From Risk to Reward: How the Traditional Finance Career I Expected Led to My Real Passion Helping Entrepreneurs to Grow
By Ivy Macharia, Associate
Original article written June 2017. Edited and published March 2018.
Breaking Beyond Expectations
Coming out of university, I had a very defined idea of how my career would turn out. With my Actuarial Science Degree, I would go into Risk Advisory at one of the Big Four consulting firms. I had quite enjoyed my entrepreneurial finance coursework: learning how to conduct valuations of early stage businesses, understanding types of capital available, and reviewing standard term sheets. However, it did not occur to me that I could pursue this as a career, interesting as it was. I had just spent 4 years training to be a financial risk manager.
Right after university, through a referral from my entrepreneurial finance lecturer, I had a chance to work with Unreasonable East Africa, a start-up accelerator based in Kampala. I supported their cohort of social enterprises with investment readiness, including building financial models to inform their capital raise process. This allowed me to apply my financial coursework in a fulfilling role where I had a chance to see the results of my work first-hand as entrepreneurs used my analysis to make critical business decisions.
Fast forward to 18 months later after having worked with a start-up accelerator and an investment advisory firm, and I was firmly convinced that I wanted to be in the business of enabling high-growth businesses to scale, especially ensuring that they have the capital required to do this. When I came across I-DEV, I had been on the look-out for an opportunity to work with SMEs, not only in investment advisory but also in designing and implementing actionable strategies for growth, market expansion and operational efficiency. The alignment of I-DEV’s core business with what I was looking for, coupled with the fact that I-DEV has an office in Nairobi, made this a perfect opportunity.
The beauty about living and working in my hometown Nairobi, amidst the entrepreneurial buzz, is that there is an interesting event happening every other week. I met a member of the I-DEV team at one of these events– the Quartz Innovators Summit. During our brief chat, I realized that the work that I-DEV does is exactly what I had been looking for. I applied for an Associate Fellow role and went through the selection process, which includes a hands-on case study based on an actual project. A few months later, I was offered a role as Analyst.
Getting Started: Moving Out of My Comfort Zone and Into the Field
Three months into the role, I am still not sure that I can describe what a typical work week looks like. On my first day, I tagged along on a meeting with a potential investor in a casual dining restaurant chain for whom we are raising capital. I got to see, first-hand, how the team owns the projects that they work on and could tackle any questions posed by the investor as well as the management could. My first thought was, “If I was looking to raise capital for my business, I would want these guys on my side!”
One month later, I was staffed on an assessment of access to clean energy household products like solar systems and cookstoves in underserved counties in Kenya, on behalf of the World Bank. The assessment focused on Turkana County and, as part of a team of 4, we spent almost two weeks in Lodwar understanding the market for clean cookstoves. Coming from an academic background where research and analysis involved using decades-old statistical tables and formulas, working on a study with little or no existing information was definitely out of my comfort zone.
We spent almost 2 weeks on the ground in Lodwar, during which we spoke to virtually every stakeholder in the energy sector: NGOs, the County Government, retailers, banks, and consumers. We mapped the supply chain for clean energy products to understand the bottlenecks involved in getting them to one of the hardest to reach areas in Kenya. On the demand side, we conducted household interviews to understand the ability and willingness to pay for clean energy products. By investigating household spending priorities, energy spending and energy savings potential of using clean energy products, we were able to identify and size the viable market for these products. This will enable the World Bank to better focus the resources set aside to promote access to clean energy.
My Role: An Expert Generalist
Clearly, at any given time, there is a lot going on at I-DEV. To maintain synergy, a typical week begins with the weekly Monday Morning Meeting where everyone on the team gives updates on the active projects, interesting leads, and any other relevant news. Anyone working on an Investment Advisory project (such as a capital raise) will find themselves working with the client to prepare the necessary documents for the investment process; holding meetings with prospective investors; or (in my opinion the best part of a capital raise) drafting and negotiating terms. Strategy and consulting engagements tend to vary greatly. They will usually involve a significant amount of fieldwork and preparing reports to synthesize the insights and recommendations.
As an Analyst, I am a generalist and work on both investment advisory and strategy and consulting projects, across all sectors. This allows me to work on a range of interesting engagements and gain expertise across the board. Despite the generalist nature of the role, working at I-DEV also allows one to structure their work in line with one’s long term goals. My long-term plan is to work with a venture capital fund investing in businesses in emerging markets. With that in mind, I am encouraged to hone my financial modeling skills, build the sector knowledge that enables one to flag interesting businesses, and understand the due diligence process and deal structures. At the same time, I am able to get in-depth sector knowledge and bring actionable, market-based solutions through our consulting engagements.
Being very young in my career journey and having most of my peers at this stage in their careers makes me appreciate the value of working at a place that is aligned with my long-term goals and allows me to grow towards achieving them. I am completely enjoying my work at I-DEV, and I am very excited to work on the upcoming projects in the pipeline, including co-managing a debt fund looking to invest in agri-businesses across Sub-Saharan Africa. Few firms provide the opportunities that I-DEV does to work alongside some of the smartest people, across a range of interesting projects, and in a region that is on the cusp of change.
