How to Stop Employees from Stealing Your Profits

Hello and welcome to the podcast. Apologies because today's episode is going to be a noisy episode. It's a public holiday and everyone is home, especially the kids. So there's going to be lots of noise in the background, but hopefully the soundproofing I've done should be able to give us some decent audio. All right, so today, today we're not going to be doing hardcore sales per SE. We're going to be talking about a bunch of stuff around structure and accountability in business.

And the reason why was because I received a message from a podcast listener. By the way, if you'd like to get in touch with me, if you'd like to connect with me, you can call me, send me a text message or a WhatsApp message on 08064662140. Also, if you'd like me to audit any of your business processes like this fellow who sent me a message, then you can call me, send me a text message or WhatsApp message on 08064662140.

Or if you're shy like a couple of people, it's OK to just send a message, say what's up and ask to be hooked up to my WhatsApp channel and I will send you the link and we can get that started right away. So this individual, what name should we give him now? All right, let's just leave him as unnamed. OK, So Mr. Unnamed, OK, let's call him John Doe. So John Doe reached out. By the way, just in case some of you are wondering, Doe actually is also a team name as well.

When I know that for people, when they say John Doe, you know DOE, it's just a random name that they give to maybe like people who've been involved in accidents. The person is unconscious. You have to assign the name. So you just say John Doe, but in my own part of the world, Doe Doo, you know, actually is a word intiv and it means a good or appealing. So it is possible that you can run into a Nigerian named John Doe.

He will just be from Benue State. So John Doe reached out to me and he said was able to get a loan from a friend to set up a small barbing salon and he's still looking for a Barber, but he can't Barb because, you know, the the guy doesn't have the skill. And then also he how do I put it? He has some physical infirmities, so it wouldn't allow him to Barb and really sorry about that. And so pity. It's just one of those things.

But I like the fact that, you know, some people don't let their, what would I say, ailments or their impediments, you know, hold them back. Like, OK, I'm limited in this way. I'm limited in that way. Basha, let me see hustle. Let me see the one that I can do. And that's the sort of approach, excuse me, that's the sort of approach that I like to tell people that look, yeah, you have this thing holding you back. You have this thing holding you back.

But within your within a certain reasonable, and I put it now, yes, there's a bunch of things holding you back from the left and from the right. But then where is there room that reasonably you can move? Because if you keep focusing on the things that are holding you back is it's going to be hard to move forward. And from this question, you can see that there are people who are dealing with more serious problems actually.

Because for me, everything is intact. My legs are intact, my hand is intact, my eyes are intact, my ears are intact, my brain is good, you know, So what excuse do I have when there are people who have legitimate, legitimate issues, you know, holding them back Anyway, So let me not turn this into a motivational thing today. So basically he set up a barbing salon. And for those of you who are curious, yes, Barb is a word.

I just thought it was a Niger thing. But I just noticed that me and this guy was sending message back and forth, you know, Barbie salon Barbara Barb. I said, OK, let me check. That is a real word, Barb. And it turns out it's it's a real world. Sorry, a real word. Sorry. I thought it was something that you know, we Nigeria has just made of. So the listener of the podcast was not asking me what system can he put in place to guarantee growth.

Now, the first thing I told him is there's no such thing as guaranteed growth. Let me repeat because some of you are looking at trying to solve your business problems, but the expectations that you have are kind of unrealistic. So there's no such thing that you can do that will guarantee growth. Now, Brian Tracy, when he talks about growing your sales and things like that, he talks about what does he call it, again, putting the odds in your favor.

And he talks about things as being a matter of probability or a matter of statistics. So there are things that we can do to increase the odds in our favor. There are things that we can do to make it more probable that the business will grow, but there's no such thing as guaranteed growth. When I was a young man, well, a much younger man because I'm still young, I thought that there were some things that were guaranteed, like insurance, for instance.

But then when I started working and I sold briefly for an insurance company, I realized that, you know, even insurance almost not guaranteed though, because sometimes there are some losses that an insurance company takes on and it's just too big for the insurance company to cover by themselves. And, and if they have done a good job, they would have reinsured, they would have engaged reinsurers. But anyway, basically I'm just trying to say that, look,

nothing is guaranteed. Nothing, absolutely nothing. So just do the best to try and make sure that the odds are in your favor and it's probable that the business is going to grow. Then since we had already spoken, you know, I told the guy that, look, you know what, we've already done a bunch of free consulting. And so, you know, after this, you know, if it's not a paid session, then nothing for you. And anyway, so I thought it would be a good idea to come over here and then share some of the, you know, some thoughts arising from this whole thing.

So you've been able to raise a loan. You've got the barbing salon. You can't. Barb, you want to hire somebody. What can you do to graduate? I say graduate. What can you do to guarantee, to guarantee growth? Yeah. Sorry if I'm a bit slow today. I don't know. I've just been feeling one kind. Just been feeling one kind, one kind, one kind. Generally try to sleep it off, but that doesn't be working. So let me just go ahead and make today's episode.

