I have been looking at the Avo space with fresh eyes over the past couple of months.  It has just happened that I have had a few powerful and influential men engage with us in all sorts of ways recently, and those engagements have made me feel really proud of the women empowerment space we have created here.

We’re not a company of women per se - our staff makeup is predominantly female, but we have our fair share of capable and enlightened men who are able to function without being threatened by powerful women. For us, the space feels normal - we work together as a team of competent folk, and don’t notice the exceptional womanness that surrounds us.

But when men come in from the outside, who are not as used to working with powerful female teams as one might think, the insights I’ve been getting are extraordinary.

Firstly, most of them underestimate our team at face value. Almost without fail they will, at some stage, express surprise at the brainpower and capability, not to mention pure confident presence of me, or other women on the team.

Then, the lack of executive male presence seems to make them feel a bit uncomfortable at an unconscious level - almost as if we can’t really be trusted to pull off the huge expectations they have of our company.

It’s followed by a ‘this is weird, but nice; too-good-to-be-true?’ conversation when they begin to settle into working with us, and find our candid, practical warmth refreshing and engaging.

It’s all very flattering, of course, but shows a sadder side up for me: despite all the good work that has been done over the past 20 years, there is still a pervading expectation that women are somehow ‘less than’ their male counterparts.  Every time a man expresses surprise at the performance of women in general, he reveals an underlying predjudice that is still firmly in place.

In the face of all this, enter Steve: a 50-year-old grey haired white male, who is taking on the senior role of managing the day-today Avo operations while I focus on building Footprint and my ‘pinky and the brain’ strategy.

He’s never had a woman boss; he’s completely bewildered by how this Woman-DNA business actually operates; he makes at least 1 ‘this woman just surprised me’ comment a day!  But what I love about having him around, is that he is refreshingly aware of every time his prejuduce trips him up; he senses a learning curve ahead of him that goes way beyond simply making this business work; and he’s not threatened by the lionesses that prowl the Avo corridors (much). At last Avo adds to its diversity mix a token middle aged pale male: Welcome aboard, Steve Gaydon. I’m really looking forward to helping you see the light!  And also, of course learning from you in buckets!

TP has made it into the Destiny man magazine. And Rachel did some awesome work researching and putting the thoughts together with him.

Human Resource departments are aften seen as cost-centres and are not always seen as adding real strategic value to the business.  TP gives us some hints and tips on how HR can be utilized correctly within your organization.

Read the scanned article from Destiny man here.

When I started working at AVO nearly three years ago, I made a commitment to to blog my journey. It does not matter to any of you whether I share my stories, but I needed something to hold myself accountable to. To keep going when it feels tough to push through.   

It has been some time since I wrote a blog, but the events of this last week have motivated me so much, I am inspired to share them with you. 

At the beginning of last year, I was encouraged by Robin Sharma to be specific about what I wanted to achieve for the year. He spoke about: Developing a strategy, setting up a self-contract, measuring yourself along the way and implementing your dreams (you can check it out in our Feb 09 archives).

I faithfully wrote down my goals, but I was not entirely sure about what steps to take to make them a reality. Did I reach my goals? no I did not. But what I learned was the necessary steps needed to reach those goals. I can now sit down with similar goals and plot the steps I need to take to get there. So were my goals wasted? not a chance!

It was quite a moment when I realized that I was on the road to fulfilling those goals even though I thought I had lost my way. I went back to some of my old journals and revisted the dreams and goals I had visualized for myself and paid little attention to.  I look at where I am right now and realise that I am on the road to the places I want to be. I realize the dreams and goals I had spent authentic time visualizing are the ones I am living!

Jules has always told me to trust the process, the hardest thing for me! Well, looking back at this week; I think life is showing me that I can trust the processes. An interesting question is, what would happen if I had paid a little more attention to those things I had visualized for my life… maybe the journey would have been more invigorating!

Bear with me …

Another event that made me sit up and take notice, came packaged in a movie  “XIII”, a new release from our local video store. A real ‘skop-skit’ movie in the vein of Bourne Identity. The main character gets hurt in a parachuting accident and loses his memory. Quite a frightening experience. A woman he meets proclaims how awesome it is, how differently she would live her life if she could erase the memories of the bad experiences in her life!

Oh my Gosh! I have worked hard in the last two years, to move forward in my life. And yes, I have moved on but the residue still sticks to me, holding me back. I decided to give it a bash and work for one week being conscious about erasing the past, asking myself “how would this moment feel,  if you did this thing without remembering that past?” I felt stronger and more alive, taking more risks which proved successful. I am committing to recognizing when my energy gets stolen by past memories of weakness or failure. I know it is going to take time but if I can reprogram my brain – I think it will produce great results.

BEE has incredible opportunities in this country and in your business, but only if it’s being used effectively.

So how exactly does one use it effectively you ask?  BEE doesn’t have to have the negative connotations that it has been given, Jules chats about this in today’s Star Workplace.

