentioned that slow networking, investing in relationships is really important. So let's go now to some more questions from our online viewers. So a question from one of our viewers is what role has social media played in networking for your businesses and we're all global businesses now so we have to interact with people through virtual means and social networking and social media has become much more important in our businesses. So perhaps Francesca if you could talk to us a little bit about social media and your experience. So I found myself on a lot of platforms and I found myself joining groups and for my kind of business information is it because things change very quickly. One has got to be very very innovative and I happen to be able to share with people from other parts of the world who have access to all this information and by virtue of that that makes me a kind of a champion in my environment. So whenever there are conferences or events or maybe expositions I definitely see myself standing out you know in a very special way and most of it has been through information I've gathered digitally from people my peers as I would put it and typically it would be somebody in my business arena or somebody out of it but who has something to advance us. Fantastic and Anna have you used social media platforms for your business? Absolutely I think that what social media shifted was from a one-way conversation a conversation of us trying to reach an audience to a two-way so that we started to be able to interact people were opt-in which is a very different experience to reaching a community. I can remember one story of part of our business is a summer camp for youth and we started posting pictures from the camp and videos all approved prior and we started getting one reactions to parents from parents whose kids were showing up and the conversation exploded in a positive way with that and then we were getting calls of kids that weren't showing up. Where's my kid? Where's that picture? So it really created a two-way conversation and the ability for us to understand our market and our clients in a way that we hadn't so it's been a powerful tool for us to tell our story and then have our story told by the people experiencing us. Okay so it's very important for that two-way conversation and Kojo have you also experienced the use of social media in your business? Yes yes yes you know a lot of work that I do in my business as I mentioned earlier it's about raising money and investing that money into business opportunities. So what I have done over the years is to be a very strong advocate for investment in Africa and entrepreneurship in Africa and I use social media to promote a lot of my speaking engagement or projects that we're working on and I realized that what that does is that it allows investors and prospective investors to see what we're doing or what we're passionate about and to talk to us about opportunities to put money through us into ventures and it allows some of the brilliant young people across Africa who are doing great things also to see what we're doing and come to the table and say hey this is what I'm doing and you guys help fund us and therefore we become a channel and a conduit for doing this. So social media you know is doing more for me than I could have paid I don't know time magazine or CNN to do to promote what we're doing. Fantastic so it's an open door it's a way to maintain relationships I think we can all agree it's important so thanks for all the great questions so far I'd like to remind you now that you can still submit more questions either using the hashtag entree exchange or by submitting them in the chat box and don't forget that Graham Marston is also in the chat helping to answer more specific questions he's typing furiously so let's go to more questions coming in now for Francesca and Kojo are you still in touch with your fellow alumni and do you think having them in your network is useful so maybe Francesca you could tell us a little bit about your views. Very very much so very much in touch as I said I told myself I've got 40 success all over the world and so there's been a very fair exchange and I've been in touch via social media with a lot of them there are a number of them who've come in and out of Ghana whom I have hosted or facilitated and there are a number of them outside of Ghana who also have been very very helpful and very useful for example I went to do a show in Liberia neighboring Liberia and I rushed in there without informing my sister my web sister over there I was coming over but I got there and turned out that I needed to have some registrations done I was directed to an office I got there and made me there she was you know she was wondering what I was doing there and her name is Angela so Angela held my hand virtually to whoever had to do my registrations and it got done before I got back I guess I could have done it without hair but probably so I would have taken a longer time out and they have had to go back or let somebody to take care of it of it for me and it's not the only example we have had so many of them probably placing their products in their markets I have to hurry in Tanzania actually marketing my products I have a number of them I'm actually expecting Oye in Nigeria probably before the end of this year because she has some business to do here in Ghana so definitely we are very very very much attached here fantastic and Kojo what is your experience it's been a blessing having a community of our colleagues all over the world who you can share ideas with and through our social media platforms and our chat pages for instance one of my colleagues from India had his company working on a new car and he put the you know a few things about the car the designs etc on our social media platforms and people commented and gave him feedback and gave him ideas even though we weren't not actually doing a test drive I recall one of my other colleagues in Greece Dimitri he's also president of the European Young Entrepreneurs Foundation they were doing a conference and he did some help on you know structuring some of their speaking themes and on delivering some of the messages and I went all the way to Greece to participate in and to help him out with it another colleague of mine Louis in Paraguay I got a client here in Ghana who needed a particular product I put it on the platform and Louis