All right now. OK. OK, OK. Now, there are two things I'd want us to consider, especially if you're in this sort of situation, I'd want you to consider, I'd want us to consider accountability and I'd want us to consider customer retention. So those of you who have this kind of business, you know, you have hair salon, you have barring salon, you have nail salon, you have massage parlor, you know, all these kind of businesses.

These are two things, aren't you to pay attention to accountability and then customer retention, accountability because sometimes, you know, this business, this kind of businesses are very Cash, Cash business, you know, and you know, on ground, so you don't know what's up. So that's how you can have maybe like a massage parlor or something. And from outside you can see that your place is very busy. They see big, big cars, you know, always full.

Then by the end of the month, the girls will now be telling you that oh, like this, like this, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know, you're seeing movements, more cash, you know, they see. So accountability is very, very important if you're in these kinds of businesses. Then also customer retention, because it's not just in Niger, like even in the UK and even in America, you know, they don't really like, OK, you come, you Barb your head and you just leave.

So the person who owns the barbing salon or the nail salon, like they don't do anything extra. Like, OK, somebody has come to come and do business with us today. Let us see if we can get them to come back next week. And I think it's a huge problem for people in these sorts of businesses. You should try and be getting people to come. You know, every, you know, somebody cuts their hair today. Let's say the guy, you know the guy, they do Afro.

It's not a bad idea that if you cut the guy's Afro this week, you highlight the guy and see if he can come back again in another three weeks. You know, if you have a repeat business, then it limits the amount of hustling, the amount of marketing that you have to do to bring in new customers. So for all these people, like if you're in this kind of space, you know, hair space for all those celebrity hair stylists are not what not, you know, in Los Angeles and or not, you know, not the scope.

No, that's just the scope. Essentially that is what they're doing that you are not doing. Yes, they've reached out to celebrity clientele and everything, but they have this customer retention thing locked down. So even though now hair stylists or now Baba or you know, whatever, they have the customer retention thing locked down. So for those of you who are thinking of going into this kind of business hair salon or you already have one, or maybe Popsy has one, Momsy has one and you want to choke your eye on it just to make sure things are going OK.

Customer attention is also something that you should be paying attention to and you will increase the odds that the business is going to succeed instead of you just being one very because you know, this business is the way we handle them, at least in this part of the world. You know, it never really amounts to to anything is there who gets some reputation and then we'll be there for like 3 or 4 years. Then before you know it, some of the barbers go away, then some customers don't come back.

And then before you know it, The thing is just a shell of it's empty. It's just a shell of it's former self. So accountability, customer retention, I think these are things that we should be paying attention to. So if you're going to be involved in this kind of business, the remittance, Gatsby daily remittance just means, you know, you collected money, so you have to forward the money back and you know, money came in.

So we have to render accounts. It has to be brutal and it has to be daily. In fact, there's one shop in my former neighborhood. What they used to do was I think the shop was supposed to close by 8:00 at night. By 7:30, they will close the door as in no new customers come in. Then the customers are inside, you know, we buy and then they will go out and then from there or more than reconciliation and until they finish reconciling accounts down to the last couple, nobody is leaving and they do it on a daily.

If you're involved in this kind of businesses are not doing this daily room with us, you'll be hearing story. Your boys will tell you that like this story won't have Part 2. The story won't make sense. So you suppose they reconcile daily. Now here's some things that a few I've seen a few bombing salons do like this. What's this thing called? Now you know, receipt, carbon copy, you know, like the old school receipt. Now like for those who did secondary school in Niger, you know, you come, you bring your bank teller, you show the account officer, the account officer will look and see that you know, this was before digital banking and everything.

They'll see that you don't payments. Then they will now write on receipts, you know the right name, they'll put session, they'll put everything. They won't put receipt number. They'll write everything as they are writing on the white receipt on top, there'll be now 11 black paper in the middle and under that black paper there'll now be another. I think it's like pink, like pink paper underneath. So that black paper is carbon copy.

So as you write on top the carbon paper, would they transfer everything to that pink one on that? So when the account officer finished, for those of you who didn't go to boarding school in Nigeria, you know, in the 90s, you know, you know what I'm talking about. But those of you who are older, you remember. So when the guy finishes, he'll now tear the white one on top. The white 1 is what you keep and show popsy that you know, truly uncle paid the school fees and you know, you squared everything because you know, now since it's cash and you know, depending on the family that you go to, your popsy can give uncle money for school fees and then uncle won't sort it.

Uncle take the money and then, you know, go and blow it on alcohol or something. Then you go to school and then issues will have on principle. I'll send you back home. So anyway, now it's like carbon copy. So I've seen some barring salons that do that. So you come in and then they issue you this carbon copy receipt and every customers must must get 1. You know, because my can carry it and throw it away when they're leaving.

But the receipt must be issued to everybody who goes. So at the end of the day, the remittance now you that owns the shop, you will now be checking the carbon copy. You'll be checking the the pink slip that remain. If you see anyone that is torn, it now means that the boys in the shop are trying to be sharp means they're trying to be sharp. Then there was another place that I used to go to in who says on three, this one was in Abuja and they used to give slips tickets after you cut your hair.

