Sad but very true. The post below yours says its being "streetwise". I call it corrupt.

Was going back to. Then I decided that before taking any jobs from Kenyans

1. They have to be referred. If not I'm not interested
2. They pay upfront. Kama hautaki nenda there are other service providers out there.
3. I don't pay hongo....Kama hautaki, kaa.

These people as Impunity calls them are nuts. You have to develop your own ecosystem if you want to survive here. And that should include avoiding these people as much as you can.

Tembea Tanzania, Rwanda and Uganda before you go back.

Alma I have come to the conclusion that I will always be a foreigner in my own country, and Im OK with that. I used to be the home-is-best type of Diasporan who always defended Kenyans ( Africans) but lo and behold, kusema ukweli Mwafrika ako na shida kubwa staring with self! I used to blame politicians but have come to realize, politician is just reaping from the inherent nature of the African to be greedy, small minded, non-development oriented, petty, the list is endless. Take the example of being a small business owner in the US, when you first start out you are encouraged to start from your garage, akina Steve Jobs started from garages then gradually built their empires. Try that in Kenya!! The pettiness that is Kanjo will ensure that they completely frustrate your efforts even when they see that the business will positively impact society. Their small mindedness is only concerned about how they wont be able to "eat" if you dont have a conventional business premise. We are led by complete morons, all the way from Kanjo mpaka hio kiti kubwa. I got fed up when I was considered naive because I did not see why I should pay a bribe so my daughter can join 1st grade. Hii corruption ka street smart nimewawachia. I realized that its super hard for someone who has lived abroad for a long time to not only fit in, but to run biashara. On the other hand, a hustler from Nairobi would fit in very easily abroad coz the systems work. That said can someone please guide me on how to shut down a business and deactivate KRA's PIN? Im really hoping that saying hey, I no longer want to do business, here are your tools back wont necessitate a bribe!! Najihurumia kuwa mKenya. On UG, Rwanda, I think saa hii Im too mentally stifled to start learning a new countries culture, wacha nikue tourist.

Nice following these real-life stories.
Biy to be successful in business do you learn from others' mistakes or from others' successes?
Methinks thread needs to capture successful entrepreneurial stories as well - so that we learn frm both, otherwise just stories of failures will generate lots of negative stories as we have already seen above.

My 2 cents

@Intelligentsia, true.
The good stories of success are everywhere, the story that is never told is the one of failure...perhaps there would be more successes, if those trying would try just one more time...

"I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work" - Thomas Edison

Nabwire I hear you.

The turnover rate of my friends who came back is 99%. I'm the only one who's stayed. The rest, just got tired of the nonsense in this country.

Why is it that its easier for me to borrow in a bank in a country that calls me a nigger but entering a banking hall in my own country, I have to leave my children's names and numbers at the door?

Incredible taxation from central and local gov't. Not taxes that you pay but what they come up with when they visit your office.

Employees who think that their work is to sit down on their computers and comment upus on wazua. I was once told that my hiring skills were bad, so I decided to hire in India. No problems there at all.

I'll speak about my industry which shall remain nameless.

Most of the companies offering these services are just plain charlatans. I was once hounded for weeks ati because I was to give someone sijui 30% for a contract. Kubaff...I had not even sought the contract, they had sought me. I told them to go to hell.....on foot.

I have been asked for proposals....Another con game. You send your proposal, they tell their buddy what to quote on theirs. So I don't send proposals anymore.

I have been given a contract then it suddenly changes on pay date. For those ones I just walk out the door. I still have some guy trolling me on FB because of that. He couldn't believe someone could walk away from such a sum.

I don't believe there are good stories on entreprenuership in Kenya simply because the system is not made that way. The system is simple.

1. You bribe a journalist with 10k to write about how rich you are
2. You get calls from gate keepers who ask you for a bribe to meet the guy
3. The guy agrees, you then have to bribe them to get the contract signed
4. Then you have to bribe them to get your payment processed
5. Then you have to take them out to celebrate.

This is upus. Especially in my industry where it would be cheaper just to spam you and get it over with.

That is why a lot of Kenyans would rather get paid a paycheck than go forward with a business idea. See the story of Able wire. Super idea that can change Africa and the world, yet he's expected to bribe his way into super stardom

Pole sana Nabwire. I understand.

As for the topic OP, yes I've fallen flat. Couldn't even pay my rent. Food shida...

