“A lady is a woman who is treated like a lady.” You remember probably this line from My Fair Lady. In a classic Harvard Business Review article, J. Sterling Livingston coined the expression “Pygmalion in management.” The main point of the article was that “a manager’s expectations are the key to a subordinate’s performance and […]
Uncategorized
Cooperating with suppliers
Last week I interviewed the Country Manager for Kenya of a large agricultural trading group. The group originated in Africa, and it operates worldwide. What attracted my attention the most is its cooperative approach to dealing with its suppliers. In this group, they buy commodity products from small farmers, and accumulate their volumes to sell. […]
Intra-African trade and transportation
When I wrote about intra-Africa business travel a few weeks ago, Charles Ivenco – one of my friends from Lagos Business School – left a comment in which he told us about the improvements in air transportation over the last decade, and how this is related to the increased levels of intra-African trade. According to […]
The challenges of internationalizing in East Africa
If you are an Africa connoisseur (or if you have followed this blog), you will know that Africa is not a single entity. And neither are African regions: not all countries in one region are the same. This is more obvious in Western Africa where the anglophone/francophone distinction is immediate. It may be less obvious […]
Tribal attributes
In a comment to an earlier post, Christian referred to how strongly Kenyans feel about tribal attributes. I think he has better insights about this than me but let me tell you about what I’ve heard, and maybe he and others will add some comments. Kenya’s ethnic diversity is high. The various tribes can be […]
