- as fourth Ashesi Venture Incubator cohort launched
The Provost of Ashesi University, Professor Angela Owusu-Ansah has advised young entrepreneurs to be focused and determined in the quest to grow their business and take advantage of available opportunities.
She stated that young entrepreneurs must be brave in their entrepreneurial endeavors because there will be challenges, however, the impact they intend to achieve must be their primary emphasis.
“I am sure one of the questions on your mind is how to be successful. Instead, you should ask, how can I be useful? Of important note and less obvious is the value you have begun to create, which is a needed response to many of Africa’s urgent needs, in particular food security and quality of living.
Failure is an important part of true learning. So focus on how you can be useful and you will be a success. Search for beauty, especially in the imperfect and you will be at peace. People will criticize you, but you are making the world better. Prepare to change by upskilling, reskilling and unlearning, and relearning so that you too may grow and change. Speak words of success into your spaces to live success,” she stated at the launch of the fourth Ashesi Venture Incubator (AVI) cohort consisting of 14 young entrepreneurs.
Professor Angela Owusu-Ansah also noted that young entrepreneurs should be willing to learn, unlearn and relearn in changing times to be able to better position themselves and grow their businesses.
“It is not possible to prepare just once for your life and your entire lives. We will learn or need to unlearn and relearn throughout our lifetime in order to respond to the nature of the dynamic context within which we live.
I’d like to say that the world is a new place. The oldest transitioning out while the new is already here, and you are one of the drivers of the new through the changes you are creating,” she said, encouraging them and emphasizing the available opportunities AVI presents.
Ashesi Venture Incubator
The Ashesi Venture Incubator is a one-year incubation program for graduates as part of their national service and for recent alumni of Ashesi University to accord them the opportunity to explore entrepreneurship as a career alternative.
The program stands to optimize the growth and impact capacity of early-stage ventures by equipping them with the tools and resources they need to transition their models into hybrid business models to transform economies.
According to the Manager of AVI, Natasha Dadzie, the vision is to drive an African renaissance through a transformative entrepreneurship hub that stimulates innovation, creativity, and impact in order to shape and support a new generation of ethical entrepreneurial leaders in Africa.
“Over the years, Fellows of the cohorts are provided with the opportunity to self-invest and redefine their business models. The program is designed for each fellow to develop their entrepreneurial capabilities, their domain expertise in their area of business, and develop a hybrid model that makes an impact while returning on profit.
It achieves this by providing its entrepreneurs with robust professional development, technical assistance, business coaching from local and global experts, personal development as well as financial stipends to keep them afloat.
The goal is to de-risk the entrepreneurial journey to ensure that our students, as well as our alumni, have the opportunity to continue on the path to economic contributions and progress through the development of their hybrid businesses,” she explained.
“In an economy like this, AVI creates a more robust ecosystem for entrepreneurs to evolve and reach a wide range of opportunities. Most importantly we mold business ventures into market-ready and investable business ventures. We stand together with them not only to develop their business ideas and processes but also to empower them to be the leaders Africa needs,” she added.
The incubator has, since 2019, trained entrepreneurs across diverse industries including agriculture, education, fashion and beauty, information technology, manufacturing, renewable energy, and e-commerce.
As an educational institution that emphasises offering a holistic education and creating ethical entrepreneurial leaders, the AVI is one of many of Ashesi’s bold commitment to offering continued support to its students and recent graduates to pursue their entrepreneurial ambitions.