Read the scanned version here for more information.

Telesales call-centres are the main contact point between most major corporations and their clients or at least their prospective clients.  Therefore it is imperative to make sure you know the game and your actual objectives.  This article applies sales principles to the telesales market, however anyone can benefit from the tips.

Raelene’s new article, which was published this month in Sales Guru, tells you just how to lift your game as a telesales agent.

Find out Rae’s tips ‘n tricks here. 

Nothing kick-starts a year more than attending the world’s biggest and probably the most important event on the leaders’ calendar - The World Economic Forum 2010. Let me enlighten you… 2000 of the the world’s leaders, (leaders in the all spheres) politics, economics, environmental issues, religion.. come together on one small resort, high in the mountains of Davos. Davos is a ski-resort in Switzerland otherwise enjoyed by royalty and the rich, fills up every year toward the end of Jan, to host the world’s most influential forum. This town, that can barely hold 2000 people, turns on it’s head when the World Economic Forum (WEF) is in town.  It manages to turn shops into banks and hospitals into hotels, and people utilise the opportunity aptly by renting their apartments for ridiculous amounts of money!

Mmm… that paragraph feels like a deja vu… (see blog on Davos in 2009)

2010, being my second year at the World Economic Forum, I sort of got a taste of what it feels like for those who boast 10, 15 years of attending the forum. They are like one big powerful family coming for a annual reunion, but instead of talking about how their children are doing and exchanging recipes, they sit in forums talking about the future of mining, business governance, who is to become the next super power of the world, which countries should sign treaties… and they pretty much determine our (us mere mortals’) lives.

This year was a big one in Davos, not only was the forum celebrating it’s 40th year, but South Africa, as WEF organising country, made sure that the delegates from around the world had the time of their lives, each taking a fond memory of SA with them! South African governement, coperates and marketing councils rallied up to showcase the best of SA! Starting with the branded transport that the delegates used on a daily basis as well as hosting an open bar the entire week at the Belveredere Hotel (Thee Hotel in Davos!) with SA’s best beers, wine, biltong, dried mango and music… and that was but a taste of SA’s hospitality as we lead up to the big gala soireé - the official closing event of the weeks’ talks, every delegate, minus the media were invited.

We pulled out all the stops, changed any doubting minds and left these high flying visitors longing to come to South Africa, for the FIFA World Cup and beyond. I’m tempted to describe the soireé by just saying “You should have been there” - that wouldn’t be fair, so Ill try and describe the chill of pride that I felt when I watched all 2000 delegates: clusters including the likes of princes, presidents and business moguls walk into our party venue all wearing an SA scarf and some even a SA beenie (that they had received as their invite to the event), each being welcomed with a gingerbeer cocktail, recieving a traditional face painting (Moyo style) while all the time being surrounded by the most awesome digital slide show of images showcasing our culture, urban life and quirky proudly South African adverts.  It was beautiful! Then the delegates are warmly welcomed by an energetic Minister Trevor Manual who then naturally broke into our national anthem… it was a world class event!

Within minutes, Freshly Ground had some of the world’s most serious people on the dance floor, working up an apetite for amazing South African dishes that had been in preparation the entire week by the top 6 chefs that we had brought with us, malva pudding and all! We had set the venue so that one could experience SA in many facets, a jazz lounge where we boasted the best in Jazz music, sipping on SA wines, SA snacks and enjoying SA artwork. Then there was the huge concert area where SA cocktails and beverages continued flowing to the sounds of Jimmy Dludlu, KB and Diski Dancers. In the middle of it all was the most amazing Tata Madiba silent exhibition, where one could experience his life and what he meant to his people… South Africans (ministers, soccer stars, business men and women… and myself) came together and showed the world how to party as we hit the dance floor to the sounds of our very own DJ Dino Bravo!

My biggest learning this year would be to seize the moment and show up strong at all times! Everybody in Davos is important, every conversation counts and every branding opportunity is instrumental! I take this learning into 2010 with me and prepare to once again welcome the world in true South African Spirit and style! The FIFA world Cup is just one more opportunity to benchmark ourselves against the best and and if Davos is anything to go by, we are right up there with the best!

I have been as disgruntled as the rest of us when it comes to the poor results of BEE and transformation in South Africa.  It has felt like a horrible tick-boxing excercise to become compliant and make sure we still have access to the opportunities that exist in SA.  At the same time, though, anyone who works with us will know we are a company that holds building South Africa very close to our hearts. 

It hasn’t been until recently that I have realised that the two ideas are compatible….. But I have seen the light!  I suddenly got that the BBBEE framework is an incredible tool for transformation that most of us have not really understood. 

So now I am on the team that helps South Africa understand!

