Vere Shaba, Founder & Director of Shaba Green Building Design & Engineering, describes herself as a green building engineering consultant – she is passionate about Africa, sustainability, energy efficiency, water efficiency and making sure that Africa has its own indigenous knowledge about green buildings. “My passion for green buildings started when I was 18 years old”, she explains. After seeing a NASA map of the world at night and noticing how dark Africa was, she began to wish that other African children could read under the covers at night, the same way she did. Ultimately, what Shaba seeks to do is look at the socio-economic aspect of engineering.
Never say no to yourself
“I managed to work under the mentorship of people who founded the green building movement, because I didn’t say no to myself,” Vera says. She compares the entrepreneurial journey to a boxing match, in which a boxer continuously gets knocked down, but more significantly, gets back up. When doors are shut in the face of an entrepreneur, they simply find others to knock on because they have not yet said no to themselves. In such cases, any other no is irrelevant.
Not compromising why you started
Knowing why you started your venture is essential for the practice of getting up from all of those closed doors and the answer “no”.
Infiltrating the market in a male-dominated industry
“Don’t label yourself, because that mindset follows you to the boardroom.” Shaba believes that the moment an entrepreneur begins to look upon themselves as too young, black, female or whatever other labels, they begin to discredit their own product and capability. “If you have credibility, you can infiltrate any market.”
An accidental entrepreneur
“I never thought I was going to start my own business, but I knew that my product was a good product when I put it in the market and people were willing to buy it and even started asking for proposals”. Shaba remembers being the worst at school entrepreneur days, but because she was solution-oriented, Shaba has grown into a problem-solving company whose services are valued and needed.
Passion and selling yourself
“You need to sell yourself. There are amazing people who do amazing things, but as soon as you put them in a boardroom they fall apart. What I would suggest to someone who feels like they can’t sell themselves is to at least sell your product. Be so passionate about it that you could almost talk about it in your sleep because people can always tell when you are passionate about your product.”
Company: Shaba Green Building Design & Engineering
Age: 29
Founded: 2016
Start-up funding: R60 000
Turnover: R3 million