Strive Masiyiwa founded Econet in 1994 when 70% of Africans had never heard a telephone ring. He built the company on a purpose-driven mission to bring telecommunications to the continent, not for profit but to meet a human need. Host Evan Carmichael shares his own mission to help a billion entrepreneurs and explains why a clear mission keeps leaders and teams moving through hard times.
Good morning, Believe Nation! Today's message is "Know Your Mission." Over to you, Strive Masiyiwa.
In 1994, I was telling people only this week in Washington, 70% of the African people in 1994 had never heard a telephone ring. I didn't say had used one, I said they'd never heard it ring. That was a human need. I knew as a young engineer, not long since my college days, that we could change that. We had the technology to do it. The resources were out there. It was a human need. We didn't wake up and say we want to make billions of dollars. We said we want to extend telecommunications to all the peoples of Africa. And I wrote it on our boards, and I told our people, and I said, Our mission is to provide telecommunications to all the people of Africa.
People want to wake up and go to work and feel like the work that they're doing matters, right? You want your life and your work to have meaning. You spend so much time working every day that you want to feel like the stuff that you're doing, that you're waking up to go to do every single day, matters. And that's not just for your team, That's for you, right? Yes, you want your employees to wake up and feel like they're doing something important, but you too, right? And if you don't have a team yet, you want to feel like every day the thing that you're about to do today makes a difference in somebody's life. You're on an important mission. And whenever you feel down or depressed or upset and you feel like maybe you shouldn't do this anymore, maybe this isn't the right business for you, the thing that keeps you going, the thing that gets you through those hard times is that important mission that you are on? My mission is to help a billion entrepreneurs. It fuels me, it drives me, it's why I wake up every day, it's why I make these videos for you. And so my question today for you is, what is your mission? Leave it in the comments below and I'm going to join in the discussion. Thank you so much for watching. Have an amazing day. Continue to believe, and I'll see you again tomorrow morning for another shot of Enespresso.
