Let the safari* continue!
Liesbeth Bakker is a young Dutch entrepreneur from the northern Province of Friesland who after having lived and gained business knowledge and experience in Spain, France and Switzerland, moved to Kenya in November 2013. She now runs The Hub East Africa, an organization aiming to help local talents in Kenya to set up social and economically sustainable businesses. In 2013, Liesbeth took the Project Identification, Development and Management (PDM) program at MSM. This proved to be a decisive experience.
“Before joining the program, I was thinking about using my business background to work with non-profit organizations in some sort of consultancy role. The knowledge I gained during the PDM program - both in terms of content and from discussions with the great people teaching and participating in the program, I came to realize that my true passion lies with entrepreneurship and in developing sustainable businesses in developing or emerging countries to provide an alternative to the - to put it bluntly - non-profit business bubble. I felt encouraged by their feedback to use my experience to change the conversation. It gave me the confidence to take the jump and launch here in Kenya.”
Even a well travelled person such as Liesbeth was struck by the diversity of students that she found at MSM. “I had never met with people from - in my eyes - exotic countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Nepal, Tanzania, Mozambique.”
The PDM program itself helped Liesbeth to gain insights in the non-profit sector and the dilemmas that exist in efforts to change the approach and help business model to become less donor-centric and more sustainable on the ground. “I see that in a developing country like Kenya there is a shift taking place to become more self reliant and cut dependency on foreign NGOs and their subsidies. The PDM program helped me understand how the whole system has been set up and the challenges that come with it. Note that I have been an atypical student in the sense that I believe in local development through (micro)-entrepreneurship rather than ‘bringing resources to the poor’.”
With her move to Kenya, Liesbeth was able to fulfill her long time interest in working in a developing economy and in using and sharing her business and management experience. “I truly feel that the different pieces of the puzzle fell into place. My 10 years in global management roles at Orange and Philips; my experience in heading up metrics, process optimization, business strategy and pricing, in managing teams and conducting projects in different countries from Brazil to Vietnam to Egypt and South Africa; my MSc in Econometrics and my MBA from IMD in Switzerland; knowing people through the IMD networks (executive level) on the one hand and MSM (middle management and grass roots level) on the other - everything added up to my being able to start up The Hub East Africa.”
Liesbeth is now busy with the preparations for the official launch of The Hub East Africa in Nairobi on 6 June. “I am pretty close to making happen what was just some high level dream back only six months ago. I have made reality even bigger than my initial dream: in addition to actively supporting startups through boot camp trainings and excursions where entrepreneurs gain practical experience in starting a business, The Hub also provides mentorship, financing solutions and office space - in short: the complete infrastructure you need to set up a sustainable business.”
Liesbeth hopes that an additional advantage of the PDM program at MSM will be that MSM alumni in Kenya and other countries in East Africa will reach out to her and join The Hub to become mentors, set up joint programs or simply participate in one of the trainings or excursions aiming to help them start their own sustainable businesses.
*Safari means long journey in Swahili
Further reading
3-week Executive Program on Project Identification, Development and Management (PDM)
Empowering women in Nepal – the success story of three courageous sisters
Global Power Shift Summit: MSM Alumnus Promote Initiatives to Combat Climate Change
Join the MSM Alumni Community
