Professionalism, losing the essence for a high conviction rate?

Law-Abiding-Citizen-Poster

Law Abiding Citizen is becoming one of my favorite movies, as someone with interest in sociology, I try to comprehend how communities form and societies function.

One of the deepest conversations in the movie is when Sarah discusses with her boss how she sees her career path at the age of 35, sharing that she wishes she hasn’t sacrificed all the things that she could be and do as a result of her commitment to the profession, just to get high convection rate on a performance report while climbing the career ladder!

Conversation starting Minute 7:10 in this video.

- Hey, Nick, can I ask you something?
- Hmm?

Would you do it
the same way now?

Would you still cut
a deal for Darby?

This is the job, Sarah.
We have to make choices.

- But did you make the right choice?
- We made the right choice, right?

I don't know.

I'm 35, Nick.

And there are things-
there are possibilities

that I'm not gonna have now.

And it's okay.
I know it's part of the deal.

And don't get me wrong.
I love working for you.

But I just want to make sure
I gave up those things

for more than just
a high conviction rate.

The experience of my father winning a 10 years long legal battle had been heart-wrenching, that put me in the mood for much exploration, lots of people hide under the mantra of professionalism and performance to do things against the essence of what they are meant to do.

Before careers and professionalism, there are humans, values and principles. Unfortunately, the human society has for the most part failed to celebrate the few good men and women who stick with the essence and build and sustain beauty other than celebrate a plastic sense of professionalism!

To hell with what you’d consider “professionalism” if it makes me lose my essence.

If this is professionalism, then I prefer to be labelled an amateur who cares about the essence of what he do!

Why am I proud of my father today?

Why am I proud of my father today?

Today, my father came to update me with the result of a legal case that seemed to have a story.

While attending a business networking dinner in London last September, I was sitting on the table with with a freelance writer who writes for the guardian, a lawyer who used to work in Egypt and a handful of finance/investment people, I was selling them on the potential of Egyptian entrepreneurs with a handful of examples we have chosen to feature with Egypreneur’s TLondonB campaign.

When we came to discuss what’s happening in Egypt, being ruled by the military and how it is perceived in the eyes of youth like myself, the story shared by my father seemed to grab everyone’s attention and initiate an interesting conversation.

After the discussion the journalist wanted to follow-up for a feature, but the story didn’t reach an end by this time.

Today, it did!

About ten years ago, yes that’s 10 years ago. My father was working as the executive director of the gardening department at the district of Maadi. Basically he was in charge of all the greenery in Maadi, my father’s bosses were former Army generals, whom in a meeting with the department, the former Army general ordered everyone to plant 1000 trees within a specific time frame within a specific area, seems like just for the sake of PR saying government planted X trees .etc

While everyone among my dad’s colleges was writing this down as a direct order from a superior officer, my father seemed to boldly disagree, stating that technically speaking, it’s impossible to plant 1000 trees in the gardens under his management, stating that will transform it into a forest not gardens. My father’s sense of direct disagreement was not something a former Army general is used to, so he seemed to GROWL on his comments while my father’s colleges are pointing for him to skip it, ignore it, don’t do it, even throw the 1000 trees in the Nile but never say NO to the general.

Technically it was impossible to plant more trees in the gardens, not even a fraction of this number, so while his colleges, used mislabeled plants as trees, order the number and then disposed them, built walls with them, my father did stick with his professional opinion to consider ordering 1000 trees a waste of government resources that’s needed somewhere else and that the maximum number of trees that can be planted is 320, which they already planted.

My father seemed to pay the price of this refusal as he got a management cut in his salary, working for the government doesn’t pay off any good anyway and it didn’t seem to make a difference, yet, my father has decided to take the case to the court.

But why?

In the battles we go through in life, it’s not about winning something, it’s not about defeating someone, but it’s about sticking with what’s right and what’s fair. Misusing government resources should be a crime, it is wrong and you shouldn’t be charged for refusing to do what is wrong.

If you accept something that goes against your values, goes against what you really stand for, you start losing your essence!

That’s when going to battle is not a matter of losses or gains, but it’s a matter of principles and values.

It’s not right to order a misuse of government resources and if you are ever ordered of that, you have the right to refuse!

IMG-20140120-00372

IMG-20140120-00373

I read the court order with pride, starting back in 2003/2004, my father led a 10 years long legal battle against a government body, for no reason except to prove what’s right and to give a reason for everyone who is given choices between what’s right and what’s easy.

Today, I feel like I have got my first ever slap on the face from my father

I got this man’s DNA!

So, who is really behind #ElMashrou3?