said hey I have a client here who is able to do that and we've been working on you know collaborating with that right now there's a new investing company we've just put some money in and I'm looking to my friends in Paraguay to help us with some software that can help us shorten the learning curve and create greater value in that space so that network of colleagues all over the world it's an immense treasure that you can't pay for fantastic I guess from your view it's a way to take your local network and go global true exactly another question from an online viewer asks how can I network with established businesses who prefer to only connect with successful businesses so this is a really I think an important question for for new entrepreneurs and I'm sure you've you've gone through it in your own experience what you know what advice might you offer I think that identifying the gatekeeper that with a real decision maker sometimes as a newer business you think you have to go right to the CEO of the company and you know one of the things I've discovered is that's not the person for me the person making the decision is the executive assistant and so the other thing is to be willing to give up something of value first before you're asking for business so there have been a few companies we've able been able as a small business to break into World Bank being one and providing something of value now you have a fan club you know these people that are so amazed by what you've provided they go back and internally send your message and spread your message so I think and patience if it's a larger opportunity it takes patience you know a small win might happen in a week a large win could take building relationships over a course of a year but be patient be patient that's that's an important advice for anyone I think Kojo have what has your experience been just to build up on what I was talking about I think that from my experience I'll see one of the major things you need to do after you get fully locked with whoever the decision makers are or the decision influencers are the big thing to do is to prove your value too many of us think that you know somebody owes us an opportunity or that it should be fair for us to to to have a shot at it but the world is not a fair place the business landscape is not a fair place you've got to prove your value and realize from my own experience in 2009 when we did our first investments in the business it was 60,000 seedings which at the time was close to 60,000 dollars at the end of last year our total assets and the management was close to three million dollars now the liabilities that we got to fund those assets mostly came from people who over the years I had through my previous jobs or through other opportunities managed to prove my value too so when you've proven your value it's easier for somebody to give an opportunity particularly big companies that will only deal with other big people they will still give you a shot if you can prove your value prove the value of your idea after like Anna said you managed to get access to the executive assistant or the decision influencer interesting and Francesca I'm sure for your business this is this is a key issue because you're trying to market your products all over the world in large retailers so how do you prove your value as Kojo mentioned what I can see and how I'll interpret the question or look at the question typically it has a lot to do with how you see yourself and the person classifying him or himself as a small business is like putting him into a certain kind of compartments I think when you are looking at growing typically what you'd be marketing would be your potential and typically what you would do would be to show that even at this stage this is how much you've been able to do so if you are very confident in what you're doing you're doing it really right then sometimes size does not even matter because for me if I were to tell somebody that this is the size of my company I'm trying to go global they would laugh but it depends on the approach like Anna said it's I break it into piece meal I do it one at a time and with each you actually do notice that people do notice you and it does open all the right doors for you great thank you so we have another question from an alum of a new beginning named Vladimir he wants to know when building relationships should I aim for quantity or work on developing fewer quality relationships Anna what's your view well based on my earlier story it's been quality but I think that finding a place that I could leverage relationships faster and leverage quality relationships there were a few occasions over the last few weeks someone said if you need something done talk to Anna and within minutes I had the right person to email and they got an email back and got what they needed and wanted that happened three times just because of who I knew nothing to do with what I knew so I think that finding a place that you can build quality relationships quickly is important so quantity is important just so you have the breadth and you have the access when you're trying to access any of the big companies we're just talking about or get someone to make a decision on your behalf or someone else's behalf so and what's been the place for you to find those those quality relationships two places one has been through EO it's an instant global network for me and it's a great place to do great business because entrepreneurs like to talk so they share a lot and I've met people that have found me and discovered me through people I've never met the other is really getting out into my industry community and being a thought leader in the industry community and being willing to partner and pair and not being selfish with resources some leadership experts and partnering with them and looking to what can I do what can I bring and narrowing our scope as to what what are we really experts in versus trying to do it all and then we're approached by larger opportunities and Francesca what is your view do you go for quality relationships or do you go for quantity I definitely would go for quality because when you are working with limited resources it's very important to focus and to get go where you get what you're looking for of course in these days of social media when we are talking about Facebook for example I would then typically limit it and limit who I'm