Mr Ntsako Mgiba is a Mandela Rhodes Foundation Scholar who is also a co-founder and CEO of JONGA. He is originally from a village called Bushbuckridge in Mpumalanga, specifically in a region called Thulamahashe. Moved to Johannesburg at the age of 5, moved to Durban when he was in grade 5 and then back to Johannesburg in grade 8 before moving to Cape Town for his tertiary studies. 

1. How old were you when you decided to pursue your current career path and what inspired you?

I always knew I was going to be an entrepreneur, but I wasn't sure at what stage it’s going to happen because growing up, I used to start businesses to help me raise money for things that I wanted. So, my parents would make deals with me that if I could raise half the money and do well academically they would bring the other half.

So, throughout the year I’d do businesses like a carwash. I'd do a little performance for people who lived in my complex. I’d bake stuff… so I literally did it all just to raise cash. So, I’d say there’s always been like an entrepreneurial seed in me. And yeah, I think even my subject choice as well, my degree of choice was also centered around something that would help me to build something. But I was going to work somewhere first, and I was even on a sasol bursary so basically, I was destined to work at sasol.

It was in my second year that I began to start my current business Jonga. And I was really inspired by personal experience, my aunt's place got robbed while I was there and just seeing how great the challenges are for these millions of people like my aunt out there who live in the township by themselves like women headed households that are vulnerable to crime. That wasn't sitting well with me. So that was what inspired me to pursue this whole idea.

So, yeah, an unexpected shot left in my business/career path. But, I guess, allowed me to live out my dream of being an entrepreneur sooner than I thought.

2. Did you ever get help with career guidance? Any mentor(s) & what role did they play?

Yeah, I definitely got a lot of help. I think, you know, when we approached our first investor it wasn't with the mindset and intention of him being an investor but we were looking for guidance.

I think we had a good idea but what we were trying to solve was way bigger than us and we needed people around us who had experience in building businesses. So, Ntando (Jonga co-founder) was being lectured by our first investor at the time for strategic thinking. We did some background research on this lecturer and we found out he had a lot of experience in the tech industry building and selling businesses. So, he was very wealthy, we approached him, and we asked him to provide assistance. And then along the way, there were many people who offered their assistance in a mentorship type of way.

And we're always open to that. And I think one of the many that got us far was how open minded we were and embracing of support. At any point we didn’t want to make it seem as though we knew all the answers and we were forthcoming that we didn’t know all the answers, but we were passionate about the project. And I think that will open up anyone’s heart to try to want to help you. So, they played a tremendous role in terms of helping us decide what is the right thing. What is the right thing to be working on? And that's the beauty of a mentor. You know that they don't only tell you how to do the things you ask them properly but they suggest the other thing that you should be doing. Probably that is sometimes more important than the things that you think you should be doing. Because reality is you just don't know what you don't know, and they guide you in identifying what you should be thinking about. So, they played a tremendous role in that sense. 

I also think the beauty of a mentor is that they open you up to other opportunities in their own personal networks if they feel like you are being a good steward of the opportunity they've given. And we've seen that personally through our first investor opening the doors to our second and third. So that was quite remarkable. That's pretty much as far as mentorship is concerned it's super important, especially if it's your first time building a business which was in my case.

3. What challenges did you face (or are facing) / had to overcome in your journey?

There are a lot of challenges when you run a business sometimes, they come more than one at a time. I'd say probably one of the biggest challenges you face, though, is there's like a form of imposter syndrome where you question yourself and you doubt yourself often at the weight of this huge challenge.

You often wonder am I the right person for this job. And that's something that’s internal and can often be a big hindrance to what you're doing. And I’ve experienced that on multiple occasions and I think that's when the role of the mentor, which encourages you and affirms the fact that you are the right person because you're the person who identified the problem and are passionate about it. So, I'd say that's an internal issue that you face. But there are also many external issues, such as access to funding. It's not easy and you have to get within certain networks and certain spaces to be able to access that and you must know your story as well. 

You’ll always experience challenges trying to convince other people that you are working on something really cool and finding ways to relay it, back to them. And then once you have the funding you struggle to see what's the best way to spend money in a responsible way and how do you find the right talent that can help you build this vision and solve this big problem? These are all challenges that we face and also how do you know that what we're doing is useful for the people that we are actually doing it for. So, the huge challenge of trying to get in the face of customers and speaking to them and finding out how we can build something that will actually enable them? 

In our case, it's working in a township, that's the biggest challenge of them all because you are working with people who don't have a lot of resources and the state of education is not always high. So, yes, you do a lot of educating on top of trying to find out things that you need. So that's a few of some of the many challenges that you’re going to experience as you build something meaningful and impactful. 

4. What has been your biggest driver/motivator?

You know, a big, big motivator is just the vision of what we're trying to accomplish. We're trying to make communities feel safe regardless of their financial means. The thought that people currently know are unsafe and vulnerable and the only reason why that is, is because they aren't able to afford protection is an injustice to me because safety and security is a primary need and the fact that its set up in such a way that it’s a privilege doesn’t make sense to me. I think that problem keeps me going. 

To perfectly be honest, sometimes money is not a good enough motivator because at times it's really tough and when it gets really tough, and you find that there are many easier ways of making money than starting a business. And one of the most difficult things is you don’t actually get money. You pay everyone else. you get money at a much later stage if you should stick it out to the end. And I’d say yeah, the motivation is to keep people safe. People like my aunt are safe.

5. What advice or key learning points from your journey would you like people to take on to theirs?

I'd say the biggest advice I can give someone is to never feel like you know what to do. Like you know everything, but to constantly take on the disposition of being curious and try to ask as many questions to people. I’m a huge proponent of many perspectives, I always want to gather as much perspective as possible before I decide. So, I often ask my friends, I'll ask people and I'll let them know what I'm thinking about and ask them what do they think about it? And then once I got a pretty good idea of what are the different perspectives… then I’m able to make the most informed decision. 

So, I’m naturally wired that way which is really helpful and I'm quite outgoing and charismatic, so I'm not too shy to actually get in the faces of people. But I find that people who ask questions are people who learn the most. So, I'd say, be inquisitive in life, constantly take note of things and ask questions. Don’t accept things as they are. But ask yourself, “how could this be improved? What if we did it this way?” These are the kinds of questions that I think you should ask if you want to get the most out of life.

6. Any advice for a young person from a rural area / township who currently has no clue where to even start when choosing a career path?      

My biggest advice is that don't feel as though you need to do something alone. Obviously, sometimes you don't have the luxury of having access to a network, but there's power in multiple perspectives and teamwork. It’s very rare in the real world where you actually need to do something alone even in the work environment. So, I’d say start to put yourself out there from an early age and try and make friends with people who are not exactly like you. And I do recognize as well that coming from the township that you don't have much interaction with people who are not like you. So naturally challenging. But I would say it's definitely worth it to challenge yourself by putting yourself in situations where you are interacting with people who are different to you and in those spaces. Don't feel as though You've got nothing to offer because you do have something to offer. You are unique and you have a unique story.