Foreword From Mr Thomas Keller (KAS Regional Representative)
Welcome to Entrepreneurship! This course is an introductory course intended to provide Namibian small to medium enterprises with knowledge of entrepreneurship. To achieve this, this Olafika course focuses on the creation of new ventures, the skills necessary for success in an entrepreneurial venture, and factors associated with new venture success.
Entrepreneurship is interdisciplinary so this 2020 online course provides students with the opportunity to draw together elements of other experiences in finance, economics, management, marketing, production and so forth, showing how these must fit together to create a whole organization, rather than viewing these as a series of unrelated components.
This course also mixes theory with practice. Students will be challenged to apply principles, concepts and frameworks to real world situations, particularly on assignments including the business plan and on exams.
The impact of Covid-19 on our communities makes this course, an essential for the season and for the future, as the world seeks solutions to the socio-economic impact of this virus.
KAS is pleased to partner and help mentor entrepreneurs in finding those solutions and keeping those businesses and their ideas afloat.
COVID-19 has brought about so much disruption, but it is also a time of abundant opportunity. New businesses today adapting to the new normal have a limited range of platforms to choose from to restart their enterprise. Olafika is a platform to help business owners rebuild, restrategise and refocus their energies.
NDTC Welcoming Message
In 2020, we are certainly all being tested on our ability to maintain our productivity, our creativity, and even our sanity. While many of us are focused on the future and how our world is changing, there is much to be learned on how we can masterfully navigate the financial, social, and business issues for our generations to come. For any entrepreneur or aspiring business, Olafika will inspire such.
The Olafika SME Development and Mentor course develops an awareness of the state of entrepreneurship in Namibia. Here entrepreneurs as students are introduced to elements of successful entrepreneurship, opportunity identification and assessment, economic development potential of small business in Namibia, alternative forms of work arrangements in the new (post-Covid_19) economy balancing an entrepreneurial lifestyle, determining what success means to each student, goal setting and visioning.
This course is more than just for entrepreneurs, alone. It’s a mindset shifting programme. We are NDTC have observed that companies increasingly want and need employees who can identify problems and opportunities, exercise initiative and develop creative solutions, and build support while implementing their ideas.
The concepts and skills emphasized in this programme should be useful whether starting a new business or innovating within an existing business or organization.
From an NDTC perspective, the goal of this course is to provide insight into:
1) the significance of entrepreneurship in Namibia,
2) entrepreneurial processes – from finding and evaluating good business opportunities to new venture start-up and growth issues, and 3) entrepreneurial behaviour, a critical success factor in new venture creation.
We are proud to follow through how entrepreneurs will learn key entrepreneurial concepts through lecture material, experiential learning, videos and interaction with successful entrepreneurs.