So, who is really behind #ElMashrou3?

Since my first post Among criticism from entrepreneurs, USAID-funded Bamyan Media Launches Egypts first reality TV Show for entrepreneurs I was contacted by a few people who worked closely with Bamyan Media and shared some insider stories about their experience which will be valuable in analyzing behind the scenes. Also, as four episodes aired, thats 1/3 of the show, that gives a reasonable amount of materials for analysis after the initial feedback and observations.

As the same feedback is repeated for the rest of the entrepreneurs who didnt catch up with the show early on, it became evident that the feedback of majority of actual entrepreneurs is merely the same, viewership rates getting even LOWER after first episode as most people lose interest! Formation of a circle of a few hundreds who are mostly involved with the teams behind the show for a basic form of engagement. And seems like the staff itself doesnt mind getting its hands dirty in feedback war as boiling criticism to a Shabi song they produced starts to surface, Asim Haneef, The show Executive Producer called it the best song ever. view it HERE

Though, a valuable debate also took place on the comments of the above song, with Peter Guirguis seemingly one of the song producers mentions an intellectual monopoly on entrepreneurship and captivating the concept from being commercialized and going mainstream, assuming that Egyptians are already practicing entrepreneurship on their own way from his point of view. Thats worth and intellectual debate on defining entrepreneurship and how it shall be transferred to mainstream audiences. You can view the conversation HERE

Also, as the investment on developing digital assets in the past 1+ year through aggressive advertising didnt pay off  in actual viewership, it seems like they decided to go guerilla marketing, they visit popular mainstream cafes like Downtown El Borsa, shift the channel to AlNahar and tried to encourage viewership, the funny bit is that in some of the photos shared in social networks form the exercise, it shows their team sitting to watch it, while people around paying absolutely no attention! They even called on their page for more people to join these campaigns!

As I wrote in my last post, feedback is only a factor in impact assessment, but an actual impact assessment should be based on identifying and analyzing variables, its about finding the variables that matter the most and digging deeper on analyzing them. The first variable of any Impact Assessment project is defining the background and motives of organization, entrepreneur and decision makers behind whatever project being done.

In this post well try to dig down to who is really really the decision maker behind the show, next post will get more into further analysis

So, who is really behind #ElMashrou3?

who_is_behind

If you check out their website or their social media profiles, youll see the who is behind El Mashrou3 is presented as TV network, production company, Bamyan Media and organizations working on entrepreneurship in Egypt such and such and such. Even my team noticed couple of channels where Egypreneur is still mentioned, which shouldnt be the case as we terminated partnership back in 2012, so as youre reading this fellows, take it off or would you like to get yourself a reminder?

ElMashrou3_Egypreneur2

Furthermore, in a communication they have sent to their subscribers and shared on their page labelled The Story behind El Mashrou3, they seemed to be doing everything possible to cover up on the reality of the ownership and funding behind the show and just mention that a bunch of Egyptian youth with a few Khawaga, Arabic word for foreigner who produced the show in Belad Barra which is usually used to refer to the west and developed countries to actually refer to Afghanistan.

egyptian_youth

So, why are they so keen on covering up on that and how truthful is the way they present themselves with? And what is the nature of involvement with these partners?

As I get back to my email archive April 2012 as Bamyan Media was starting its operations in Egypt, they presented other entrepreneurship-focused organizations with a basic partnership, I was only asked for approval on using Egypreneur logo on the brochure below and approved it, by then the way the partnership was presented was fairly professional and straightforward. Though, they have used this approval to post our brand in every possible channel without permission afterwards.

early_partnerships

Well, obviously Bamyan Media was gaining legitimacy by using these organizations brands, it is a straightforward market entry strategy, you want to befriend those already with good reputation and track record and get their support in what youre doing, a potential massive exposure through TV is a good point to start. Then use that to sell on others that you already have everyones support and that this thing is actually co-created and approved by everyone, which might not be the real case,  some of the visible feedback from my last post was from founder of entities presented as partner organizations.

What happened to partnerships afterwards was quite amateurish and superficial, when only numbers matter, even if you run a starting student activity you can get your logo as a show partner and you count as vote of confidence on the show. As its shared by Omar Aysha, I can understand the motives behind such a move as at some stage they were trying to hide the massive USAID involvement, as it might fire back as they go mainstream, they started sticking any logos they get their hands on, so if you want to, you cant find someone to blame!

