 This is the way to do it. This is the way to do it. This is the way to do it. Personal experience makes the best of experts in any given field. In today's program, we have Teddy Oyo, the founder of Kisumu House of Photography. Teddy, Karibusana. Thank you. So it's a package for me, your experience in the media industry. Well, the experience is both challenging and exciting at the same time, but for me, my journey and experience has been a long one. However, within a short time, but long in terms of experience, I was not to be in the media industry to start with, because when I finished, well, I had an inspiration, but when I finished my high school, it took quite long before I got into this space. I finished my high school in 2006, and I joined college in 2011. So you can imagine that span. Within that period, I was just doing some other things, but were not related to media or anything back in the village. So it has been a long journey from that time to where I am now. I went to Kenya Institute of Mass Communication. I did broadcast journalism. My experience in exposure in media came at the time when I went for internships in one of the several mainstream media houses. From there, I came and stinted a bit. Where the twist came is when I finished and joined the mainstream media, then I didn't last long because there were issues within. They were cutting down on staffing, scaling down their time. It really disoriented me. I stayed out for almost six months and, funnily enough, I got an opportunity to work in a hotel. I worked in a hotel. So when I was telling my friends I'm working in a hotel, the colleagues or classmates, they were like, hotel, what do you do at the hotel? I would not explain much. I would just tell them I'm working in a hotel because that was my first and imagined experience or diversion of a career. A unique one. Imagine you having inspiration to work in a media house. You have been on radio because I was on local radio and you know the village. You already know you. No, then you want to explain now I'm cooking or doing something because then they don't know any other aspect of hotel apart from offering services. So I kept it silently. What I used to tell them. But nowadays I'm not on air. I'm producing content so you can't hear me. I had to lie a lot of time because they used to hear me. I had a show radio in a local radio station. A show in the evening so everybody would be listening to me. So all of a sudden they are not hearing that kind of thing. So what do I have to do? I have to keep you know the whole world is we don't can't tell them anything. They know you as a journalist. They know you as a media personality and the village about it. Our son. When you go say hi to us. So you can imagine that kind of experience. So from there I began accepting that it's real that I'm not in. I'm not. But in the hotel it is the good thing was I was in the department of communication digital marketing. So it's still I do not die that much in terms of what I do. But it's only the sector that changed. So I stinted there for probably okay I can gauge it for around four years. At some point I left to go work somewhere. Then I came back to the hotel again. Then from the hotel now I I now shifted back now to media. So that's journey. Yeah it's quite a colorful journey I might say. So what sparked the interest towards your media and communication career? I used to have a person I was looking after. Like a person who was my inspiration. Used to be in one of the radio stations as I was growing up. So every time I used to love. Let me just say this is a story of every other journalist. Of every other person immediately. They must have had somebody who was inspiring them to be what they are. If at all they didn't become a journalist of media personalities by accident. If at all they didn't. If they didn't come by accident. Then they must have been following somebody who was inspiring them. So when I was growing up I used to listen to a lot of radios. And my dad is an electronics person. He repairs radios. So we had a lot of interaction with radios. So we loved, we loved, we loved it. So all along it was just radio, radio, radio. Then that inspiration came. So when I finished high school. Well I did not go through the, I did not go through the, I mean the job. So I had to wait for me to get some money to go through the college. Then opportunity, when the opportunity came I said now. I was just to make it. I got into class with people who had graduated just the other year. So we were two of us in class. But again the inspiration of our star was, we wanted our star to shine. We were two of us who are older in that class. Because we finished the same year with that gentleman. So we used to tell ourselves that let's shine here. And we used to do it. My first radio experience was within the school where I was hosting a show. So you see it was already picking up. Yeah so I had an exposure. I was hosting a show every week. Then from there when I went for internship I was also, my first internship was of course on radio. Then now another one was also on radio. So it was so much on radio. Your part was just on radio. Radio, let me just say it was still a little radio. Then you know if you are in radio you can only be radio. You see this other aspect of media like let's say TV production and all. There are a lot of other things you can do with that skill. But radio you are just a radio. So it was kind of challenging for you to transition to anything. If you are not working in radio what are you doing? What are you doing? True true true. Yeah so that's what I can say inspired me