talking to I open it as wide as possible so that's if we have good information it goes as viral as possible but typically for people for business networking I look a lot to the business associations I belong to for example I belong to the global share alliance and what I do to make myself visible is to share information so typically I would go for a speaking engagement at one of these maybe do some training and share my experiences and what I know with the people there what happens with that is that people also come to you to share information and you learn a lot and what happens is that you find people who would normally have not shared information with you do so because they feel that link that you belong to a certain group an example is typically sharing information with competitors quote unquote these people are supposed to be competitors ideally you would not have shared or stayed that close but when you get to meet under such settings in these groups like the association of Ghana industries share network you know all the relevant associations and groups and then you just like kind of target after having learned about tag network and I actually made the effort you know to liaise with people who would not excuse me to say waste my time but who can be of value whatever I'm doing and Kojo do you share Anna and Francesca's view on quality I do because the truth is that entrepreneurs are very busy people so sometimes you know going for quantities a waste of your time and everybody else's time but if you go in for quality and if you pay attention to the people in your industry who will give you value or who are willing to work with you towards a particular objective your success chances are better I've also perhaps just as I mentioned noticed that the formal associations may not necessarily deliver the same value everywhere in the world you've got to look at you know the peculiarities of your market here in Ghana in my industry I find that sometimes the informal relationships work better even than the formal association so I think everybody who is watching or listening to us all over the world also needs to consider their local context even while we talk networking sometimes a formal associate relationships may not be the ones to deliver but you still need to build relationships informally with people in the you know community in which you operate okay so informal industry associations quality relationships I think we have a pretty good path forward for for for Vladimir another online viewer would like to know what has been the personality trait that has helped you reach your networking goals I don't know Anna do you have a particular personality trait that helps you in this I think passion it's it's contagious in networking and people seek you out and so that's for me that been the strongest trait for me doesn't every entrepreneur have passion isn't that required to be an entrepreneur I think it's the fact that I've I've found communities that I can be myself and I can demonstrate that passion versus behavior in a certain way so on the other question too around quality versus quantity there have been several rooms I've been in front of 150 to 200 people and delivering a quality program to that room with passion I haven't gone around and met every single person but I have all these advocates in the room suddenly because they had a quality experience or got asked a powerful question or had a quality experience with someone next to them so looking at quality in that way as well can be exponential okay great and Kojo how about you what is your personality trait is it passion or is it something else it's something else I think for me what has worked is a desire to learn because I'm a young entrant in an industry made up of you know a lot of successful old people who played in this industry for a while now and I realize that what really makes those who are willing to to teach or to help me out do it is that they find that I have a desire to learn from them and it makes them more open and willing to to share experiences with me and to share leads with me and literally to to help me out a lot so for me that's what's been working a desire to learn okay great we have passion that does desire to learn and Francesca what is your particular quality that has helped in networking I think pure openness and honesty I present myself as it is and that is it and for those who connect and connect well we work along if it's not connecting that's it it's not meant to be but when it happens that way those who connect actually get as much as they can get out of me and I think I'm also to be able to get so much out of other people fantastic so we have passion we have willingness to learn and we have honesty I think those are three good traits that we can all focus on so we have another question from Twitter asked by Will he asks when when do you know you're doing more networking and less business how do you maintain that balance so maybe we can ask Kojo to answer that one first I think that it depends on where you are in your in your journey as an entrepreneur in my first four years as a business person I did a lot more working building the structures building the systems building the reporting templates training the people working with them on a day-to-day basis but as you go up the ladder and as you go up in the journey you're going to end up being required to do more networking and that becomes your full-time job description I have a little joke that the chief executive or the you know number one leader in the organization is the number one diplomat for the organization your job is to go out and be in the right circles to bring in the big ticket deals and to open the big doors but you can only do that after you've built a very strong system behind you that can deliver even if you brought on the table a two million dollar deal so when do you know you're doing less networking or more working it depends on where you are in the in the journey in the early stages you need to do a lot more working and a lot less networking to you know to feed what you're building but as you go up and as you build stronger structures I think you need to do a lot more networking to bring in the business that the structures will deliver and Francesca how do you know when you're doing too much networking and too little work or vice versa just like everything else you have to set your priorities