I'm only breathing when I realised that Kenya sio mama ao baba yangu...Looked outside the borders and somehow, others value effort. Hapa ni ukora tu.

Wow Alma, kweli you have summed it well, kwanza the bribing journalists to get fame!! One thing that intrigues me is the numerous panels that are constantly held, kila siku kuna some event, you have to cough sijui how many billions to hear people speak on issues that they clearly have very little grasp of!! Aki the circus that is Kenya. But I dont regret atleast trying, nimepata MBA yangu for practically free, not by sitting in a class, but by trying to do business in an environment where everyone, and I mean everyone, is speculating on how they can vuka with your money. So dont be sorry, hii kuhustle 24/7 ya Kenyans, nataka kuipeleka huko, westerners wont know what hit them coz nitakuwa the typical Kenyan, nimeajiria, but pia nauza vitungu kwa ofisi na pia niko na kaMpesa somewhere, and did I tell you Im also a travel agent...hahahaha

I think industry yako is IT, waa huko pia nilionyeshwa maajabu!! Imagine a guy setting up a website for you, does a brilliant job, but there are some spelling mistakes. He promises to correct it and also give you a link where you cn correct mistakes yourself. Almost 2 years later, no correction made, calls are not picked up AND the idiot and his team have the nerve to ask you on numerous occasions to refer them for jobs to the point of adding you ( without your consent to their numerous FB groups ( they have like a million side hustles!! Yani sijui kama hiii unprofessionalism iko kwa damu, all people want is easy money. I never got an office ( thank God!) here's free advice, when starting out in business ( especially in Kenya) dont get an office, trust me you will thank me later.

well baking in the night most of the time

Wow... balls of steel those.... and yet I thought taking a 300k haircut on my stocks was bad!!

Wow,I have no words.You have inspired me.

All the best.

God bless you @Liv - Thinking about other people and their families while there is absolutely nothing in it for you. Such people are few.

My former director was one such person. We had an employee who was in charge of ordering stuff for the company. The request and verification process from the departments was water tight but unfortunately, the fellow is the one who received the items and when we were billed we never counter checked what was billed and what was delivered. That fellow checked the invoice and if HE was okay with it, he forwarded it for payment (a huge controls lapse [in hindsight] and trust on the fellow). It turned out the fellow was ordering stuff that was being delivered elsewhere but billed to us (At times he would insist on collecting the items himself as we later learned). We only realized this when we started getting invoices with items we never used (like binding machines) and items we had not ordered in a long time (like certain types of printers etc). We also got a pay demand for an invoice that the employee had obviously not forwarded because it contained 100% items we had never ordered and it came at a time when we had no outstanding payments.

We called the company which confirmed that we owed them! We requested a representative of the company to come to our offices for a meeting. The fellow had all the documentation including LPOs for the items signed by our employee. We were in the meeting the representative, our procurement guy (his minor role in the company), the director and myself and the fellow had no option but to accept that he actually ordered those items. We had no option but to disclose what was happening to the reperesentative. He also told us that there were some of "our" orders that "we" (the fellow!) paid for in cash after the credit period. Turns out the fellow could order all type of stuff in our name (on credit) and then pay later. He then got bold and started sneeking them into our orders and finally started doing 100% personal orders that we paid for!!! After getting the details of pending payments, we told the representative we will get back to him.

I had a meeting with the director and agreed we should audit all the past invoices. The audit showed that we had actually paid for so many items we had never ordered nor had got them delivered. We called the "procurement" guy for a meeting with the evidence and he accepted that he received those items separately and bla bla bla. We requested him to leave the meeting and after further discussion, we agreed he should be fired. He was to get his letter in a day or two. The next day, the director called me - and this is the shocking part - and told me he doesn't think we should fire the fellow. He told me he knows the guy is married and has kids and if we fire him, we will be punishing the wife and kids and they had done absolutely nothing wrong!!! We agreed we will pay all outstanding payments (Because they were done with our LPOs by the person who used to do procurement and the suppliers had no way of knowing they were being taken for a ride) and bill the fellow. We also totalled all the items the fellow had obtained fraudulently. We called him for a meeting and he said how much of that money he was able to pay as a lump sum in two weeks. The rest we agreed how much will be deducted from his salary till the full amount is covered. And the fellow kept his job with a warning and the procurement function transferred to someone else with stricter controls.

Unfortunately, after some time, the same fellow came up with fake LPOs in the company name, ordered for items from one of the other companies we used to deal with and we got billed. He was fired pap!!!