And I think every four tickets would entitle you to a free haircut or something like that. So after, you know, in the beginning I thought was good, maybe like customer attention tactics or something. But I now realize that oh, OK. It's also an accountability play, you know, because if every four, every four tickets you get and attaches you to a free haircut, now we ensure that every single time boys enter, you don't want to collect their ticket so that they can be entitled to a fifth one.

So I realized that the owner was sharp when I was very, very sharp. Killing two birds in one stone. Number one, trying to get some locking. Let people be coming back again and again. But then also, he will now know for sure how many people are barbing here in that place because that one, you know, receipt, some people say receipt, don't give me receipt. And then they'll work out. Bali is this one. You know who doesn't appreciate a free haircut?

Boys definitely will collect their receipt. And in fact, for women, you know, women's hairstyle is even more expensive. You implement that kind of thing. Oh, they definitely will take it now. Like let's say you want to do headlock, let's say headlocks. What's it called? Dreadlocks. I think right now at the time of this recording, depending on where you go in Abuja, you know, dreadlock, you know, you meet the lock master, be waiting in a column.

So the lock master will do your dreadlocks. It can't be anything between like 60 to like maybe like 150 K. So if every single time the baby enters the salon, she did drop like 80 K, 100K. But then you say that there's this system that after every three visits should be entitled to everyone. Come on, of course she will take it now. So she spent 80 K this month, ATK next month. Sorry, no, when you're locking it, you lock is every two, two months, every 3, three months.

Sure, she'll pay ATK in January, then ATK in March, then ATK in July, July, then ATK in July, August, then in September, then the one that she comes from November will now be free. So for sure when she's leaving, she'll say, Oh yeah, my ticket because she knows that she's going to save on ATK or, you know, whatever in the future. In fact, if she's being sharp, you know, she might collect the tickets and then when it's time now for the free something, she will now come for another procedure that is more expensive.

But anyway, so you're the owner of a shop. That way you're going to be able to track how are people coming in. And it's something you can use to hold the sales boys and sorry, not the sales boys, the barbers and the manicure people and everything. Sure, you can hold them to account to say that look in so, so, so and so period. I know that 300 people passed through the shop. So where is my money for 300 people if you don't have this money for 300 people?

Oh yeah, Mona, go sleep for sale, all of you. You know, so, and it's unfortunate, but you know, sometimes that's just how business is in Nigeria. So the number of receipts, the number of tickets, the number of every, every must match the cash that is in the drawer. Because you know, these businesses now a lot of times it's, it's cash. You come in and drop cash. But I have noticed that there are some outfits in Abuja anyway that I've stopped receiving cash.

Like this one pharmacy that I go to. Yeah, there's a pharmacy. No, there's a, there's a Barber salon. Yes, it's strictly transfer. Strictly transfer and POS. This is the account number. You don't have cash, we can't help you. So there's some businesses that are now trying like that. Just also another way to make sure that no tratra happens. So it's account only the account number is over there. This is the official POS.

So if you have your card, no problem, you don't have card may transfer. So you're in this line of business. You have to make sure that accountability is is key. And unfortunately, you have to do this thing daily. Stress, we have to do it daily or else your money will be disappearing much more. The Barber will cut the hair of 50 guys, but he will tell you that this month was rough. Only 20 people came. Then the money for 30 people will now pocket.

Then let's see. OK, then you can also use incentives in your salon because if you pay a flat salary, sometimes salary doesn't really pay. So what some people do is that they offer base plus Commission and it's something that those of you who are professional salespeople are used to. So every single Barber in this place, you know, your base salary is, you know, 100K or maybe 50K or whatever. But then depending on the number of heads, you know, you'll be getting, you know, 10% of every head you cut, every hair you cut or whatever, you know, stuff like that.

So with this kind of mindset, now the barbers, you know, feel they, they take charge because that same place where I said I just got my hand, we'll say zone 3 where they used to give 4 tickets and then after every 4 you get the fifth one free. By the way, those of you listening now, you notice how I keep saying in the podcast that you know, if you're a business owner, you're self-employed, as you're going around, as you're engaging in commerce, you're doing things, open your eyes and see what other people are doing.

You know, sometimes you get ideas. So just open and look like, oh, this is how they do this in this business. Oh, this is how they do that in that business. You know, you get some, you get some good ideas. OK, so, so in that Barber salon now, I noticed that the the guys are more, and I put it more engaged. It wasn't just a matter of culture here. And then you've, you know, try and make small talk, you know, blah, blah, blah.

Collect your phone number so that they can boss you. You know, at least one guy will say like boss, it's been a while, we haven't seen you how far, you know, that kind of thing. So they're more engaged, you know, they know that the more people that they talk to, the more money that they make. So you can try that. It gives, you know, some incentive structure if you have your own, if you're running above in salon. OK, now before we jump back into the topic for the day, I'd like to tell you a little bit about something that me and my guys are working on and that's the Kenga Software Factory.

