Pitching with confidence - A beautiful journey from shyness to success!
Fatou Kine, a young entrepreneur from Guediawaye, started E-tontine an electronic saving system business in 2015. Her model is the modern version of the Tontine, the African traditional and most prevalent saving system used by women.
A tontine is an informal investment plan used by women in Senegal to raise capital. At the beginning each member agrees to pay a monthly fix amount for a specific period of time.
Every month a lottery is organized, and the winner collects the total of the accumulated fund. The monthly lottery continues until all members win.
Fatou Kine came up with the idea of creating an electronic version of the tontine by offering tangibles products (fridges, TVs, furnitures, etc.) in lieu of the traditional money received by the monthly winner.
When Fatou Kine was selected for the second edition of the Creative Enterprise Programme, from 3 to 5 October 2018, at the Urban Culture House in Ouakam, Dakar, she was already running her business. The Creative Enterprise Programme was then an opportunity for her to improve her knowledge, to gain new skills and to share it with her team. But she could not imagine that this training would open new doors for her.
Initially her interest in the training was mainly to improve her business skills. It did not cross her mind that she would be able to overcome her fear of public speaking by learning how to pitch.
During the training her biggest challenge was to be able to talk about her ideas due to her shyness. Like reported by Amina Diagne and El Hadj Niasse- Nesta certified associates, in charge of the training - it was very difficult for her to share her insights, despite her passion. Fortunately, with a lot of support and coaching from the associates and her peers, Fatou Kine managed to overcome that weakness and perfected her business pitch presentation.
Few months later, Fatou Kine applied for the Orange Linguere Digital Challenge (LDC), one of the biggest contests for women entrepreneurs in Senegal.
With the lessons learnt during her Creative Enterprise Programme training, she was successfully selected for the pitching stage and finally won the second prize of 5 million XOF (7000 GBP) !
When interviewed, Fatou Kine said that taking part in the Creative Enterprise Programme training was a wake-up call for her and gave her enough confidence to apply for the contest and to talk about her business. Now Fatou Kine is ready to seize new opportunities and to bring E –tontine to the next level. Fatou Kine aspire to include more products like cars and why not, real estate.