Leadership Lessons from an African Village Headman

When I think of southern Africa, I do not necessarily assume that there are leadership lessons that would be relevant to my U.S.-based entrepreneurial ecosystem. A close encounter and extended conversation with an African Village Headman showed me the errors of that thinking.

An African Leader’s Challenge

While in Africa, I met and talked to the hereditary leader of a 500-person subsistence farming village who had been guiding and advocating for his community for decades. He shared how a group of people figured out a visionary way to make a difference in the lives of a broad group of stakeholders by bringing together the leadership of several local villages whose land abutted a massive national park full of African wildlife to achieve a vision of helping preserve the wildlife and generate outside investment in the form of ecotourism in a way that profoundly benefited the local villages. Challenges the Headman’s people faced included:

• Arid land that is not particularly fertile – and dependence on subsistence farming
• An economic system embodied primarily in cattle and communal land
• Wildlife predation of the cattle and grain stores
• A lack of education, medical care, and job training
• A dearth of employment opportunities
• And more

He shared with us how he and two other village headmen had collaborated with a group seeking to connect resources from a booming ecotourism industry with the local indigenous rural communities. The goal was to create a dynamic that provided incentives to protect wildlife while helping local communities flourish. The joint vision was to leverage deep insight into the local dynamics to develop a symbiotic relationship between wildlife conservation, responsible tourism, and local community growth. The kind of multi-dimensional solution they came up with required vision, iterations, and insight into the specific challenges faced by those directly involved and crafting win-win-win solutions, just like the partnerships needed by innovative startups.

Value Creation Vision

As we walked around some of the open-air village buildings and then sat together to discuss his priorities and goals, listening to his sophisticated thinking about what would create sustainable economic growth for his people was fascinating. I was also struck by his deep compassion, insight, and wisdom, even as I was reminded of how U.S. entrepreneurs face some of the same challenges as they seek to develop economic value in our capitalist system.

The vision to create durable and sustainable results demanded a robust understanding of the conditions facing both the wildlife and the rural communities. For example, balancing the needs of hungry wildlife with the needs of local humans highlights how poaching/hunting to provide for one’s family makes good economic sense unless there is a greater incentive to protect the wildlife in a way that still enables families to flourish. A vision emerged and involved negotiating “licensing” the use of a substantial plot of communal land (which meant giving up grazing grounds for cattle) for a dedicated rhino refuge to create a fee-paying tourist destination to see the newly relocated and protected endangered white rhinos. By securing control of a substantial portion of the proceeds, the Headman and his community could prioritize investments that made a difference in the villagers’ day-to-day lives as well as secure 17 km of elephant-proof fencing that created an economically viable buffer zone that effectively reduced elephant-human conflict.

This innovative approach reminded me of an entrepreneur’s need to do extensive discovery work when developing their ideas for value creation. Understanding the real nature of the problems and constraints faced by various stakeholders is imperative to figuring out a value-creating solution approach.

Economic Empowerment, Not Charity

As the leader of a community of primarily subsistence farmers and craftspeople who share community land, the Headman did not want temporary charity. For example, years ago, installing a one-time fence to try to keep the wildlife in their national park and out of the rural villages was ultimately an outsider-initiated innovation that failed. The result of this one-time charitable initiative with no provision for ongoing maintenance is a now old, rusted, dilapidated, non-functional electric fence. Rather than protect the villagers and the wildlife through good boundaries, right before our eyes, we watched elephants languidly stepping over the fence into the forbidden areas in search of water and food. This highlighted how a concept that makes sense to non-locals (let’s put in a fence!) may not sustainably address the respective needs of both the wildlife and human communities.

When negotiating the white rhino conservation reserve plans, the Headman explained his priority on ensuring sustainable economic empowerment in such a new initiative. He said the program needed to invest in job training for locals, sustainable job creation, and ongoing investment so that more people could be self-sufficient. He and his peers agreed to provide the land for the white rhino preserve with the requirement that local people be hired and trained to do the protection and conservation work, creating jobs and economic incentives for the whole community to protect these precious animals after two previous repopulation attempts had failed to protect the rhinos from poaching. Several years later, 42 local scouts have been trained and deployed in rhino conservation. Also, additional locals have been trained and employed in new tourist facilities, clearing fireguards, and providing water for wildlife.

For entrepreneurs, the analogy is in figuring out what is valuable to your future customers and how to generate enough value that it makes sense for them to continue to buy the products or services your startup is delivering. This is how a growing and sustainable business is created!

Succession Planning

Listening to this Headman, who had inherited his position when the previous Headman died, think proactively about how to prepare his daughter to take over for him was inspiring as an example of proactive succession planning. He was actively preparing his successor with a potent mix of experiences over time so he could have a chance to proactively retire while ensuring a timely and supported transition to a worthy successor.

His forward-looking thoughtfulness was a good reminder of how important it is for startup leaders to craft proactive leadership development succession plans as part of growing a strong and resilient organization. While a tiny team may not have the depth to have a complete set of succession plans, it is worth identifying your deepest risk points and what you would do if the unexpected and unthinkable happened. As an entrepreneurial leader for over 20 years, I have faced the proverbial “got hit by a bus” problem multiple times and can declare from experience that it does sometimes happen, and it is worth regular reflection to try to put some contingency plans in place and take proactive steps to prepare backups.

Create a Virtuous Cycle

As I reflect on the sweep of this Headman’s stories, I am struck by the success he and his peers have already achieved and how that sets up a virtuous cycle that can continue to lift up their communities. Sharing a portion of their communal lands with critical conditions of use has resulted in:

• A maintained, electric-fence buffer zone between their villages and the sometimes destructive free-roaming wildlife living in the neighboring national park, reducing friction between humans and animals
• Ecotourism career opportunities for local villagers ranging from becoming certified guides, safari camp staff, and other positions that allow them to support their families without having to migrate elsewhere
• Paying jobs that encourage former wildlife poachers to become wildlife conservationists by maintaining and operating solar and generator-powered water pumping stations  
• Around-the-clock protection for newly reintroduced at-risk white rhinos by trained and employed villagers
• Primary and secondary schools staffed by educated African teachers and funded by tourism dollars that are the envy of the whole region
• A local medical clinic funded by proceeds from these initiatives to help improve the health of the community
• Opportunities for local village craftspeople to sell their wares (textiles, wooden carvings, and art made from reclaimed wildlife snares) directly to ecotourists, injecting much-needed cash into a subsistence farming economy

These outcomes are so compelling that other similarly situated villages are now asking if they can get the same deal – and replicate this success up and down the border of the national park. It may take some time – and likely an increase in tourism – to fund such progress. However, this initial embodiment of a new systemic approach of mutually reinforcing and sustainable changes can only be considered a terrific success! Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and recognition of making a difference. May all of our entrepreneurial ventures make such a tremendous positive impact on the world!