Out of the country out of the box transforming the world.
one of the lessons
that i learned from my business failure
is that all individuals can
transform the world by simply going
out of their own home country
into the developing world to start a
business
some years back i had an opportunity
to go to ukraine ukraine at that time
had become an independent country
and when i arrived i saw utter
economic chaos people were in misery
their spending power had been hurt
there were no food and basic necessities
in the shelves and the currency
and the money was depreciating every day
i stayed back in kiev not quite sure
what i was going to do
next
one day i was walking on the streets
and i noticed a long line
of course in those days lines were not
uncommon
there were lines for everything people
got into the line
even before asking what the line was for
because they knew that something
valuable was being sold
out of curiosity i got into the line
myself
and when i came to the top of the line i
realized it was for
meat so if you can imagine this
particular scene that i saw
a butcher standing behind a counter
with half a side of beef hanging off a
hook
and with a very large knife he was
cutting up the pieces of meat
wrapping it in an old newspaper and
handing it to the person
on the line the person on the line the
customer
could not ask for a specific cut they
got what they got
as i watched that scene ideas began to
come into my mind
bulbs flashed and i thought to myself
why don’t i get into the meat business
and prepare
good quality meat that is packaged
portion controlled into steaks hamburger
patties
weighed with a brand and then try to
sell it through
a supermarket or supermarket chains that
were springing up at that time
as i thought about it i liked the idea
and that’s what i decided to do
so through friends and relationships
that i had been building while i was
living over there they
kind of steered me to go to western
ukraine
where there was a meat plant that was
looking to modernize itself
and i went over there met with the
director of the meat plant was quite
happy to see us
because it was a critical time in their
history
and we agreed to a collaboration
agreement in the form of a joint venture
where they would provide high quality
beef sides and we would process them
into
products that were of high quality
packaged
labeled and in a brand that we had
registered
at that time all for the first time
happening in ukraine
so with the help of our staff that we
hired
and their enthusiasm we were able to
in the next two years reach every
supermarket in kiev
reached the hotels and restaurants over
there and
even diversified or expanded our product
line
into poultry and vegetables
and in fact at that time the company had
achieved something like 80 percent of
the market share
of high quality meat products
one fine day there was a knock on the
door
several people with kalashnikovs barged
into
our office they threw me on the floor
terrorized our staff pointed a gun at
them
who disappeared out of fear
they had a truck parked below
and they picked up everything that we
had in our office
our filing cabinets even our desks
files put it in their truck and drove
off
we tried to recover our business we
tried
however the powers that were behind this
attack
were a lot more powerful than we had
ever thought
and at one point it became clear that
this would be mission impossible
at that point i decided to throw in the
towel
and go back home i went back
and when i got home i fell into a mental
depression
my midlife crisis was precipitated
earlier
i recovered out of the economic
whole and the mental crisis that i had
faced
and moved on with my life
some years later i was happening to read
a newspaper
and it was talking about ukraine
and ukraine’s meat industry and as i
read the article
i realized that they were talking about
the meat businesses that had been
created over there which were now
employing thousands of people
generating jobs adding to the economy
what were they doing exactly what we had
started
branded meat products being sold through
supermarket chains and being sold
to hotels and restaurants
initially my first reaction was sadness
sadness because we had been denied the
opportunity
to remain over there to participate in
the
country’s success in this particular
industry
that happened but i also felt
positive in some ways positive because
the seeds that we had shown earlier on
in developing the first private network
distribution that included production
and marketing of meat had blossomed into
a major industry for the country
that idea after reading the article
gave me the basis for this talk that we
are having
today at ted which is that
every individual has the possibility
of transforming the world
whether you succeed or whether you fail
i also felt as a result of my own
experiences and failures
that perhaps there would be a better way
of doing this
if i were to advise you today with all
of the
hindsight of experience i have
and i have distilled this into a three
step
methodology if i may say so for
anyone to go out and do this
so step number one is
select the right country and you can
understand
why because based on my own personal
experience this is a critical step
so how do you select the right country
me the right country should have two
characteristics
the first is it should be safe for you
and for your business and the second
it should be low cost of living
why do i emphasize low cost of living
why because if you’re starting a
business on a bootstrap
you don’t want high expensive living
costs to eat away the money
that you would be rather putting it into
your business
and businesses always take longer than
what we have planned in an ambiguous
environment
so where do we get this information well
there are lists of countries
out there by safety and security and
their list of countries
out there by cost of living and you have
to merge these two lists
and shortlist some countries that
catches your interest
step number two go
there in other words go there and see
if the ground reality is exactly
what you have read and things are what
you have
been researching
talk to people visit supermarkets
and find out what exactly do they need
services many times the developing world
countries don’t
need the next big thing that we are all
chasing
after they need basic stuff and there is
believe it or not
a target market that can pay for it that
is growing
as they grow
so once you have done that come up with
a business plan 17 18 page document
that tells you how you’re going to get
from point a to point b
step three and this is the most
important of them all
take the plunge in other words
start the business don’t hesitate
don’t over analyze your data
why because the country is
shifting rapidly because of
globalization
things are happening too quick for you
your data could be obsolete tomorrow
and over analysis is an enemy of
entrepreneurship so don’t procrastinate
you want to start and learn from your
mistakes and you will pivot your
business
based on the challenges you are likely
to encounter
and what are you going to get back in
return something extremely invaluable
for you personally
which is instinct instinct of navigating
in a world
where nothing is clear
now you may be wondering at this point
if i did all of this
what can happen so let’s look at the two
scenarios as to what can happen
the first is a bad scenario and the
other
the other one is a good scenario so in
the bad scenario
you don’t make money your business it
goes bankrupt
or it gets expropriated like mine did
what then well you go back home
your friends and family will still be
there
they’ll appreciate you for what you have
done
and believe me you will be at a lot
higher learning curve by then after this
experience than anyone else
who just stayed back
what is the good side the good side is
you do well
you make money you then scale up your
business
you move to other cities you may move to
other countries
and at some point you may cash out
and decide that you don’t want to
work for anyone else
in both cases the country gets
transformed
whether you lose or you win
so when you have so much of an upside
potential
to make a difference in the developing
world
with so little of downside risk what are
you waiting for
let’s go and transform the world
thank you
you