into being in this industry. It has been a very interesting journey I must say. I've interacted with a lot of people. I've networked enough but not enough for the future. For this far I've seen I can say I've really made friends. And you seem to have so much love for media. So how intentional must one be in order to pursue a particular part? You pursued media as your particular part. So how intentional must one be to pursue their own part? Very much intentional. So if you want to be a chef start interacting with chefs. Be in the spaces where food is being talked about. Avoid things that are food related. In that manner you are preparing yourself for the game. If you media understand and be in those spaces because those opportunities or rather you can be skilled but opportunity might not be there. But how do you get opportunities interact with people within those spaces? So that's a number one intentional. Intentional in terms of skills acquisition. Be know what you know very well what you want to do. You know after having that skill the opportunity will just fall in place. But don't wait for opportunity for you to get skill. Create that skill then the opportunity when the opportunity comes you now just fit in. So yeah so just be very intentional. For me I was very intentional with what I wanted to do. Like I was in the hotel industry but I was still doing. Yeah you're still focused on media. On media and the fact that I was also in the hotel I was working in was also in the setup where I interned and done media. So this generally is still interacted with me. We still got along I still knew what was happening there in the media spaces around me. So I did not lose it. You see some people when they divert they lose it in the contacts their networks. Even the skill inspiration around what they wanted to do. For me I did not lose it. I used to even when I'm off job I'm doing photography and media content for other clients. There are people who didn't even know that I'm Italian. Yeah they didn't. And let's speak about the Kisumu house of photography. You've talked about radio with so much love. So what is the genesis of Kisumu house of photography? It's a short story. When I started my now my okay just doing media or doing content creation in terms of photography I used to call myself Smolted. Smolted? Ted Photography. Smolted Photography. Yes that was the first name. Because the other time I was called by I was attending a state function. I used to write. I used to blog a lot. Those same when blogs were very local blogs. You know Facebook was very subtle in terms of people used to read blogs. So I used to write blogs for different events for different people review personalities. Then my blog was called explorekisumu.co.ke. The Explore Kisumu was about to tell people about people in Kisumu. People around what they're doing. The places to visit in Kisumu. The personalities I blogged about DJs. Musicians coming up. Then there was a creative economy function organized by the state. Then I inboxed. I remember I inboxed. It's funny but I inboxed Big Ted. Out of nowhere. I just inboxed Big Ted that I'm doing this and this. I've seen there's a creative economy conference coming up in Nairobi. But I'm based in Kisumu. Then also when you came because they came to source for the creatives for that event. And I wrote a story on my blog. What event are you talking about just to catch on for you? The creative economy. Oh okay okay. Conference. Creative economy conference. Creative economy conference. Conference. That was the first creative economy conference that was happening in Kenya. So I wrote a story when they came to fish creatives within Kisumu. Then I shared with him that blog link. Then I told him this is what I wrote. Then he just told me Ted gave me your number. You are joining that event. The conference. The conference. All the conference. It was attended by it was the first IM conference that attended. It was IM. Just to say so. So when that came in I was telling you the genesis of KHP. Now the conference when we attended the conference. When I was called because we were the bloggers of that event. We were the hashtag guys of that event. Then Big Ted calls me in a podium. And says also here we have Ted. But now we can be true Ted's. One has to because I'm small. I'm big. I'm Big Ted. He's becoming small Ted. That's how small Ted photographic him. So from there I started branding my things as small Ted, small Ted, small Ted photographic. Then it came people started challenging me because I was growing very fast. People started telling me why do you call yourself small? They didn't know. I didn't have that time to explain the source of that name. So I told them I'll grow big. I'll grow big. So after that I saw there was need to not be small anymore. But to be big. Then I came up I said what outfit can I have that encompasses all the because I was now actually doing digital marketing for different brands. I was doing content creation for different brands and that do not need that small name. That's how we came up with Kisumu House of Photography and Communications. The registered name is Kisumu House of Photography and Communications Limited. So that's the umbrella body that now I use as my company to do my affairs. It's quite it's quite catchy Kisumu House of Photography. You are the house. Yeah, I'm looking for anything. I look for that. Wow. So what activities do you undertake at KHP? KHP. Yeah KHP does a lot of things. KHP handles PR. We do thought and see. We do web design. We do digital content creation. We do brand management and endorsements. We do photography and