and especially in these days of social network if one does not take care you spend all your time you know tweeting and what's happened and all of that I have through my business learned how to use what I call my down times anytime I'm in a situation where I cannot do much I find something very useful to do like when I was setting up when things go very tough I could not really move I spent those times doing research and business planning so in the same way I typically would do let's say social networking when I'm driving somewhere or where I'm when I'm stuck at a reception or something you know and also for person to person networking I actually do pace myself and determine what is really necessary and what is not because it's very important to keep the balance or you find yourself you know doing all of that and even other things can attend it too that's interesting Anna you know Kojo and Francesca talked about a couple interesting concepts there I mean one was that you have to focus on the stage you're in of your business and I'd be interested to hear from you on your experiences your business has grown from just you to a larger company on whether your networking approach has changed whether that balance has changed and then if you have opinions on Francesca's concept about downtime I think we're all we always feel like we have to be on but I think that downtime is also really important so what are your thoughts on that so we've been in business 17 years and I wish I would have started a not to-do list a lot earlier I think that once I started to pinpoint what I shouldn't be doing and that what I should be doing what my unique ability was things that I love to do and I'm really great at I wish I would have started a lot earlier on that it's and so I tell my team my role similar to what Cojo said I remove obstacles and I get you introduced to who you need to talk to so that's been a powerful thing for me to identify what only I can do and also what I shouldn't be doing I think the other thing that allowed me to think bigger and dream a little bit bigger was to know I had those systems otherwise I might have made our list of dreams a lot shorter if I knew that I had to go and enact every single operational piece of that so building that team allows the CEO to think a little bit bigger and push the team a little bit more so really getting myself I did I blocked out days where on Thursday I'm just going to think big don't talk to me don't call me don't schedule any media I'm just going to think big it's going to be think big Thursday big Thursday you know Friday it's just going to be getting my logistics together for the next week Monday it's going to having those days and letting whatever your community maybe it's your employees maybe it's your vendors know and identify with those days you know today I am I'm focused on growing and talking to vendors talking to new clients but Thursdays think big so setting those times aside okay and how is networking changed as your business has evolved is it different at the early stages or the later stages it's very much I think I offer much more in networking than I ever used to I don't go into a networking event now looking to see who can I do business with that's completely changed and I have so much more success at networking events and it's usually the person I've talked to has referred me to somebody else very rarely that the person I talk to someday I end up doing business with okay so you're giving you're demonstrating your value as I think Kojo was mentioning earlier okay great another question we have from Twitter this time from Samuel thank you very much for the question he asks what do you do to prevent getting complacent especially after achieving exciting results as a first-timer in entrepreneurship I think this is a this is a really good question and maybe Kojo and Francesca you could kick it off for us typically one piece setting new goals because no matter how far you've gone there's a lot more you can do so that is one very major way of doing a certain new goals thinking bigger doing other things bringing other people in and especially for the kind of business I am in I have a lot of focus on influencing my community especially because of the source of my raw material so it's not possible to get complacent because typically there are always new challenges and new things you can either invest in you know or get in so you just have to let the passion keep going you just have to keep growing it's not to say that you would be an insatiable animal that wants everything but the whole deal is that you grow until you are dead well Kojo I'd be interested in your your views on that what are your tricks of the trade for avoiding complacency after you have success I think the natural tendency for any entrepreneurs to pick up a new challenge but the risk with that is that you may end up abandoning the very things that you started or the very things that brought you the success in your quest for new success I mean I watched some of the programs and you see some of the biggest entrepreneurs now decide to take up interesting things hunting and sailing and all sort of things and I think it's obviously because they are getting bored with their own success and they are looking for a new challenge but my way out is to increase value even within the space that you have been successful so if what we wanted to do was to build a company and our value or asset on the Marine Corps was $60,000 it's not about looking for a new challenge that says let's abandon that and go do something else but it's about how do we grow into newer markets or how do we increase assets and management how do we increase value how do we diversify a little bit so that you don't abandon what you are doing but you increase value you create more value even within the space that you have selected to operate that's my little trick around it that's a great trick and Anna after 17 years in business this is something that you have to focus on right so what are you doing every day to make sure that you're pushing your entrepreneurial venture forward I thought of two things one is a very specific day when I felt like I was getting out of touch with what was happening at the front line of business we have a set of core values and I went we're on 300 acres and I went on a run around the property and saw all the groups and noted that every core value