We have joined forces with a company called Africa Empowered (CEO Vuyo Jack), who is wading into the middle of the BEE debate with a vision of becoming the catalyst of real transformation within SA.  Vuyo and his team are focussing on working with strategic partners from South Africa’s key stakeholder communities, (Government, Corporate, Labour and civil society) to address key issues of alignment and integration.  They will deliver ‘on the ground’ solutions that provide insights, skills and access to beneficiary communities, whilst at the same time surfacing local issues and communicating them into the right places.

We’re part of the ‘On the ground’ solutions: we’ll be delivering BEE insights and awareness workshops across the country in true Footprint fashion!  I’m hoping we can reach at least 10 000 folk before the BEE summit in September this year!

Where we’ll focus: The Eyethu Sonke project will be targeting South Africans in 3 different stakeholder communities:

• BEE opportunity beneficiaries: grassroots communities across South Africa in both urban and rural contexts, including potential SME entrepreneurs
• BEE opportunity beneficiaries: corporate workers who could benefit from BEE through skills development and BEE share ownership initiatives, and SME suppliers to corporate and government institutions
• BEE opportunity providers government and corporate management and staff who influence how BEE policy is executed through application of the BBBEE codes (Procurement, Senior Management, Recruitment, CSI and Enterprise Development teams)

The work delivered as part of the Eyethu Sonke initiative is classified as Enterprise Development as it is helping South Africans all along the BEE spectrum to understand the framework and opportunities that exist for Empowerment and Transformation, and then provides opportunities to fulfill skills gaps with appropriate enterprise development training. In this spirit, all funds ceded to Africa Empowered for the purposes of this project will automatically accrue BEE points on the provider’s scorecard. In this way, AE provides a convenient and powerful option for channeling funds in a way that achieves the spirit of BEE at a scale large enough to make a significant impact on the Empowerment landscape, whilst achieving maximum compliance on the BBBEE codes for Enterprise Development.

To our corporate customers who read this blog - connect with me if you feel you are able to participate or contribute in some way - let’s work together to build South Africa, one person at a time.

On the 18th of January our precious Ev gave birth to a healthy baby girl at 3:30 in the morning. 

About a year before Ev’s little bundle of joy was even thought of, I was working quietly in our offices when Donald (Ev’s 6 year old son) came back from school.  He was doing his homework when he found a picture of a little baby girl in a magazine.  He proceded to cut it out and brought it to show Evelyn.  He said with a smile on his face, “this is the next baby you must buy mom, we can call her Lerato”…

He somehow knew what the future held for the Mahasha family.

Congrats to Ev, Eric and Donny and welcome little Lerato to our big scary world!

Hey Blog-readers.  This week we have had a great media week with two Avo articles published in the Star.  Double Whammy!

:)

The first is an interview of our very own Sandi, she tells about the unfortunate failure of her last business.  The article focuses on what went wrong and how to prevent it from happening to your business.  Although it was a very sore spot for Sands, her strength has enabled thousands of others to hopefully not get caught in the same situation.  Well done Sands, it must have been difficult for you but it was a bold move to share your past experience with South Africa.

Check Sandi’s article out here.

Our second article was written by Jules ‘BossChick’ Newton.  Her optimistic view on the recession really comes through in her latest article describing how to bounce back this year.  So let’s start fresh this year and take the proverbial bull by the horns.  There is no reason for 2010 to be a year of downers, so let the storm of last year bring forth the opportunity for growth.

Check Jules’ article out here.

Well, I just teared up. We sent one of our Footprint training mentors, Jill Wellbeloved, out into the field in Bronkhorstspruit to do some interviews and write an article about the entrepreneurial spirit of one of our trainers, Tshepo Malibe.

Shew! She brought back such a touching article that gave us exactly the feelgood fix we all chase in Footprint, and I wanted to share some poignant extracts from Jill’s article…

Tshepo said that learning to be a financial literacy trainer had “changed my life”. Now after having trained 379 learners he says “To see other people changing is a wonderful thing - especially that everything revolves around money. You can see it in their eyes during the workshop - a light goes on! As a trainer I feel as if I’m contributing to the community and making a difference. This work also helps my entrepreneurial spirit, not only by seeing training as a business, but I am now seeing opportunities all around me. Kwaggafontein is growing and I can be part of that.”

And…

Annah was really excited that she had attended the course before Christmas. “I spent wisely this Christmas. This course helped me make my Christmas grocery list. I worked out my budget and looked at my needs and wants, so was able to see what was important and what was not. I stuck to my list so didn’t spend money on unimportant things. This made me happy.”

Also…

Grace … added, “Tshepo managed to be patient with us older people when trying to teach us. This is unusual for young people who are always impatient. And because of this, I have managed to save for school fees for my young ones this year. I didn’t punch my money away in December and so I can pay for school fees. So my young ones also benefited from the workshop.” 

And then…

Busisiwe grabbed Tshepo’s attention and told him, “You must get the young people to come to your workshop. If I had known this information when I was young I would have been a rich woman now!”

You see, this is the kind of thing we dreamed of when Footprint was conceived in our hearts – helping South Africans become empowered, one person at a time.