You can reach it at IKSF dot Ng and it's targeted at Nigerian founders. So unfortunately, if you're on a barbing salon, it doesn't apply except if as the owner of a barbing salon, you want to create a website for your barbing salon, then you can go there to IKSF dot Ng and then you're going to be able to build your website. But for the rest of you Nigerian founders, you know you can. You want to build your product, but you're having issues with software maybe.

Software designers are charging you too much or you don't know how to code, you don't know how to build a website, you don't have a tech founder, you don't know who's going to handle all those tech things for you. You just go to ekanga software factory iksf dot Ng and then you're going to be able to have your product live in seven days. You will also be entitled to your free.com dot Ng domain and also free hosting for one year.

And whenever you're done, if you want to migrate, you want to leave and go to another service provider, that's not a problem. We will migrate your code for you. So if you own the barbing salon and you create the website and after a while you don't want us to continue maintaining the website for you, You just said, look, I don't tie. I want you know, I want to bounce. I want to court you say no problem, we'll either migrate it for you or we'll make it possible for you to migrate all your code by yourself, migrate your website to another person.

So if you'd like to take advantage of a special promo that we've got going on, yeah, all you have to do is go to IKSF dot Ng and then to get the 20% discount, just type in the promo code TAV. That is TAV or Ayede AYEDE. Both of those are my my names. So either is going to entitle you to a 20% discount. So why don't you just head straight to IKSF dot Ng and let's get your business started. You don't have to be afraid of software issues, that you don't have to let code hold you back.

So I was spoken about how accountability is really, really important. We've come up with some old school ideas about how you can track, you know, how many people have been coming through your barbershop. And I've also spoken about incentive structures and I have seen it live myself about how it affects the enthusiasm for the boys that you have in the shop or the ladies that you have in the shop. In case you have a female salon,

then. OK, customer data. At the top of the podcast episode today, I'd already spoken about how you people in these line of business, like you don't care about customer data at all. You don't collect people's phone numbers. You don't do like nothing. Somebody will just come in, cut their hair and then they just like believe and that's it. You didn't get nothing from the person or like in female salons, for instance, where my wife used to attend.

Go to this one in so far, I mean, Okano in Wu say 2, what's that place called again is in some Plaza, like at the very top, you know, So there was one time that one woman came in like her and her daughter and they came and did some, you know, fancy stuff, you know, plenty of easy and everything by the time they were leaving, like even for that time or by the time they're leaving was like I think maybe like 400K or so.

And that's how the lady came and she was happy and then she left. He wouldn't collect her phone number. Like that thing is mad. It's a hair salon for Christ sakes. Somebody comes in there with her children, just drop 400K like that and then leave. You will say thank you, Mike. You didn't collect the phone number. Or more like that kind of person. You collect their digits now. So that once in a while, like, OK, I don't know how you know,

women do hair. If it's the kind of hairstyle that needs maintenance every two, two weeks. Then after two weeks, you send her a message. You send Madam, it's been a while we haven't seen you now, but I'm sure you do. It's time for touch up. One thing, one thing you get customer data, you people customer data you have massage parlor, you have barbing salon, you have nail manicure, nail pedicure something. So be collecting somebody's details.

All right, there are different ways to go about it now. The old school way, which I recommend for most people is you just ask for their phone number. Go ahead and ask for their phone number stored in your phone. But the other ways of going about it, there's a friend of mine who runs a she does a letter bags. That's what she does. So whether they get the digits is at the end. They say, oh, phone number for your receipt please.

And then bam, that's it. That's how they catch up the phone number so that when new bags are being produced, when they're doing Christmas promo or whatever, they have access to people's phone numbers. They can send out WhatsApp messages to people or they can even, OK, like while I was in my friend's store, there was someone who came and I didn't know that Nigerian women buy bags like that. Like they buy bags, bags, bags.

Because anyway, let me just continue. There was one bag there that was I think like 300K. So somebody came in and of course one of the sales ladies recognized. I said, oh, welcome back my hope, no press. Oh no, there's no problem, No problem. But that bag I bought that time because all the bags had different names. I can't remember. Let's just say this bag was called the Amina. So no, no, no problem, no problem. But that Amina I want to buy.

I want to buy 5 for my friends so no problem I'll come this and then unfortunately they didn't have all of them. So anyway the lady was willing to pay. Remember I say 5 and one bag is how much 300 Ki was sitting there myself. I did the math in my head I said Tarish my is this not 1.5? In my mind, I ran the math. Is this not 1.5? Somebody's dropping on top handbag and lady paid and then so oh Madam, no problem, I have your phone number blah blah blah.

And then of course Madam leaves and you know, she calls the store. So I called the people in the shop and then she was not able to call Madam, but oh Madam, your bags will be ready by so so so and so. Would you like to come and pick it up or should we bring it to you? Oh, bring it to you. OK, no problem. To the house or to the office. OK, OK. Can we have the office address and actually the key? I'm inside computer. You see how you're getting somebody's contact digits?

