My Week Mentoring a South African Entrepreneur

I just wrapped up a week long program where I had the amazing opportunity to mentor a young woman from South Africa named Ntombenhle Khatwane, the founder of an ethnic hair care line called Afro Botanics. Her business is just a year old and she flew in to learn from me about how to run a beauty company.

How did I get this opportunity? Read the back story on my blog here.

She arrived to her hotel late on a Saturday night and I called in to check on her, only to discover the airport had lost her luggage. I can’t even imagine what that must have felt like–arriving at a foreign country and not having your belongings. But no worries, Dallas is great for shopping so I picked her up on Sunday and we got her a few outfits to wear to hold over over until the luggage would arrive (which ended up being three days later). We had a lot of fun shopping and I got to witness her having her first cookie. Cookie, you ask? Yes, cookie. She had never had one before…and she loved the chocolate chip ones. (Here’s a picture from Twitter of her eating her first-ever cookie!)

On Monday, we got right down to work on her strategic plan. It was fun for me to put myself in her shoes as a new business owner with a world of opportunities ahead of her. With so many different directions to go in, it was good that we discussed which roads were worth heading down and which were not…

That afternoon, she sat in on the final interview process for the full time personal assistant position I was looking to fill. While I had three incredibly smart candidates, she gave valuable input for my decision making. (Rachel got the job! She is fabulous and will be my right hand, mini-me, travel companion and BFF.)

The middle of the week was spent doing many other things. I had her sit in on various meetings and calls that I had scheduled. Things like meeting with my CFO to go over the budget, interviews with beauty editors and operational meetings with the warehouse. We also took a Franklin Covey course learning about execution and the important of staying focused. We both were taught the importance of saying NO to great ideas. Huh? They quoted Tom Cook, COO of Apple, “We are the most focused company that I know of, or have read of, or have any knowledge of. We say no to good ideas every day. We say no to great ideas in order to keep the amount of things we focus on very small in number, so that we can put enormous energy behind the ones we do choose, so that we can deliver the best products in the world.” Both Ntombenhle and I have a gazillion great ideas and want to do it all, so we walked away understanding the importance of keeping the focus narrow.

On the personal side, we went and worked out one night at CrossFit. Entrepreneurs work hard and so relieving stress is necessary. She was inspired to go back to South Africa and get back to her workouts again.

I also took her to see a Dallas Mavericks game as that was her one big request. She watches ESPN in South Africa and is a huge Mavs fan so it was like a dream come true to see them play! Plus, we had court side seats so that made it extra exciting for her.

On Friday, we attended a women’s conference, for which I was a panelist talking about having an effective sales strategy. I had a lot to share with the attendees, but we both learned a lot from the other fabulous speakers too.

All in all, it was a really busy and exciting week for both of us. I learned a lot from her and she from me. (Read the article that appeared on BNET talking about what we learned from each other.)

I am very happy to call Ntombenhle my friend–one that I will keep in touch with and see again on my next visit to South Africa. She is incredibly smart, driven, passionate, hard-working and a very generous woman with a very bright future ahead of her–I can’t wait to see her business grow!

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Information courtesy of www.ReneeRouleau.com, a website with skin care tips, products based on nine skin types and advice from skin care expert and celebrity esthetician, Renée Rouleau.