that we have and our company was showing up and was very moved and went back to my team and told them and that injected me with a lot of new energy and the second thing is mentorship so I work with a lot of startup companies and their energy and I remember back to when I had that kind of energy and fear in the startup phase and that has really addressed any complacency I don't have the opportunity for complacency with those two things but very specifically mentorship and looking for what it is why you're in the business you're in so taking the opportunity to give back to your community a little bit and help some entrepreneurs that are at our earlier stages in their venture is a way you avoid complacency yes great fantastic so before we get to more of your great questions I would like to thank the viewing party in Hub Accra Ghana for joining us today hello Accra how are you doing also don't forget to tweet pictures questions or quotes using the hashtag entre exchange okay on to the next question is networking the same around the world I've been told that different cultures and societies have different unspoken rules for networking and contacting new colleagues so maybe Anna you can kick it off and sort of talk about what networking like in the United States and then we can hear from Kojo and Francesca some differences in culture I think that the biggest thing to keep in mind in the United States is the noise all of the stimulus all of the input that's coming in and not to be part of the noise but to be but to be different recognized polite and to provide that value right off the start to people whether it be something you're giving up that you're comfortable giving up and I think it's also in the United States it's also being introduced through somebody you know is really important to have that warm introduction anytime somebody says and I've got this new opportunity can you provide me a warm introduction don't just have me call them can you go out of your way to provide me that warm introduction so that's a big thing I think I ran a program with 18 countries back in June and in London and the the face to face was was no different in the networking which was which was refreshing because I knew how to behave so the face to face and some of the things we've talked about was no different for me okay great and Kojo earlier you were talking about the importance of paying attention to local context so what's the culture of networking in in in your experience in Ghana I'm very excited about that question because we always assume that you know you can paint the whole world with one brush when it comes to some of these principles and as I mentioned you've got to look at the local context here in Ghana my personal view is that formal networking events and channels really don't deliver the success you are looking for you need to pay more attention to what I call retail networking where you build one-on-one relationships with the people who matter to your industry and you know here in Ghana we're very hospitable people who like to care a lot about each other and so if you want to build a good relationship with people in your industry you've got to care about the things that matter to them and it may sound funny to people from other parts of the world but funeral house for example at Deshisa funeral for example are a big deal if if if if if I control a five million dollar fund and you want to access that fund it's great for you to bring your business plan and everything but if two of you brought your business plan and all your documents and another you know paid attention to have a closer relationship with me so that we understood each other a lot more I understood the ethos of his company chances are that I may be more open to dealing with him so here in Ghana you've got to pay attention to the cultural nuances attend the people's funerals pay attention to the people have a strong personal relationship with the people deal with the things that matter to them and it's out of that relationship that you can you can you can blossom in business that's that's really interesting I can tell you in the United States that's something that we would never think of so I think having that local insight into how to do networking is is very important Francesca do you have anything to add on that so since he talked about the national arena I would like to go beyond also to add you know one has to be very sensitive to the cultural sensitivities of whoever you're dealing with for example how you'd network with somebody in Asia will be very different from how you'd network with somebody in Europe and so especially when what you're dealing with is important enough then it's made the good to research you know to find out from somebody or somewhere so you know which lines you can cross and which ones you cannot because sometimes some very thin lines can be very very costly to you certain cultures if you are not sensitive to them okay that's wonderful wonderful insight and I think what we're talking about here really is is trust you know how do we how do we generate trust with our contacts so that we can do business together and that's a little bit different depending on the culture you're talking about so we have another question from a viewer who asks how do you usually connect after your initial networking so how do you and how do you keep track of all your contacts I mean it's sort of a similar question to the quality versus quantity question but if you you know if you're in business for 17 years after 17 years you have quite a few contacts so what what tricks do you have to offer Anna that that you use to keep in touch with all of your contacts the first is 24 hours you're reaching back out to that person really within the first 24 hours and the second is back to my not to do list making sure I have somebody in my life that's good at what I'm not good at and I'm not good at keeping track of contacts on a physical level or tactical and so really having my assistant drive that my assistant driving a little longer email than I might write and putting that template in front of me so yeah I would say getting back to people within 24 hours mentioning something from the conversation that meant something to them is important to me and then if it's something I really want to pursue getting a call set up and just connecting and before I go into that call what is it what value