You see, tomorrow if you want to go and say thank you to Madam, you have an office address that somebody can physically go there and say, oh, Madam, I was in the neighborhood. Just wanted to check on you the bags that you delivered to your friends. I hope everybody liked it. Madam, we thank you very much for your custom. Oh, and please Madam, just carry this while I say now a token of our appreciation, you know, give Madam something, maybe the new line of bags like you have created or something.

But lots of businesses, Nigeria, we do a very, very poor job when it comes to customer data. Poor job phone number. You won't collect address, you won't collect nothing. You'll just say thank you very much for coming Ma. We hope to see you soon Ma. And then you smile. Bye bye. Enjoy the rest of your day Ma. Like a common get people's contact details, phone number, at least phone number. Some of you tried to collect emails.

OK, just know that e-mail is the worst. I break because e-mail has the worst open rates. People don't really open their emails not to talk of reading. But anyway, I guess if you must collect e-mail, well, you're better than somebody who's collecting nothing, but just know that has the worst then for nail salons, bathroom salons, these kinds of businesses, power and maintenance or more, you suppose log everything, everything.

So generator, how long did they run? Who put on the generator? Must log it on the sheet generator around from this to this, Who went to go and buy fewer? How many liters? Where's the receipt from the filling station? All these sorts of things. And yes, filling stations give receipts. If you didn't know, know it now, well, people can still cheat because there was one of my mumsy's friend whose driver used to cheat like that.

You know, maybe she, let's say she gives him like anything was small and then filling up your car was not expensive. So maybe she give the guy, you know, like 2K or so to go and buy a fuel. This was a long time ago, long, long, long time ago. And maybe he will now tell the fuel Lieutenant like, you know, instead of on the receipt, just write 2K. But then on the fuel that you buy, that we buy, just drop 117. You, you keep 100, you now give me 200.

So found out that he was playing those kind of games and then they sacked him. But yeah, you, there are receipts. You know, it's better than nothing. It's better than nothing. At least you limit how much money the boys are stealing from you. Some of you say why? He's saying boys, boys, boys. Unfortunately, you know, girls need to, but in this situation is a bit I say boys and the thief pass so so logs. When was the generator on?

Who bought fuel then what else? The spirits that you use for the machines and the oil for the machines and everything. How many bottles of spirit did we buy in January? How many bottles of oil? How many days, how many that you know and stuff like that. So these are the kinds of things to look out for if you're on the bathing salon, a nail salon, a a pedicure, manicure, body massage, alumni massage, facial scrub, something, something, you know, you win these fancy businesses.

These are the sorts of things that you ought to that you should be paying attention to. But remember, just like I told the fellow, let's call him John Doe again, not his real name. So it's like I told John Doe, well, there's no guarantees in business. No guarantee. But for your line of business, you just make sure you do these sorts of things. And we try and increase the odds, increase the chances that we're going to have a profitable business at the end of the day.

But unfortunately, every business, every business, getting your own challenge, every business, every business. I must confess, for me personally, I didn't fear this kind of business because like my, my dad used to, that's when, well, really, really little. Like before junior secondary school, he was a cement distributor for Ashaka. Ashaka Cement. Uh huh. I don't know if Ashaka Cement is still in existence. So, yeah, he's a distributor for Ashaka Cement.

And you know, like how our parents now or our grandparents, you know, that attitude of OK, God has blessed me, me Sir, let me bless some people. So that's how my Popsy was thinking now. So you went to go and bring some of his, his folks from the village, some of his cousins, you know, like, oh, manage this one. And then it turned out that they were being funny. Let me put it like that. Maybe a customer come and buy 100 bag of cement, you know,

maybe they'll remove one bag or something. But then you know, they got greedy and I think on one particular order they removed was it 1 bag on every tent or something like that. And unfortunately, you know, cement is, is a physical something and people who are in this business like they know, like me, I don't know. But somebody can walk into a place and see a stack and say no, this is not complete. That is supposed to be 500 bag.

This is not 500 bag. They just know because the height is off. And then by the time you count, because you arrange everything in rows, you count 12222 and then you multiply. You now see that stuff is missing. So unfortunately the guy found out because it was easy. You pay for 500 bags of cement. Somebody's taking one out of every 10. So that will mean that 50 bags are missing. So you know, if you normally buy your cement 5500 bags, you know what it looks like.

If you go down, you look at it, you know that look, this doesn't look like 500 bags. You can tell it's like for those of us in university who like I used to bring a bucket of Gary to school, paint bucket. I used to feel it like because, you know, people used to bring fancy stuff. I'm like, look, what's the whole point of this fancy stuff? No cornflakes and all these things we finish, but then Gary is always there and then Gary swells.