The point is, none of these partners has any decision to take regarding the show, they might be invited to nice events and focus groups but its only done as much as it serves the objectives of the owning company, Bamyan Media, which hired a team to polish their image within the community and attract beneficiaries who, knowingly or not knowingly, will back their mission and even defend them in return for direct benefits. Add to it the fact that the community working on entrepreneurship support in Egypt still didnt reach the maturity to decide and the critical thinking to accept and reject, often no one will reject anything from anyone while struggling with finding their own next steps.

Truth is, the TV Network is just a TV Network that hosted the show and offered it a standard promotion package, the production company was just a production company hired to produce the show, partners except for USAID and Silatech are just a logo exchange and superficial involvement, mostly to gain legitimacy in front of main sponsors and strategic partners.

For critical analysis, we have to look for ownership, who has the power for decision making and influence.

Thats what matters and thats when we are driven back to where it started:

Anna_Afghanistan2Courtesy of http://www.thesolutionsjournal.com

In 2007, while David Elliot was working as a Senior Development Consultant for USAID in Afghanistan, his daughter Anna Elliot, 23 years old student at Hampshire University and part time Bartender came for a visit to Afghanistan, observing the popularity of Reality TV Shows at the time, with American-style Afghan Star and others. Anna had an interesting conversation with her dad regarding doing a similar show focusing on entrepreneurs.

As per his Linkedin Profile, at that time, David Elliot was managing a $54 million USAID project for Afghanistan Small and Medium Enterprise Development (ASMED). After the US-led war on Afghanistan starting 2011, the US government directed lots of Aid money into rebuilding Afghanistan, obviously, it seems that senior USAID consultant David Elliot didnt find it hard to secure $500K USD to fulfill his daughters ambition to launch an American-style reality TV Show for social entrepreneurs, probably at the least competitive and non-transparent market, Afghanistan. This Devex page explicitly shows USAID as the organization executed the show.

Surprisingly the only official videos from the Dream & Achieve TV Show produced in Afghanistan was hosted on the YouTube channel of the ASMED fund Mr. David Elliot was leading, showing even that the project might have been funded by funds he personally managed for USAID, checkout the USER NAME of the hosting channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/ASMEDInfo/videos

Anna Elliot seemed to postpone her studies and get involved with producing a Pilot series of her Reality TV Show, managed under the umbrella of USAID, the show was hosted on Afghanistans most popular TV Network TOLO TV Wikipedia shows a 41% of viewership market share while the owning company itself claims 59% viewership share HERE, the TV Network claim to have 17 Million constant viewers (NBCNews).

It is claimed that the pilot series attracted 7 Million viewers in Afghanistan, which while looking good for PR, technically speaking, even if the claim is true, given the hosting TV Network statistics, it means that 10 Million constant viewers to the channel has either switched off their TV or shifted to another channel as the show aired, comparably to another TV Show hosted on the same channel Afghan Star they are claiming 11 Million viewers per episode.

But anyway, relying on the pilot series a PR campaign was launched in Western media and the show seemed to gain coverage from media outlets like Fast Company and New York times.

Something here to note that at this time, US media companies, seemed to working on dominating the scene in Afghanistan, a virgin market created after the war on Afghanistan, according to this NBC News Article Why Afghanistans election campaign may look familiar to American TV viewers, it shows that Afghanistan has become a comfy bed for US media companies and aspiring media entrepreneurs.

 This entry on USAID website itself, claims that the show was a success story and promises a second season that never came to be and of course shows the muscles of the US development agency in creating entrepreneurial revolutions where it is needed the most: http://www.usaid.gov/results-data/success-stories/afghan-entrepreneurs-%E2%80%9Cdream-and-achieve%E2%80%9D

Though this KabulPress.org article seems to disagree, entitled American corruption and mismanagement threaten Afghanistan’s future under headline Suspect American AID projects in Afghanistan, it lists the TV Show by the Elliots as one of the projects USAID claims has created impact while its  not actually sensed on the ground. As per Wikipedia (KabulPress) is Afghanistans most read news site.

DreamAchieve

I found it extremely difficult to track any proper digital footprints resulting from the show in Afghanistan. I was even told by a producer Bamyan Media worked with when they came to Egypt that they didnt want to show him the produced show in Afghanistan, because it was very amateurish. Furthermore, on the tongue of Anna Elliot herself, she stated that the show was boring but 7 million people watched it before one of her team members intervene to mention that she is just not good at selling herself.

In 2009, Anna and David Elliot established Bamyan Media to take the concept further and launch the show in different countries, Bamyan Media uses a mix of a non-profit and for-profit business model to launch the same format of the TV Show in different countries with market for entrepreneurship, mostly developing countries in transition. 

But did Bamyan Media drop the USAID umbrella the project started through?

