EdM

Entrepreneur|Investor|Husband|Father

[🚨 Masculinity Rediscovered 🚨 @BecomeAManAgain]

A man without money management is just a rich fool waiting to be broke.

Making money is easy, keeping it takes wisdom.

Invest like every dollar is a seed for your future self.

Act broke, because the loudest spender is the fastest loser.

Flashy living impresses strangers, but it empties your pockets.

The quiet man stacking wealth is always ahead of the man showing it off.

Discipline with money builds freedom that flexing never will.

Your goal isn’t to look rich, it’s to be untouchable.

Learn to let your assets speak louder than your ego.

A man with savings sleeps better than a man with chains.

Wealth isn’t measured by what you wear, but by what you own.

Your family doesn’t eat your designer belt, they eat from your discipline.

Money is a tool, not a toy. Use it or lose it.

The investor outlives the consumer every single time.

Don’t chase validation, chase compound interest.

Real men let the world underestimate them.

Because nothing is stronger than silent, hidden wealth.

Money management isn’t optional. It’s survival.

And survival is the first rule of manhood.

[Mark Essien @markessien]

Believing that one tribe of humans is smarter or better than others is the most limiting thing you can do. It severely constrains how you see possibilities in the world.

[EdM @EdMasau]

If you can imagine it then it can be done. Well done @elonmusk and team. You are such an inspiration

[Chief Nerd @TheChiefNerd]

Two years ago @elonmusk told us his ‘nutty’ idea to ‘catch the largest and heaviest flying object ever made and pluck it out of the air.’

Looks like it wasn’t so ‘nutty’ after all.

[EdM @EdMasau]

Excellent insights and l particularly liked the part on seeking out mentors early on and allowing them to rip you apart for your own good.

[VT @VusiThembekwayo]

I have been very careful not to comment on #DRIP issue at this time. Our brother & his team are already having a plenty tough time right now, they don’t need voices of condemnation at this time.

Even if some warned him & he didn’t listen, now might not the best time to pick at the wound. This is just my opinion, you all are free to express yours fam.

A public failure of something that has so closely defined you (something on which you built your credentials) is humiliating to say the least.

So, and maybe I am getting old, but my default is to give grace.

Here is what all entrepreneurs - especially 1st generation entrepreneurs - can learn from this painful episode:

1. Seek out mentors as early as you can.

A lot of us have made the kinds of mistakes that could have easily resulted in our businesses failing.

My personal saving grace has been that I have been very intentional about seeking advice & perspectives from more experienced entrepreneurs.

This is why - very publicly - Dr. Richard Maponya was a mentor when we started @MyGrowthFund . Since his passing, I have decided to keep my relationships with my mentors private because most of them just don’t like the limelight or attention. But believe me, I have them.

So, if you’re reading this, find somebody with at least 10yrs of experience (the 10yrs is because you want somebody that has been through economic & market cycles) and ask them to meet with you once every 3-months for an hour coffee.

IF THEY AGREE, Come with very specific questions, share what you’re struggling with - don’t bring the PR version of yourself - and then sit there and uncomfortably let them rip you apart.

Rather they amplify your failings in private so you can fix them, than those failings become humiliating blind spots.

Remember that by the time your failings become public, it’s usually too late.

2. Find your wolf pack.

Being an entrepreneur is lonely. Being successful at something can fool you into thinking that everybody genuinely loves you, or wants you to succeed or that you’re just a “genius”.

Newsflash: You’re not.

Joining communities like EO (for lower revenues businesses) or YPO (for more mature businesses) is a lifeline. Take it. There are also Chambers of commerce in most towns. Join them.

Don’t walk alone!
It’s dangerous.

3. There is a distinction between the four stages of a business & you need to know which stage you are good at:

Stage 1: starting a business,

This requires innovation & self motivation.

Stage 2: running a business,

This requires grit & patience. Business is hard and it takes time to learn. Give yourself time.

Stage 3: Scaling a business,

This requires brutal clarity. I have seen folks critiquing the brother for expanding into adjacencies.