So you just make sure you buy Gary 1 paint, fill up the paint bucket. That's why I used to buy used to buy it then sugar, buy it. Shit ton of sugar then, you know, just to live the soft life and make sure that I have some, some milk, nice milk, but you know, cowbell, not that expensive stuff. So cowbell, you know, 3 crowns that kind of milk. So just like with Gary, any time anybody mess with my Gary, I don't know, I get back, bring up my Gary from under the bed.

I open it. You can just tell because you know it's physical. It's Gary now you know the level your Gary was at the last time. You know the level it is at now. Anyway, sorry, let me stop boring you guys, especially those of you who didn't have the the pleasure of going through Nigerian university and Nigerian boarding schools and stuff like that. But anyway, it was fun. It was fun. I'm not sure if I'm ready for my kids to do the same, but it was fun while they lasted.

OK, now let us look at another case study because John Doe's case now is very, is very how I put it. It's real. So I made-up the name John Doe, but it's a real situation. But then there's some of you who listen to this episode. I'm like, OK, cool. You've spoken about business principles for the masses. What about those of us who are higher up? You know, what about those of us who are higher? Shalom. What about those of us who are sophisticated?

What about those of us who are doing much more impressive things in business? And look, the principle still applies and it's something that I talk about a lot on the podcast because we discussed some principles and maybe we talked about it from the angle of, you know, bread business or Gary business or fried fish business. It doesn't mean it doesn't apply to those of you in the software space. So I decided to come up with another fictional scenario and remember that this is fictional.

So if you hear any similarity to your name or any similarity to your company, just know that it is purely a coincidence. So now today, let the letter case study be Doctor Amara Okezia. And some of you wonder, like, how come you're picking female names? Yeah, I'm doing that deliberately because unfortunately not. So the people who listen to the podcast are men. So let me keep on using more female examples. So hopefully we can get more female listeners of the podcast.

So Doctor Amara Okezia, I'll be surprised if that's somebody's real name. If your name is Amara Okezia, it's just a coincidence. But please reach out and just say hi. Let me just say that, OK, I finally got to chat with the real life Amara Okezia. So let's say Doctor Amara Okezia is a researcher in biotech and let's say she's based in Lagos, but she's a short tool between Lagos, Ibadan, you know, like that. And let's say she's trying to secure seed funding.

Seed funding just means OK, seed or let's say seed funding. Now, OK, of course you know what seed is. Now the seed is where you carry out plants, then plant in the ground and the plant will now grow, then you now harvest. So seed funding, the one where you go take start, that is seed funding. So she's looking for $150,000 in seed funding. And what she wants to come up with is a, a local version of a rapid diagnostic kit.

Now some of you say, Bros, you're making things up. Actually, I'm not because, OK, well, yes, I made, I made it up. But I'm just trying to tell you that there are people that are working on all kinds of problems. Because I remember one time when my kids were really little and went to the hospital in Abuja and then one sales Rep was there and he wanted, he wanted to know if I would sign the consent form so that you could take my son's blood sample.

But it will be anonymized. And I said no, I'm not going to do that. The guy explained that no, no, no, it's not like that was nice. If we go job, we need to. But since the doctor has already ordered a blood test to be taken, they have protocols with their labs so that they can give us sample from the one that already taken. So I said, OK, so you won't you're not going to choke my my son. I said no, I won't do that. They'll give us in the lab.

So we signed it off. They're in order to know what they're working on and they're working on rapid diagnosing kids because right now malaria testing, like even for hospitals that do it quick, quick, I think they say like one hour and 1 hour is a hassle, is a hassle because we've got jobs, we've got businesses, we've got things to do. We've already waited like 4 hour on the queue. We finally seen the doctor. They say we should wait one hour again after another one hour.

You now join the queue, man. Nothing can be madding. Really, really madding. So at some point when my kids were a little, if anything came and was hospital related, I just used to just clear the whole day. Like, you know what? I don't know how long this thing is going to take. So I'll just clear the whole day and just resign my mind that or more today. Me and the hospital, we are best friends. So, yeah, I found out that people are working on faster tests, and in some pharmacy I

saw that the pharmacist claim that they have a test that is now 3 minutes. I'm like, OK, that is impressive. You collect blood sample. Now 3 minutes later you can say, OK, this person has malaria or this person has typhoid. That's really, really impressive. So yes, it's made-up, but there are people who are working on these sorts of things all the time and there's money to be made. Now, let's say Doctor Amara, she's more of a scientist.

She's not really a salesperson. She's not really an operator. You get, because these things happen. It's like Wozniak and Steve Jobs. So Wozniak computer guy. But you know, you know, to like people. But then Steve Jobs, Steve Jobs, yes, likes people, wants to make money. So the two of them manage made in heaven. You, you're the smart person be doing your thing in the lab. Me, I'll face everybody on the outside. So Doctor Meyer, she's brilliant, brilliant.

But sales, she doesn't like talk to people she doesn't really want to. She's not only a business operator. No problem. So she has taken, let's say she has taken personal loan, maybe like from Popsy or Momsy. She took some small coins just to build the prototype. But The thing is, she now needs partners and investors to now grow this thing. OK, so remember the example that I gave earlier. This guy has raised money from somebody else to do the barbing salon, but he can't Barb himself.