After launching the pilot season, Anna Elliot was being celebrated in western media as a hero who went to Afghanistan to empower its entrepreneurs and was even being hosted in a conversation at The While House 

BamyanMedia_WhiteHouse

What a second target after Afghanistan would it be other than Egypt post 25 revolution? Yes, that was it, Bamyan Media presented USAID with a proposal to move to Egypt with the backing of USAID funds and it seemed they were able to secure a big check to get their operation started, the deal is supposedly to cover 2-3 years of operating costs for Bamyan Media to initiate their TV Show and business in Egypt.

I can claim having insider information at this part, because at this time, I was working on a similar TV Show for entrepreneurs in Egypt through Egypreneur, that was not an idea or a hunch, but a production-ready concept with agreement with a TV Network and initial agreement with a major sponsor.

abdelsamad-estimation

The TV Network was sold after the revolution and I was left alone searching for alternatives, passing the 6 months mark in formatting the researching options to produce the show to trigger the entrepreneurial energy of Egyptian youth post 25th revolution and part of a strategy to setup Egypreneur as an independent institution that supports entrepreneurs in Egypt. I was approached by USAID employees who offered support and accordingly was given details about what Im working on.

us2email

In the process of communicating with USAID around my TV Show project, I was forwarded an email that was sent by Anna Elliot March 17th 2011, which was a thank you note for USAID support an a promise of follow-up on next steps. I skipped it as the attached format targeting social entrepreneurs didnt seem close to what we have arrived at at that time. 

But it seems that it wasnt the case, a few months later, I heard that USAID contracted Bamyan Media to execute a Reality TV Show for entrepreneurs in Egypt, getting busy and overwhelmed with other initiatives we started at Egypreneur, I decided to learn from the experience and completely ignore the matter, but it didnt seem to want to ignore me.

The newly established Bamyan Media out of a spin-off from a USAID project, was able to secure a three years contract with USAID to initiate  and replicate their model in Egypt, Omar Aysha, former editor at wamda.com claims a $5 Million USD check was given for their project in Egypt, having no source to confirm or deny, what can be confirmed is that USAID was committed to providing the operating cost for Bamyan Media for 2-3 years, meaning you have 40 employees, 8 services contracts per month, USAID just pay the bills for Bamyan Media allowing them to get cozy while working on their project for two to three years?

Anyway, Bamyan Media created a for-profit company El Mashrou3 LLC through which it handle its operations in Egypt, well, some people might have issues with getting funded as a non-profit then using this money to create a for-profit business, but entrepreneurially speaking youre fine to do whatever you wish as long as you are not breaking the law or any business or personal commitments, I was told that Bamyan Media owns 99% of El Mashrou3 LLC.

ElMashrou3_Header

Accordingly the controlling element in all activities and actions related to #ElMashrou3 comes from Bamyan Media and El Mashrou3 LLC which received enormous backing from USAID, it seems that Bamyan Media are doing some PR efforts lately to present the involvement as an Egyptian company called El Mashrou3 LLC, which is nothing but an interface to Bamyan Media in Egypt to expand on its commercial benefit. According to their website, Bamyan Media seems to be working hard on expanding the operation of El Mashrou3 to be Pan-Arab reality TV Show for entrepreneurs. 

With very little impact and massively low viewership created by the show, added to a few cases of misconducted by Bamyan Media that made one of their former contractors mention to me in a private communication that they are the most horrid unprofessional scam bags I have ever worked with.

It seems that Bamyan Media have got very arrogant given the massive backing from their government money that they not only felt comfortable enough to screw up for two years, but they choose to violate interest and intellectual property of local entrepreneurs on their way to complete dominance on the MENA entrepreneurship landscape.

David_Yemen

The questions that comes to our mind as we analyze the leadership behind the show is, are they qualified with a track record to run this kind of thing? Do they have actual pressing desire to create impact through their TV Show, real one? Is the way in which they secured funding for the show and the way they dealt with their contractors and local entrepreneurs represents a social enterprise seeking to create positive impact? 

To be continued

In hindsight, Anna Elliot’s reality TV series might seem like a media mogul’s strategy to build market share in developing countries. Source: Milton Magazine

Anna_Elliot_1

Courtesy of Bamyan Media on Facebook

DISCLAIMER: Information provided is available on public channels, reference is provided for the most part, no personal offense was intended and no ones privacy was violated in the process of carrying out this research/analysis.

My 2014 Chief Aim is…

Derek says that telling someone your goal make you less likely to achieve it.

Either it’ll get done and you’ll know it in good time, or it won’t and I will save myself the embarrassment.

