George Yaw Amoah: Not afraid to fail
“You are not what has happened to you. But what you decided to do about it”. That’s philosophy of George Yaw Amoah who has known success, suffered crushing setbacks and dragged himself back up again.
Advertisement
The setbacks he suffered have shaped his outlook and made him the entrepreneur he is today. “Now, I factor the possibility of failure into everything as I recognise failure as an integral part of the journey to success”
Journey to success
After high school at the Ofori Panin and St Augustine’s, Amoah went on study for a degree in political science at the New York’s Pace University.
He then went to the United States Air Force and fought in wars - cyber wars, participating on various missions as Information Management Specialist.
He attributes his tenacity to his time in the military. To illustrate his point, he recounts an incident at boot camp in San Antonio, Texas. “It was about 90 or so degrees Celsius. Dressed in thick military uniform, we were out doing drills. I so desperate i wanted to quit. But my drill Sergeant wouldn’t let me. She made me cry by shouting and spitting in my face ….I still remember her words ‘never give up, never quit, never, never’ ‘You are lucky to be alive and to be here’.
From the Air Force, Amoah headed to the University of Pennsylvania for a Master’s in Public Administration and concurrently took some courses at The Wharton School of Business.
A career in a technology and financial services then followed where he worked for IBM, Verizon and later in succession for the (then) top three global banks: Lehmann Brothers, Citibank, and JP Morgan Chase.
Restless Soul
But Amoah was a restless soul who had always looked to doing something new. Throughout his youth, he would easily grow bored and go looking for a new challenge, something which sometimes landed him in trouble.
So it was no surprise when after several years on Wall Street he quit his job and moved to Ghana because he was bored and needed a new challenge. He found his challenge when a business owner asked if he could provide the leadership in his distribution business needed. This being just the sort of job he’d left Wall Street for, Amoah set out to reorganise the company’s processes.
The effect was almost immediate and the company won a number industry awards and accolades. This was when it hit him: “If I can do it for someone else, I can certainly do it for myself”. He subsequently started his own distribution business and eventually became something of a “Mr Corporate Fixer” with businesses seeking his advice on various business decisions they faced. The future looked bright.
Until 2013 when failure came exacerbated by excess growth, inappropriate capital sourcing, unreliable management and most importantly by Amoah not realising that the market place had changed.
After selling his cars and other properties to pay off debts, stay afloat and to fund legal battles, he turned his home into an office where he and handful of staff he’d retained worked round the clock to rebuild the business.
He also challenged his own thinking and ‘MBA textbook’ approach which had made him slow to respond to market dynamics. Instead, he adopted the everyday rapid fire decision style of the typical Kantamanto entrepreneur who desists from the ‘analysis paralysis’ educated entrepreneurs can be so prone to. Amoah believes we often fail because we are reluctant to challenge the ideas we have been exposed to, “Failure comes when we get stuck where we are; when we are not ready to innovate”
Second coming
Today, Amoah is ‘back again’ he tells me. He’s rebuilt his distribution business, expanding the scope to include financial services using Fintech. He’s also brought in equity partners and new management. In addition, he’s using his experience and network to support other entrepreneurs, particularly those in the informal sector through Lycaon Capital, a capital firm he set up. He says ‘most companies don’t need capital. They need discipline and an ability to work with little before seeking external financing”. It is precisely this need that Lycaon is providing its clients.
His simple advice
Amoah, whose first contact with entrepreneurship was through his mother’s tie-dye business, believes becoming an entrepreneur only requires taking the first step. “Just start. Start where you are. Make a phone call; go to the Registrar General’s. Every day, do something that brings you closer to your goal”.
He adds, “all your options have to be exploited. You are allowed only to give up when you have exploited all of your options. And at that point, I don’t even call it giving up. You are just going in a different direction”.
He should know. He’s living and walking his own talk. — GB