Doctor Amira, she has borrowed money from Momsey and Popsy and one or two rich uncles. She has built the prototype. But to run the lab now you'll be somebody else, or to be finding the partners will be somebody else. Or OK, maybe let's say she's OK with looking for partners and everything, but to run the lab herself, she wants another person to run the lab. So remember now what I said about this thing of a daily remittance and how you have to track cash if you are in the barbing business.

For her, she has to be able to track data running through the business. So just like how the Barber will need a strict cash protocol and receipt protocol for hash, you need a strict documentation protocol. Every time we run the test, we log it. Every test failure, we log it. Every test that succeed, we log it all the all the what do you call this in a reagent? Reagents are chemicals that you use to speed up a chemical reaction.

ABI can't remember. Look, it's been a long time since she studied all this in chemistry and everything. So all the reagents, reagents that they use, I don't know how to pronounce it, sorry, but in my school uses a reagent. So all the LD reagents that they're using log everything and then time stamp, you know, everything when people come in, when people come out, when you run the stairs, when you do that, blah, blah, blah, blah,

blah. Now, the reason why someone Doctor Amara in this situation where she do this kind of thing is because at the end of the day, it's not just finished product that should be showing investors or future partners should be showing them a carbon copy, should be showing them an exact replica. That look, this is how this business is going to run. This is how we're going to run this in like a like a tight shape, like I'm transparent.

My business is leak proof. My business is professional taste. And see, here are the figures. You can see it now maybe this. So that's the scope. So you can see that the principle applies. It's all that. My friend John Doe, the Barber, he has to be tracking Cash Amaka Amaka Amaya should be tracking something else, should be tracking data. Then let's see what else. So let's see that she needs a data engineer now to build the elite engineer to build the hardware.

Because remember, she made the prototype. But of course, by the time you're looking for investors and you want to start building much more serious stuff, you know, you have to stop doing child's play. You have to call in a professional eventually and say, look, this is how he must. This is how these are the specs. Go and build according to these specs. So let's say now she wants to bring in an engineer to build her the next version of the prototype, but she can't avoid high salary.

One way that she can incentivize this person is paid salary is, sorry, salary plus Commission, just like the people in the Baba, in the Baba shop. So you can give the engineer stipend. And look, you know what, I know you're a senior engineer, you're used to collecting 600K, blah, blah, blah. What is what we'll do, I'll be giving you 150 every month. I'll be giving you 200 every month flat. Then we're going to give you a percentage in the company, but it will take four years to vest.

So you have to work for four years and then I will entitle you to, I don't know, 15% of the company, 20% of the company or whatever. So the whole plan with this scope is to get the engineer to not work like an employee and be looking for fixed Larry, but to start acting like a partner. Some of you already do this because somebody reach out to me. You want you need help with your startup and then you guys want to offer me equity.

See, for those of you who want to reach out and offer me equity, let me tell you guys 1 secret that you don't really know. This is it. Everybody's offering equity. Everybody says this idea is going to be great. This idea is going to be awesome. This idea is going to be stupendous. It's going to be fabulous. We're all going to be mind blowingly rich. So Mr. Consultant, come and work for us. We'll give you equity. Everybody says that.

Everybody. And I don't blame you for trying to get labour for free, but let's be honest. Yeah, everybody thinks they have the, excuse me, everybody thinks they have the greatest thing since sliced bread. But if you throw that equity thing in my face or 30% equity, 20% equity, 50% equity, like you're not, you're not seducing me. And even if I'm going to agree, I say, OK, more do equity. You don't have to pay me now or don't pay me too much now.

If I'm going to do the equity thing, it'll only be when I can see traction. Traction means people are using the thing, people are downloading the thing or people are paying for The thing is when I see traction, I can now say, OK, do you know what? I think there is something here. So people who supported Mark Zuckerberg and got in for equity, it is because they saw traction. Now, OK, this boys website, this boys app, this boys idea, see as then the Russia, the guy rolled it out in Harvard.

See how many people signed up? The guy rolled it out in in MIT. See as people roll in Florida, See as people sign up from here to here, see as then the rush AM, then the rush AM, they say, OK, distraction. There is something here. So if you're going to throw around this whole equity thing, please. All right, you want a graphic designer, You want a website designer, You want a sales consultant, and you just tell them, oh, you know what?

Just do this for us. We give you equity, my friend. Show traction first. When the instruction, you're the one that will be chasing people away. When the instruction, people will be saying, oh, boy, how far can we join? Because we'll be able to see from the outside that things are moving. OK, where was I? Oh, dear. OK, we're ready. 45 minutes. OK, OK, OK, anyway you get the point. So base plus plus Commission will get the engineer to work harder to work some more than let's see what else.

