Meet our Rwanda Country Director
2017 has been a busy year for Yan Kwizera, who leads N-Frnds’ Rwanda team. Yan manages the on-the-ground relationships with our strategic partners, government partners and funders.
He travels across the country to ensure the collection and dispersion of information to and from smallholder farmers for a mAgri program, funded by USAID. He works closely with the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Services (MINAGRI), giving the government access to information, such as milk collection data, at a local level. This is data that MINAGRI has never seen before, because it did not exist at a local level until N-Frnds digitized the milk collection process.
Yan is also a big part in making N-Frnds’ technology more accessible, efficient and user- friendly. N-Frnds has been partnering with RwandaOnline on the e-government platform Irembo, giving Rwandans access to services like land transfer, driver’s license, birth certificates and more through their existing mobile devices and without the need for Internet. Yan combines his tech know-how with his own experience trying to navigate through government services to enhance the Irembo platform for his fellow Rwandans.
To get a better understanding of Yan and his role at N-Frnds read the excerpts below, originally published on The Afrikan Legacy.
Now that you are the Country Director for nFrnds Rwanda, what does your typical day look like?
I always have a list of projects I am working on for the week. So, my days are not the same but they all involve lots of meetings. I typically do three to four meetings a day and most of my days start with calling partners to check if the meetings are still on. I read analytics reports of our platform first thing in the morning to understand customer behaviour and re-think of our value proposition for current and future projects. Check on both regional and international news to know what is going on that can impact our business both positively and negatively. Send a Whatsapp message to my girlfriend (laugh). In between work meetings, I always try to put a lunch meet up with someone who is out of my industry just to relax but at the same time learn something new.
Some days I have Skype calls with our HQ to update each other and draw directions. I think I would say that I love it because it is not that structured from A to Z and thus not boring or routine (which is what I like about startups).
I finish my meetings around 5pm and then set a block of hours to do summaries and plans/proposals for the next steps. I go to the gym around 7pm and then dinner preferably with a business partner just to not waste that time too. After dinner it is again my laptop but this time either following a course at Stanford or exploring the next big idea.
Two days a week I always try to go outside Kigali to understand how rural area people use technology and what can we propose them as our mission is to connect the unconnected.
What advice do you have for young people who aspire to follow a career in ICT?
Do not think twice about it, the fact that you are thinking about it, means you have to try. Do not hesitate to change jobs, schools, places if you feel it is no longer working because the next one is where you will learn more about yourself and the industry. Be ready to fail and see failure as a lesson (as they say, fail fast and move on). Lastly, learn, unlearn and relearn and enjoy it (make it fun!).
How does nFrnds continue to connect the unconnected? And how do you involve/empower youth in your programs?
Everything we do everyday has to be aligned with that mission. It goes beyond business; it is something we are passionate about. Information is power and we want to empower communities. We work with different partners around the world ranging from banks to large agribusinesses and governments allowing them to interact directly with the masses for the first time! All this with a simple phone (called stupid phone too). Our platform allows low-income earners to consume technology the same way a person with a computer or a smart phone does. And not just any information but information relevant to their lives like Agri extension information, financial inclusion, health, education, etc.
Each year, we organise youth fellowship programs, a hands on training program for university graduates that teaches them about entrepreneurship, product and business development but also we send them on the ground to talk to customers and build products on top of nFrnds platform. We hire from the pools of these fellows. This year we even added a special fellowship program for women as we think empowering women is empowering the world.
To read the full article, please visit The Afrikan Legacy, a platform that celebrates young Africans who are contributing substantially to the advancement of their industries and societies. Excerpts were re-published with permission.
