Bethlehem Tilahun Alemu Quotes

For me, I never thought because I'm a woman I'm not going to do something, I'm not going to try it this or that. The way I see myself is… I'm a person. I am capable of doing whatever I want and I'm going to succeed because I'm going to be working really hard to be there each and every day. So, for African girls and women to say 'I'm not going to be able to do this, I'm not capable of doing this,' you're killing yourself. If we are brave enough to go out to sell ideas to people, I think we can succeed.

My advice would be to build your idea piece by piece and get real and honest traction in the market with that idea while retaining as much equity as you can.

It is possible to deploy local resources while creating a market-leading global brand, and to do it all from scratch.

I think conventional wisdom is, by definition, the antithesis of entrepreneurialism, so I am probably on the other side of a lot of it.

People are traveling a long ways to bring in different ideas into their continent and country to start a business. But my idea is, look at who you are as a person. How you grew up. Everything around you is a business idea. When you see a problem, find the solution. That will be a business idea.

I always reflect and think about the same thing: business is about solving problems. Trying to identify the singular most difficult situation would be doing a disservice to this simple fact: if you are not continuously encountering tough situations as an entrepreneur, and solving them, then you are not really in business. Encountering obstacles and overcoming them is my day-to-day existence.

but to exquisitely execute that idea over and over and make it into a living, breathing reality. The best entrepreneurs literally seem to live their companies.

Since we are a fair trade organisation people want to buy fair trade shoes from us but they want to buy at cheap prices. That I don't understand. I know that running a business is not that easy and there is always a threat, there is always a risk that we are going to take, but I love it.

I like to visualise my goals in my own private space. I try and make it as real as possible so it is almost tangible to me. That gives these goals an immediacy and realness both for me and for my team that allows people to really chase that idea or goal in a visceral way.

Prosperity creation is the sole route to the elimination of poverty. And to create sustained prosperity, you have to create something truly world class.

We are doing well. We are trying to do $2m this year. In 2016, we are planning to do $20m. So that's why we are working hard and we are trying to expand our working facility. The demand is here. It's up to us to take that advantage and to make it happen,

This gave me a good knowledge of the industry, which was extremely useful in terms of setting up the company and making it grow,

We Decided to Create the Better Life We were all waiting for

… the needle I am constantly attempting to thread: building exciting brands around our unique cultures, brands that become ubiquitous and impactful.

are sharing Ethiopian cultures with the world and finding exciting ways to keep these cultures vibrant and fully relevant.