But I don’t agree that he was wrong. I think he may well have been correct.
It’s called “economies of scope”. And is an often used but seldom understood model for scaling a business.

The core issue - from my vantage point - seems to be ‘over-trading’.

What I can tell is you most businesses that survive early stage are actually destroyed by a poorly executed attempt at scaling.

Scale can kill you. How do you avoid that? Refer to point (1) above.

Stage 4a: Managing a struggling business. This requires an entire post on its own. Suffice to say, there are people who specialise at just this part. That’s why large companies hire a turnaround team.

Stage 4b: managing a successful business is also hard because you must be disciplined in your actions & measured in your decisions. Don’t drink your own cool-aid or believe your own hype. Stay teachable.

Footnote: we must resist the urge to be simplistic in our analysis of why companies fail or why founders sometimes destroy the value they have created. There are academic theses on this subject and yet it still happens. So we are all students.

Recommended reading “The Science of Failing Well” by Dr. Amy Edmonson.

Sorry for the lecture.

VT

[Tinashe @baba_nyenyedzi]

The Cow fallacy

Asked which is worth more, a US$500 cow or a $800 second hand iPhone 12, most people and by most i mean 76% said the cow.

The audience discarded the dollar value and made a value judgement on which was worth more. Furthermore, one could sense that the question assaulted their sense of justice and what they deem to be fair. By this I mean, how dare I even pose such a question or make such a comparison. The moral virtue inspired the cow answer. A cow in a Zimbabwean culture setting is more than just an asset, it’s an investment. Regardless of price. While a phone is conspicuous consumption. Worse an iPhone. This faulty judgement call is to be known as the cow fallacy.

Stock theft in Zimbabwe attracts a custodial sentence of 9years or more depending on the number of cattle stolen. It’s the sort of notoriety that makes it to the first pages of the newspapers, online, tabloids, broadsheet, all and sundry. The journalists that report these stories carry with them the moral burden of society to express disgust and normalise nine year jail terms. The irony is that the same journalists, known for expensive gadgetry, will get their phone stolen and not even bother reporting it. To be fair, the police indifference and nonchalant treatment has a lot to do with it. They’ll even ask for a bribe for assenting to values of $800 phones thinking it’s to swindle insurance companies. The second irony, at the police station is that under stock theft the value is ignored. “Aba mombe,”- they stole a cow, fate sealed.

One Judge, became famous for handling stock theft and putting away cattle rustlers. The Judge’s, sense of justice, as with society was enkindled beyond the stock theft, it carries with it, cultural, religious and traditional norms. None of the economic value of a cow.

In history books, the historians made sure to emphasize cattle rustling as an injustice than stolen gold. The emphatic praise on how rich our ancestors were, was given in the number of cattle expertly estimated and children made to remember. I vaguely remember it as 300 000 ( be outlandish and say $1000 a cow and see how silly this was- historians, often enough, missed economics classes). The historian used cow population to project a wealthy nation. Yet the gold, nobody ascertains. Lobengula is said to have given Frank Johnson troops two bags of gold as a call or token for peace. What does two bags of gold mean? A cow is worth about ten grams of gold. To gain perspective, that’s about ten sand particles or grains. Smaller than gravel. Why are historians mistakenly considering the land wealthy based on cows and not gold?

Our society’s sense of value is determined greatly by communist thinking. Meaning, they apply moral value judgments to everything beyond just cows. Under communism there is no price to determine value. You work according to ability and wealth distributed according to need. The commune determines the value of a good or service. Societal norms are the pricing system. This is diametrically opposite capitalism which believes the market system is the final arbiter of value. While value, like beauty is a subjective matter the market reconciles a million subjective opinions to a consensus. It’s that consensus or popular value that holds true and not one’s personal feelings about a good.

Therefore when a judge, law, law makers and society put a value on a cow beyond its market value, in-fact discarding market value, they’re imposing their value judgment and distorting the market place. This is command economics by stealth. This has far reaching consequences. Market prices are a signal to the wants and needs of society. High prices signal to entrepreneurs to be innovative and lower prices the normalization of profit. It’s not a coincidence that high housing prices have invited lots of innovation in the industry. While bananas in their ubiquity are sold at every corner by every vendor.

