Fireside Chat with Farai Munjoma: Founder of Shasha Network
Today, we had the rare opportunity to catch an inspiring young leader Farai Munjoma, the Founder of Shasha Network. His story is one of perseverance, determination & triumph. Having achieved so much at a young age, we can only imagine the glorious milestones on his horizon. It is our pleasure to introduce you to Farai Munjoma!
NZ: Tell us a bit about yourself and the journey that led you to create Shasha Network?
FM: My name is Farai Munjoma, I was born and raised in a small farming town in Zimbabwe. I come from an extended family of 5 children. As a young Zimbabwean, my journey has been characterised by numerous cycles of economic turmoil and political instability. Growing up during a hyperinflationary period, drove me to be more resilient and remain committed to achieving academic and career success. In an era of uncertainty, this was the surest way of enhancing my odds of a better future.
I was fortunate enough to have received opportunities to advance my education. I completed my pre-university program in South Africa at the African Leadership Academy before heading to Mauritius, where I completed my undergraduate at the African Leadership University. However, this wasn’t the case for most of my gifted peers, who were not presented with the same opportunities to advance their education and resorted to menial jobs and vending back home. Beyond lack of financial resources, some of the barriers to them achieving their hopes and aspirations manifested themselves in lack of access to career information, mentorship, and social capital. In other words, they lacked a tribe of people working hard behind the scenes to enable their journey. This is what inspired me to embark on this journey and create Shasha Network, a global network of mentors and scholars working together to close the career aspiration gap for young people across Africa.
NZ: What are the greatest obstacles you’ve had to overcome on your journey?
FM: In 2012, I lost my mother who was the breadwinner in my family, afterward, I faced so many challenges accessing education as my retired father was unable to support my education. At some point, I dropped out of school and had to sell chickens on the roadside to raise funds for my education. Luckily, through my mother’s civil servant pension fund, I was extended school fees loans that educated me throughout high school, but this wasn’t enough to take me to university. I was determined to work hard and get a scholarship to attend university, but this wasn’t the case.
Before enrolling at the African Leadership University, I found myself lacking the finances to access this education. Instead of giving up, I came up with an idea. After having spent the last 2 years of my academic and entrepreneurial journey networking at various forums and conferences, I realised that my network had significantly grown. I planned to write emails to 50 different people who I had met and ask for USD$24,000. Coming from a country such as Zimbabwe, this is a lot of money, but I was optimistic. After strategically selecting my 50 contacts I started receiving multiple emails of regret. The opening lines simply read, “We are proud of you Farai, however, we cannot support you at this moment. God bless.” I received 39 of these emails and the rest never responded. It took a great deal of courage and vulnerability to reach out to all these people, I was simply desperate to go to college.
After 3 months of knocking on so many doors, I was about to give up. It was only 10 days before ALU opened when I received an email with the headline, “Get Ready for College.” An American videographer, Arthur, who had come to my school in 2012 had convinced 15 of his friends to contribute towards my tuition. This is how I ended up being able to attend university.
NZ: Today relationships are the strongest currency in the business world. Who were your mentors on the road to success?
FM: At the core of my story is the ability to build relationships and have a community of people willing to bet on my dreams. When we go out into the world ready to add value and to learn about people, we cultivate meaningful relationships. Never in my entire life did I ever think that someone I’d met earlier on in my life would later open up doors for me to get a tertiary education. Throughout my life, I have had multiple mentors, I am still in touch with my primary school teacher. Someone who reminds me of how far I have come on my journey.
The most underestimated and overlooked mentors are often peers. These are the ones who have had the most significant impact in my life because they have always been in my ear throughout my entire journey, we spend a lot of our time and share the same spaces with them. A good example of such a peer is Shasha Network’s Chief Operating Officer, Lionel Tarumbwa, whom I have known for over 10 years. We have worked together since high school, starting an environmental club together and being part of the same magazine editorial team. The list of people who have had a similar impact is endless, I have always viewed my peers as collaborators and trusted advisors. This is at the core of how we run the Bridge program, we promote a collaborative environment among the scholars because we believe that some of the best collaborations of tomorrow are seeded today. That is why we bring scholars from all corners of Africa to grow together through the same program.
NZ: What is the future of Shasha Network?
FM: The goal is to grow our network to a million alumni across Africa in the next decade and we will achieve this through collaborations and partnerships with organisations on a similar mission. We have mentors from top universities, companies, and nonprofits such as Oxford, Cambridge, Stanford, University of Edinburgh, Facebook, Deloitte, and Junior Achievement just to name a few. Our global network of mentors is growing and we have mentors located in 32 countries and counting.
At Shasha, we are committed to supporting scholars through their school-to-work transition. This process can be accelerated if they are well networked and trained in soft skills such as Self Leadership, Mentorship, Career Research, and Personal Branding. The Shasha scholar’s journey only begins after their 4-week intensive program. We are continuing to grow our community of experts and mentors so that our alumni have access to industry-based mentorship, continuous career development support, and networking opportunities.
We have already started seeing the impact of our scholars such as Yadah Ngolo from the DRC, a young man who has started Robotics training camps to educate young people in his community. Another example, Valerie Lobo, a young woman from Zimbabwe combating period poverty through raising awareness and collaborating with small businesses to support 1000 girls with sanitary products. This list of stories is endless and to me that is what the future of Shasha Network looks like, having courageous scholars who are ready and well equipped to solve challenges in their jobs, industries, or communities.
