Hello Muraya, Great topic for discussion. Simply speaking I could sight 2 issues (from personal observation) that we may need to address. *Risk taking culture*
From experience, this goes beyond folks with deep pockets and banking institutions and other financial players in the market. Conversations with folks in these circles end up with the blank statement that "IT is a Big Risk Investment". Thus we opt for solid less risk investments - real estate, shopping malls, shopping centers, etc. As much as it is our job as IT practitioners to convince these folks otherwise, its a double edged sword. Its sometimes perceptions like these ones from the folks who can invest money into risk areas that create an economy that is net import instead of net export. End of the day folks won't stay in houses and shop in malls they can't afford to shop in if the economy will not create surplus revenues from products that will bring in net revenue.
Granted business is all about returns, but who knew Mark Zuckerberg could launch the largest online community from a dorm? What if he just decided to build a shopping mall? The biggest wins are always in uncharted territories. So its on us and our investment partners to look at things differently. *Scalability* We also need to give a compelling reason why our products are not just enough for the job. A lot of innovations stagnate at the "it does enough" zone and fail to look for bigger fish to fry. There is also an attention to detail issue in the equation. Basically, if we produce whats sufficent and not whats excellent, we compromise on principles of great product development. We need to think beyond this. Just my 2 cents... On Fri, Aug 17, 2018 at 11:43 AM S.M. Muraya via kictanet < kictanet@lists.kictanet.or.ke> wrote:
Last week Walu penned some very pertinent thoughts (will create a second thread for that article). The current one is somehow related
https://www.nation.co.ke/oped/blogs/dot9/walubengo/Why-local-funding-critica...
Quote: "What is this that foreign investors see in our ICT potential that local investors don’t? Additionally, what are the ‘strings’ attached, which more often than not go hand in hand with foreign money... our typical local investor is only interested in the traditional assets.."
Reality: We (veterans in ignoring/undermining each other) did not model decency for upcoming talent and now they worship foreigners who due to cultural differences (misunderstanding) cannot move our nation forward.
https://businesstech.co.za/news/cloud-hosting/251373/amazon-and-microsoft-ta...
Case in point, why do excellent multi nationals (e.g. Microsoft, Amazon) favor South Africa for data centers? In South Africa there is an efficient, creative (primarily white) minority population which does not undermine (deceive) itself as much as we do.
To conclude, last year, a well spoken, well presented employer/investor (former high school mate of mine 25+ years ago) was shocked by Kenyans in their early twenties. He conducted a research for one of his clients and 24 out of 26 lied in their submissions.
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