videography. So that's what we do. Immediately we are a team. Actually, Hinaw's team is around five people, but we work with a lot of people because sometimes we get jobs that need a lot of human capital. That needs manpower to execute. So we... You should recruit me. I'm also manpower. I will. Yeah, of course you feed the bill. We actually don't have a voice of a person. So we always source when client wants. So we do a lot in terms of content creation. And we've worked with several other organizations, corporate entities, individuals, SMEs to... In those regards of PR, content creation, digital marketing, we do all that. So that's what we do. We're based in Kisumu. That's a lot of activities that you undertake. So how do you ensure that everything is running smoothly at the organization? It's challenging, but having been in the background of media and all that, it all costs for planning. Occasionally I have a number of events or assignments to do, but how I do that is nowadays I build client confidence in the company not as big. That's the... I think that's the wisdom I had that I should not go astray because I shall have limited my ability. I shall... So if I tell someone that I'm sending someone, they will not have the confidence, they would want to see me. But I still get that a lot, especially for individuals who still want me to attend the events as a person because then they trust in what I do. Yeah. So but I've really built confidence in my team. I've told them this is something called Hinao's policy, how we do our things, and the quality that is required. So even if I'm not there, you'll see me in the quality that is delivered to you. It's satisfying to see client happy at the end of the day, but that's always our goal. Speaking of clients, who are your target clients and why these specific ones? Our clients, we don't have a specific client for us because in all the industries, what we do is required, is the need that drives our client. Do they need what we offer? Do they need what we offer? We'll offer that. You know, creating content, all these people need content. In everything we do, they need content. So we are not limited to any client. We also work with individuals, NGOs, governments, ministries. Though it calls for you to work with certain entities, it needs you to do some things differently. That's where the company comes handy. There are things we can do that individual cannot do because they need those company registration documents, they need a carrier, they need all that. For you to work with a bigger, for you to go big, you also have to have those things in place. That's so much diversity in terms of clientele. So taking on such a huge responsibility to handle different kind of people, how has it affected your business in the long run? It has affected my business positively because I'm not where I was before. So it has affected me in terms of getting people trusting me that I'll be everywhere, but my team will be everywhere. So that's a positive effect, yes. What other challenges have you encountered in this journey and how did you get by? The challenges that we face are majorly sometimes clients who do not meet their end of bargain. Like do the clients do a project, you've created your time, you've used resources, but now they don't want to pay. They pay, now we came up with a policy, a payment policy. Payment policy services. Yeah, payment policy of, if it's not an LPO, then you commit a percentage before, then during, then after. So the three-tier payment plan it saves us to not to spend on resources that are not going to be catered for by the client. So in the event that client fails to pay, even after the delivery, you have sorted your bills, running course already, so you're not going to lose. Also, you also have clients who take too long beyond their agreed payment terms. Then another challenge we find is there's a lot of lately, there's a lot of theft of equipment. You have so much experience in the media industry. You have been able to rise up against different odds. What advice can you give to a young person freshly out of high school or campus? And maybe they feel there is no hope for them to continue. What advice do you have for them? My advice is two-faced. Number one, when you are in college or in your formative years or your career, identify your strength. Then commercialize your strength. Number two, come out here and identify people who can be humble. Humility is the best thing you can ever do. If you're never humble, you can never learn those things. So, be humble, accept corrections, accept advices. Stand on the way of opportunity. Opportunities can pass the other side if you don't stand there. Be found there. Just be found there. Thank you so much, Teddy. I have loved this. You have so much that you need to share. So, how can we find you as we close up? Okay, we are Kisumah house of photography. Finally, there's not that house yet. There's not a physical house. There's not a physical house. Our email address is info at khpcommunications.com. We have digital at khpcommunications.com. We have for me, Teddy Oyo at khpcommunications.com. But we also have a Gmail address, which is khpcommunications.gmail.com. So, our numbers are 0712, 729390. That's my personal number for business. 0712, 729390. That's the number that we do business with. But by and large, we are always open for business. We do a lot with people. You have had it. Find your strength and commercialize it. Be humble. Find mentors. They will lead you in the right way to start towards your success. This has been Youth In Action. I am Nyongweso Grenis. See you next time.