5 minute read
Grad Gallery: Divya Vasant
LinkedIn: bit.ly/3tCejgK
Current position:
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Founder and CEO of The Amazi Group
Past positions:
Project Director of The Microfranchise Accelerator (a division of The Clothing Bank)
Credit Analyst at Futuregrowth Asset Management
Credit Research Analyst at Absa Capital
Academic history:
2007 Bachelor of Business Science specialising in Economics at University of Cape Town (UCT)
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What is Amazi, and what led you to establish it?
The statistic that haunted me for over a decade is: 10% of the South African population own 90-95% of our country’s asset base, while 40% of the population own the remaining 5-10% and 50% of the population have no meaningful assets, no measurable wealth and no means to create wealth.
Access to opportunity was built for a few, and certainly not for women. Our economy disregards women by failing to address the systemic issues that keep women excluded. The archetype for opportunity in South Africa remains male. The way we can progress women is to pioneer a new system which from inception seeks to include women. This is why I founded AMAZI – a women-owned, social business that creates opportunities for women to learn, to earn and to have their own microbusinesses.
The Amazi Group creates access to knowledge, tools and opportunities for women to unlock their potential and progress to positions of ownership within the wellness industry.
What are the key skills that have contributed to your success so far?
Negotiation: When you’re a young brown woman and every boardroom you walk into is full of men, you learn that negotiation isn’t just about the term sheet. It starts from the minute you type out an email and the words you choose, to the way you answer your phone and how confident you come across, to the way you walk into a meeting room and where you decide to seat yourself.
Financial modelling and scenario planning: Being able to articulate a path to sustainability and understanding the various scenarios that could get you there are crucial to creating a direction for your organisation.
Self-reflection: Broken people build broken organisations. Your insecurities are amplified and your self-doubt can overwhelm you. Being curious about yourself and investing in the tools and the professional support to deepen the relationship you have with yourself are the most selfless acts you can do as a leader.
What value do your qualifications add to your work, directly or indirectly?
Knowledge of economics empowers you to see how a dynamic system lives. It is a framework that shows you how all decisions can take away from some and add to others. It empowers you to see the whole picture in a way few other frameworks can. To engage in the economics of a situation is to confront the very real trade-offs that happen every day just for someone/something to survive. These trade-offs are often harsh, they’re often unkind and they’re often difficult to accept; however, being able to identify and quantify theseoffs is important when you’re dedicated to challenging the status quo.
Advice for graduates currently entering the world of work?
I’ve seen people crippled by the uncertainty we find ourselves in and at the same time I have seen people reinvent themselves and craft ways of living, working and being that aren’t about what “should’’ be done but what they believe is right for them. Embrace the opportunity to challenge the “way things were’’ because let’s face it, they weren’t that great to begin with. Start something of your own. You don’t need to confine your creativity, your talent or your energy to one place. See yourself as a diverse contributor; a diverse income creator.
What’s the biggest challenge that you have faced as a social entrepreneur?
We’ve been taught that there is only one way to create economic value: profit. We see profit and non-profit as being opposite and opposing.
We associate serious work with making profit and “do-gooder” work with nonprofits. Even when we register a company in South Africa at the CIPC, we have to choose between registering a for-profit or non-profit legal entity because we have not allowed for the possibility that something in-between can exist – where social good can be scaled with profit-generating models. Structurally, South Africa hasn’t acknowledged the existence of any other form of capitalism. Every institution we come across – government departments, SARS, banks, insurance companies, etc. – want to box us into either being a non-profit or a for-profit only.
How did the COVID-19 restrictions impact Amazi?
Once we articulated for ourselves how our model needed to be reshaped, we began creating digital solutions to our development programmes so that we could continue to impact the progression of women even if physical learning spaces remained closed. Importantly, we spent most of 2020 engaging with our landlords and key suppliers. For the most part, we’ve been able to craft recovery plans which allowed us the space to rebuild ourselves. However, as with so many other organisations, we did also have to bear the brunt of unreasonable demands from companies that had made no allowance for the impact of the pandemic.
How did the Zanele Mbeki Fellowship influence your career and journey?
Before I joined the fellowship I wrestled with adopting the title “feminist” because the misguided marketing of feminism that we are all exposed to left me feeling uncomfortable about being anti-men – a belief I thought needed to have to identify as a feminist. The fellowship taught me that feminism is not gendered. It is a philosophy, a worldview, a political standpoint which holds inclusivity as a central pillar and fights against power imbalances that result in dominance/oppression. That learning brought about the realisation that I am an ardent feminist and my set of values and world view is feminist.
