Empowering clients

Haute’s elevator pitch is:

“Haute empowers entrepreneurs in Africa by providing them with management training and consulting services.  Since 2007, Haute has worked with 195 clients, who have used the knowledge and skills gained from our services to grow their businesses and create over 300 new jobs in Africa.”

Two key concepts are embedded in this statement:

1.    Empowering.  We only work with existing business owners.  If you are an existing business owner, you already have a passion for your business and are trying to grow it.  We aren’t in the business of convincing anyone to be an entrepreneur that isn’t one already.  We are only in the business of empowering people to do what they are already trying to do.  Haute hasn’t grown any businesses or created any jobs in Africa – our clients have. 

2.    Clients.  We only have “clients”.  We do not have “recipients” or “beneficiaries”, as many other nonprofits do.  A management training or consulting company here in the US (e.g. McKinsey, Booz) has clients – and not recipients or beneficiaries – so why would Haute be any different?  After all, our clients are highly intelligent and often masters of their specific trade.  We ask our clients for feedback on how to improve our services, and our entire consulting process is built around listening to them and helping them to achieve their business goals.  We don’t degrade our clients by acting like we know what is best for them. 

Given Haute’s approach, we found the TED Talk below by Ernesto Sirolli to be spot-on.  It’s 18 minutes long and is insightful but also quite entertaining.  Enjoy!

Symptoms vs. causes

In the medical field, there is a clear distinction between the symptoms of a disease and its causes.  Take malaria, for example.  The symptoms of this disease tend to include headache, joint pain and dramatic swings in body temperature that cause shivering and sweating.  These symptoms – especially the last one – are "how you know malaria when you see it". 

The cause of malaria, however, is the presence of malaria parasites in the liver that then invade the blood stream.  Or, if you want to a step backwards, the cause of malaria is being bitten by a mosquito carrying malaria parasites. 

In order to cure someone of malaria, the parasites in the infected person's liver and blood must be killed.  We could never cure a patient just by treating the symptoms of malaria.  Giving ibuprofen to a patient would help reduce their headache and joint pain, but they would still have malaria.

Now let's have a look at poverty.  What are the symptoms of poverty?  How do you know poverty when you see it?  Well, the most common symptoms are a lack of food, clothing, shelter, healthcare, and other basic goods and services that make life longer and more comfortable.  We can and should treat these symptoms in order to make the impoverished more comfortable.  Instead of ibuprofen, these symptoms are treated by relief services that supply food, clothing, shelter, etc.  Relief services are essential, but they do not treat the causes of poverty.  After receiving the much needed goods and services, the recipients are still poor.

What, then, are the causes of poverty?  To be sure, there are many.  Let's start by asking where people in "developed" regions get their food, clothing, shelter, etc.  Let's take food as an example.  Most of mine comes from Walmart.  Where does Walmart get food?  From distributors of food or directly from farmers.  Notice that all these - Walmart, distributors, and farmers - are all businesses.  As a matter of fact, all the goods and services that are missing in impoverished regions are supplied by businesses in developed regions. 

The Business is, in my opinion, the most amazing and un-celebrated of human inventions.  Businesses provide us with the goods and services we need to make life longer and more comfortable, and it also pays us a salary or wages in order to buy these things. 

Take a moment and look around you.  Most, if not all, of the things you can see were provided or placed there by a business.

One of the most significant causes of poverty is a lack of viable businesses, or, more precisely, the lack of skills required to start, lead or participate in a viable business.

If a person has the ability to start, lead or participate in a viable business, and that person does not have a job, then they are merely unemployed.  If a person does not have the ability to start, lead, or participate in a viable business, then that person is poor.

Sounds simple, but it's true.