This is the irony.

The law protects cows as an asset and at the same time destroys the industry. Whereas an insurance market could have developed for cattle and priced correctly better care of our livestock. Because of the “protection” of the law, cattle population especially in the rural areas is wiped out completely by diseases of neglect. Financial markets and intermediation is difficult at best. Car and short term insurance provides the largest investment pool in the country. Imagine an entire industry has been shut out by an insidious law. Livestock insurance demand has been curtailed by the law and with it innovation. With it savings and consequently curtails economic growth.

Back to the cow fallacy. $800 is worth more than $500. Regardless of the underlying asset. The market, made up of millions of participants has judged the investment case, utility, costs and nuances of supply and demand to come to a price. A judge can’t rig this economic price. Our law makers invariably make things worse by forcing onto the market their value judgements. The 76% of the survey are wrong in putting greater value to a good than its market value. The market value is the worth of a product or service.

[Clint Murphy @IAmClintMurphy]

I've spent 23+ years studying Finance and became a multi-millionaire in my 30s.

I'll teach you everything you need to know about Personal Financial in the next 7 minutes:

[Christine Carrillo @ChristineCarril]

How to make progress in your business:

Solve 1 problem at a time

How to make zero progress in your business:

Solve 9 problems at a time

[🦋Kgaliiey🦋 @Kgaliiey_]

“I wish Black Parents would have pushed Financial Literacy like they did Religion on their kids, growing up!” Tsi.

[eNCA @eNCA]

[BREAKING NEWS] South Africans no longer required to wear face masks. Limits on gatherings have also been dropped. Health Minister Joe Phaahla has published these changes in the government gazette. #DStv403 #eNCA

[EdM @EdMasau]

"The true measure of success for an entrepreneur isn't how much money you make, but how you impact positively on people's lives." @DJSbu #betteryou

[Ranga.🇿🇼 @RangaMberi]

A Zimbabwean captaining a team to a trophy! Inject it in my veins!

Well done, Warrior @TendayiDarikwa👏🏽🇿🇼
Best wishes to the @LaticsOfficial in the Championship

[EdM @EdMasau]

There is nothing more irritating than those people who talk endlessly about doing something and yet never do anything. #Edohart #JustDoIt

[EdM @EdMasau]

Lose no time, be always employed in something useful, cut off all unnecessary actions.

[EdM @EdMasau]

"#Economics is a science of choice. No father saves money to build a house when his children are starving and not going to school."

[EdM @EdMasau]

@DuchessTalitha @daddyhope This video was not taken in Epworth. There is no Chicken Slice outlet and surrounding buildings in Epworth. I come from there and the calling of names of people who come from there is uncalled for.

[EdM @EdMasau]

Focusing on improving body fat % is key to leading a #healthylifestyle. The results shown are mine and they help me be clear on my #wellness goals.

[EdM @EdMasau]

The holiday is over, its time to go back to the office. The purpose is clear - help our clients to lead healthier, happier, longer lives #betteryou @VeloWellness

[EdM @EdMasau]

Nurturing employees post pandemic requires going beyond paying hefty paychecks and taking care of their mental health.

[EdM @EdMasau]

Thank you @VumiliaAfrica and @rabisonshumba for this opportunity to assist employees in dealing with #Trauma

[Vumilia Africa Group @VumiliaAfrica]

#TraumaCounselling - Profit is a by-product of employees who are taken care of. @VumiliaAfrica has completed a trauma counselling program for practitioners in Provincial Government. Thank you #EdMasau for executing it #TheVumiliaWay. #SkillsDevelopment #EmployeeWellness #EAP

[MASAUSpirits @MasauSpirits]

At Masau Craft Distillery,we have a simple goal..to create Handcrafted African Spirits of premium quality.

Meet our Team @ Avianto The Business Hub,Muldersdrift,Gauteng.

Come Have a Drink with us this Weekend!

#team #masaucraftdistillery #nowopen #somethingafrican #southafrica