A view from inside the South African High Commission in London, England

Dreamtrepreneur (Part 2) – Off to London day 1

As two Co-Founders, based in South Africa, we were fortunate enough to visit London and get the most amazing insights into how similar companies are run here. After an 11 hour flight, paid for by the awesome people at Virgin Atlantic as part of the Dreamtrepreneur competition, we rushed to our hotel to meet the lovely Ms Catherine Lecavalier, the lady responsible for setting up all the amazing meetings that we had scheduled for the upcoming week.

DroneSnap at the South African High Commission in London
Dreamtrepreneur winners: Mario (right) & Jason (left) (DroneSnap) with Catherine Lecavalier (centre right) and Ridhwana Shaik (centre left)

Dreamtrepreneur at the South African High Commission

We were honoured to be invited to the South African House in London to meet with Ms Thobile Mazibuko, the Economic Counsellor, whose job involves keeping the good relations between South Africa and the UK. DroneSnap, being a fairly young but consistently growing company, has been considering the opportunities for expanding globally and this particular relationship was a great one to form for future ventures that might involve the UK.

DroneSnap at the South African High Commission. Dreamtrepreneurs in the making.
Mario (centre right) & Jason (centre left) (DroneSnap) and founder of SOS Footwear, Ridhwana Shaik (left) with the Economic Counsellor of the South African High Commission, Thobile Mazibuko (centre) and the Marketing Officer, Lyndsey Duff (right)

The Future for Young Business Leaders

Our second appointment for the day was an amazingly insightful panel debate hosted at the Institute of Directors. After realising that we were the only two guys wearing t-shirts in a room full of formally dressed men and women, we were happy to be assumed to be part of the tech startup scene and got to meet some very experienced people.

The topics for the debate included; “What does the future hold for our next generation of business leaders?”, “How will that affect our aspiring leaders and change the companies they are running?” and “What challenges will our next CEOs face?”. Hearing the opinions of these thought leaders from a different country has helped us understand certain business and leadership principles in much more depth which is value that could never have a price tag.

DroneSnap at the Institute of Directors. Dreamtrepreneur in the making.
Dreamtrepreneur winners at a panel debate at the Institute of Directors

 

See part 3 here.