The Sunday News
Mthabisi Tshuma, Business Correspondent
ENTREPRENEURSHIP trainers have turned to the digital sphere to continue training as they gear up for the new normal in the business industry.
The sector has been failing to conduct continuous training sessions for interested entrepreneurs under the on-going lockdown period, which has seen most industry activities come to a halt.
A number of the training programmers have since the lockdown been conducting the lessons online in Webinars and Online live streams posing difficulties to a number of people who cannot afford data.
In order to address such, Zimbabwe’s digital marketing platforms Tofara Online has teamed up with German based entrepreneurship consultancy, DeutschConnect in organising a WhatsApp Entrepreneurship Conference in Zimbabwe.
The event has been dubbed, “Global Entrepreneurship Meetup.”
Tofara Online Founder, Ms Tofara Chokera said the Global Entrepreneurship Meetup had come about as a result of realising that most Zimbabweans cannot afford data.
“The platform came after we realised that a number of entrepreneurs who may want to be part of digital learning through Webinars and Online Live Streams have no data yet there is hunger for knowledge and information needed for businesses to scale.
“We had a trial over the past month with three successful WhatsApp conferences including one on Export Readiness in partnership with the Zimtrade and SME Banking Talk with BancABC,” she said.
Ms Chokera said there is need for more entrepreneurship training in order to ensure the economy is revived.
“We are satisfied with the trial runs we have done. People are hungry for knowledge and information especially now as they cannot physically meet due to Covid-19.
“In the Export Readiness and SME Banking Business Talk events we had over 700 and 800 people in each event respectively and it was interactive as we allowed questions and answers after the presentations,” said Ms Chokera.
In a telephone interview, DeutschConnect co-founder Mr Kumbirai Chipadza said that they were excited to partner by bringing in a strong line up of business experts.
“We have a strong line up of 11 global business experts who also understand the local conditions our business people are facing.
“Furthermore, we are impressed with the innovative way Tofara Online has come up with and it goes to show that innovation is not only about new technologies but maximizing on old ones as well,” he said.
Mr Chipadza added that the event would also be cost effective and favourable on participants in terms of data, connectivity and participating in the comfort of their own homes as well as getting 11 business experts frm around the globe they would not have ordinarily met in one room.
The Global Entrepreneurship Meetup concept has already attracted buy-in from local corporates who are taking up the limited advertising space.
The organisers have already partnered with a South African based organisation to do a South Africa version in August.
@mthabisi_mthire