could I bring to them what value do I have for them okay great and Kojo do you have any thoughts or any tricks of the trade I was beginning to think that was a trick question because it sounds pretty simple in my mind it's my phone my database so I have a database of fund managers I have a database of prospective investee companies have different databases so depending on what I'm looking for I can go through them but I you know just simply have my phone and sometimes I'll just go through my phone book and say here's a guy I have an headphone from you know for a while just call him and say hey dude how you doing I have an headphone you know while everything okay I was just taking up on you and I find that you don't little things like that if I can't reach you just send your text message hey I just thought of you this morning I hope all is well at your place little things like that just keep you in touch and the next time you call you you're not a stranger and it's easier to get a foot in the door okay so I can expect a call from you in about a week or a month's time perhaps you never know fantastic Francesca what Francesca what thoughts are you on technology is doing it a lot and like Anna said by etiquettes it's good to send a thank you note something after you've met people but at the end of the day I go back to the quality and the quantity thing depending on how much you need you have in common or you need to keep in touch for you find yourself using technology to stay in touch and if the connection or the link was strong enough sometimes after several years when it becomes necessary or when you just have to bump into each other it's the reconnect just comes back great thank you well unfortunately we are almost out of time but we do have time for one more question so let's take that final question so Vanya another online viewer asks how can a local network effectively be used to identify social needs as well as business opportunities so I think this is another important question we're all members of our community we're not just business people so perhaps Francesca you want to start us off and tell us how your network has been useful in identifying social needs as well as business needs especially in the part of the world I come from the two normally do get interlinked and you typically start off from a business point but you get to identify social needs and sometimes it will be a social social business need so it just kind of happens just by looking at the situation depending on who you're dealing with for example if I take the sources of my materials when you go in there it's typically a business need you're going to get a raw material to produce but once you deal with them and you get to know about their families and their livelihoods and what it is that motivates them and keeps them going then even as a business decision it makes sense to tamper a little bit of social needs to their business needs so that's how it works out typically both locally and internationally and Kojo do you have any thoughts on using your network to identify social as well as business needs? Yeah I think for me two things one is regular interactivity and the second thing is that interactivity must be channeled or geared towards solving problems or creating markets and if I'm regularly interacting with anybody in any of my groups and interacting about things that show us how to solve problems or create markets the two just connect and we have somebody there Great Anna what do you think about what Kojo and Francesca said and also your own experience in identifying those needs in your community? We just had our team retreat and this came up being very deliberate about not only getting into the conversations and getting to the table where these conversations are happening that affect our business and that affect our community so we are every month dedicated to finding two communities or two maybe a board a conversation something going on in our community to connect with as a team so that we not only are we at that table but the businesses to hear what the pain points are and what we can solve or contribute to Maybe that helps a little bit to continue the passion I mean because like I think we all have an interest in giving back to our communities and we can tap into our networks to figure out where those opportunities are Absolutely Well I'd like to thank everybody very much for your fantastic questions I think we've all learned some really great tips on how to best incorporate our networks to help build and sustain our businesses and give back to our communities as well Francesca and Kojo do you have any final thoughts or advice you'd like to share with us? Yeah Simply put for all of those who are out there and wondering when to start or take networking entrepreneurship more seriously I'll say now get started now very much like that Great Fantastic Francesca briefly any final thoughts? Just like to add that it does take some great effort no matter how sweet or nice or warm you are it must be targeted it must be structured for it to be very useful Very good advice thank you very much Francesca Anna anything to add for our viewers out there? Just three words you're not alone That's great you are not alone certainly and I think you have a you have a one million person strong network across the entire globe to tap into and I encourage you to do that so one thing I'd like to ask all of our viewers if they haven't already talked to their their peers in that alumni network I encourage you to pick up the phone and call your peers as Kojo and Francesca they're sitting right next to each other I'm sure they're they're going to do some great networking right after this this program ends and I'd like to thank Anna for taking the time out of out of her day you have a very busy day I'm glad we're not on your do not do list and I'd like to thank everyone today and also Francesca and Kojo for your participation and helpful insight a big thanks also goes out to all the international exchange alumni that I mentioned who joined this web chat from around the world thanks also to the entrepreneurs from around the world who logged in to watch and participate in our discussion a recording of this program will be available on the international exchange alumni website and Facebook page so stay tuned for our next entrepreneurs exchange interactive in January thanks again and have a great day