When Gugulethu businesswoman Girl Yeki resigned from her job she did not have a plan but eventually embarked on a journey as an entrepreneur.
Thanks to her hard work and passion, she has succeeded in the world of business.
Today she dreams of running a business that will keep the township economy where it belongs-in the townships.
She wishes emerging traders, especially women, could do business where they live and not have to go far to buy their stock.
Ms Yeki, 38, also established a packaging company last month and her aim is to support spaza shops and vendors in the township.
She said she was inspired by the struggle of aspiring young, black business people, street vendors and other small businesses.
She wants to advance the education and leadership ability of women entrepreneurs.
She said women can succeed but they needed to make sacrifices by giving up the need for things such as expensive clothing and cars.
She said the people who are rewarded these days are those who are workaholics, good communicators, open-minded people and who know what they want in life.
She said women are steadily making inroads in the so-called men’s world.
“Although we are still a long way from closing the gender gap, women are making some gradual progress. But we need to let go of a lot of things. As women we need to know what we want. To us life is all about looking good all the time. But that needs to come to an end. We need to downgrade and work hard,” she said.
Going forward she said township business people, women in particular, need to change their mindset.
She said they still struggle with balancing their time and finances.
She said entrepreneurs could inspire girls across the continent to strive towards closing the gender gap.
“Truth be told we have all it takes to run the world. Women are powerful but need to change a few things. Let us do away with masculinity and patriarchy and lead from the front,” she told Vukani.
She said as a woman she is able to work in a flexible manner and be a mentor. On her business, she admitted that it has not been all smooth sailing.
She said she was faced with a whole lot of challenges such as marketing and getting local business people to trust her services.
“Like many other women within business, I find it difficult to connect to women’s businesses. I think being in the township it is not easy to get marketing. But I am doing all I can. I have people that assist me to market the business,” she said. She said women have to overcome subtle gender bias which is not easy to deal with. However, she said women are rocks who will certainly lead the world.