OK, customer data. Customer data now for someone in Amara's situation will be a nice identity keeper. Customer data especially and the data, OK, we can't really call you customers, but say let's say stakeholders, stakeholder data. So especially people who are let's say she runs into, she gets investors keep their data. She runs into venture capitalists, whether they work together or not, keep their data. Government officials keep their data, health officials keep their data so that every, I

don't know, every one month, every 1 1/2 months, every two months, you know, America can be sending a progress brief to the investors. OK for the investors, let's say she debrief them like once a month. Other people, you know, every to two months or something like that. So whether it's WhatsApp reminders or emails or phone calls or something just to let people know like half hour, the idea things like that. Now the whole point of doing things like this now, being in touch all these stakeholders is when it's now time to ask for that $150,000.

Because remember, that's how much she wants to ask for, for her idea. Because she has been staying top of mind with all these people. She will not be a total stranger. She has been staying top of mind. They've been hearing from her to two weeks, one month to two months. She's not a stranger. So when she wants to now have a meeting with the minister or have a meeting with the senator, have a meeting with the venture capitalist, you know it will be possible to hook up a meeting because the the relationship had been had been warmed up.

Then let's see what else. OK, since we're now talking about software, there's something that you people, I say software start-ups, some label in the start of space need to pay attention to and that's your burn rate. Bond rate just means how much cash are you spending? How quickly are you people running out of running out of cash. So it's also a good idea for you people in the sample space to be tracking your burn rate because too many people that I talked to that they have no idea about the burn rate, how much money you spend this month, they don't know.

Last month, how much did you spend? They don't know the month before you don't know. If you don't know how much is your spend you spent this month, last month, the month before. How, how can you plan for what it is you're going to spend, you know, next month or three months or 12 months down the line? So just like for the bombing salon, they have to be tracking fuel, how much fuel, how much keeper oil, how much on generator maintenance, blah,

blah, blah. You should be tracking all these things as well. So how much lab time do you people use? How much time do you use in cloud computing? How many credits are you using for easy credits? I think they're called credits. Yeah, credits, I think, like for Apollo, I want to use Apollo, and I'm told that I have to buy credits to use Apollo. So you're going to track everything. And the benefit of doing that is that Doctor Amira will now be able to tell the investors how long this $150,000 is going to last because she's been tracking her burn rate.

So if she wants to raise $150,000 and let's say she did spend, how much is that in there? Now you know what, let me just freestyle. So let's say she's she's raised $150,000 and she's spending $1500 a month. OK, let's say 150,000. Anyway, you get my point. Let's say she raises $150,000. I should also be spending $1500 per month. Then this money should last her ten months. Abby, 10 months, assuming my math is correct. Anyway, those of you who are mathematically inclined, you let me know whether I have the math correct or not.

What you can see, basically what I was just trying to say is that I'm talking about a structure and accountability in business, you know, can apply for people in Barbing Salon, can apply for somebody who is involved in a startup, you know, whatever. So yes, there are people who are maybe not as fortunate as we are and who are doing businesses like Barbing Salon, but it doesn't mean that no one we're using those people as case study.

We shouldn't say, OK, this thing doesn't apply to me because whatever principles that we apply, even for Culukuli and same, same business, you know, can apply to other businesses as well. So what you do is just that, you know, next time you're listening to a case study or podcast or whatever, not just mine, but somebody else, you know, you listen and then you just ask, how can this apply to my own business scenario? In fact, for me, I learn a lot because I take the experiences that I got in law, in civil service and in events.

And then I always try and see how I can parlay that into my consulting practice. And then there are podcasts that I listened to from the construction space, construction space medical sales. What again, construction medical sales, I can't remember the other ones I listened to. But anyway, from there I always hear some interesting stuff like, oh, you know what? Even though that is in the construction business, this can also apply in in a, in a consulting business as well.

Yeah, so that's it. And that's all for today. Remember, if you're a Nigerian founder, you know, like Doctor Amara for instance, you're about to launch your business and there's a software component to it. You don't have to worry about things being too expensive or you not knowing how to write code or you don't have a tech founder. You just go to Ekenga software factory that is IKSF dot Ng. So you go there and we'll have your product idea live in seven days.

We'll also get you, Doctor Amara, if you exist or you're in a, you know, maybe that's not your name, but you know, similar scenario. We also give you a free.com dot Ng domain and also free web hosting for one year. And remember, whatever it is that you create on the Kanga Software factory IKSF dot Ng, it belongs to you 100%. We're not going to hold you. We're not going to hold you to ransom at all. You know, you the one who came up with the idea and yes, we may have built it, but it belongs to you.

When you're ready to leave, we say, Oh yeah, here's your code. If you want to leave quietly, you don't want to tell us. You will migrate the code with your own self, you know, by your own self. No hassles at all. And then for your first product, we're going to project sorry, for your first project, we're going, we're going to give you a 20% discount. So all you have to do is just enter Tav, that is TAV, or enter Ayede.

That's the discount code. Ayede is a YEDE. Both of them are my names, so entering Tav or Aede into the as a discount code is going to entitle you to 20% of your first project. So that's all for today. Sorry for taking another hour. Thanks for your time and attention. I'll catch you all at some other time.