So, enough talking. Just do it!

In Egypt, are we hypocrites?

Well, here we go with another sensitive topic, but what #Getting_Real I promised myself to stick with in 2014 might be less than exploring what matters the most and rarely explored and trying to define the principles upon which we want to live and build our society, if you are in your 20s I think that should be one of the important questions to ask yourself.

A few times I was having some true talks and I mentioned something awkward like: “All acts of our society, are based upon hypocrisy”, oh yah, of course you get some equally awkward reaction when you say that among people, who are basically are the society, you’re talking about.

But, C’mon, ain’t that true already?

Ain’t our family meetings and chit-chats are about showcasing how great everyone is? Ever talked about concerns, challenges or dreams? How can we help?

Ain’t most of those experience the pressure of finishing school do that because of “societal pressure” not out of passion or even benefit?

Ain’t marriage in our society is more about social status and financial security more than actual love or human connection? What do parents check and hunt for?

Ain’t all relationships within your limited social circles look publicly perfect, people shake hands and kiss cheeks, but what’s inside is inside?

Ain’t most of us are lying about being in “competition” and twisting the qualities of “collaboration” and “co-creation” to avoid direct confrontation? Pussies much?

Ain’t we shy away from having real strategic partnerships in business and within “ecosystems” because we pretend to be partners already and strike from behind or below the belt?

Ain’t most of the behavior you observe from those “partners” and “friends” can be considered “passive aggressive”?

Ain’t we hide ourselves most of the time behind shiny Facebook statuses, tweets and blog posts?

Doesn’t that just make us hypocrites?

Let’s say that in the last 10 year when I could understand being a part of a society, above 16 years old, I felt it’s not true, really? You like me because I’m top of my class? Do you really dare to break through all the superficial defense mechanisms and sneak into everyone’s true self, touch their pains and really “connect” with them?

When you go in disagreement or competition, why don’t you just state that if you do this we are in goddamn competition that will cost us both, let’s partner better? But people do everything they can to avoid that, they end up with passive aggressive behavior, I will hit you from behind, but nicely, because we are friends. If you say something about competition you are the bad guy, really?

If you step on my toes, I will cut your balls off, if you have any!

Does the above statement scare you, yes, I wrote that on my Facebook status, I really like it, not necessarily like I will do it, but I think it makes sense as a warning.

So, why don’t we talk about what matters? Why it’s socially unacceptable to state things as it is? It would be even more acceptable to lie than to state something that would sound perfectly fine to me.

Personally, I’m not good at hiding stuff you know and I plan to stick with the truth, if I don’t like it I will say it out loud and If I don’t like you, I will let you know and equally if I like you, I will let you know. I feel quite free and don’t need to hide myself like most people do.

That probably scares some people away and I don’t mind, be my guest.

With all our imperfections, with all our fears and failures we are beautiful creatures already. So, don’t hide yourself, your feelings or your situations for any reason.

I love this scene from The Phone Booth, the guy is messed up inside, like most of us, but at least he can afford the truth and he would be loved even more after it.

I dream of living in a truthful society…

If you share with people who you really are and they reject you, screw them and come join me…

Let’s build a better society 🙂

So, how would #ImpactLab do Impact Assessment to #ElMashrou3?

Well, after my last journal on: Among criticism from entrepreneurs, USAID-funded Bamyan Media launches Egypt’s first Reality TV Show. Some of my colleges at Egypreneur, thought it’s close to how it would look like as an Impact Lab report, especially as I confessed a background they feared the report might be criticized based on, and they mentioned as we don’t get hired for doing these impact assessment projects anyway, I would use this personal publishing platform to introduce what impact assessment is and how we usually go about doing it.

Can be an educational bit until we have some serious work to do. I will just take the last post regarding the TV Show as an example.

Do you know that all these comments and negative feedback from entrepreneurs might be actually irrelevant? All these talks about the format and selection of entrepreneurs might not be the variables that matter at all?

Why?

Because scientifically speaking anything that you design, you design it to achieve a specific output/goal/impact, right? In order to graduate this output, you have lots of variables or ingredients to introduce as an input, correct? And you have a process to go through to get this output.

Then anything that human designs can be analyzed into:

Input >> Process > Output

It’s like your Mama’s Pizza. The delicious or awkward Pizza your mama prepares at different occasions, if your Mama decides to impress you with your own favorite type of Pizza, that is the taste you had is the output, the result, the impact..

Which might actually change and you might not like it at some point but it remains alright…

If your Mommy’s goal/output changes from making you, your own favorite type of Pizza into hosting a party with 50 of your friends, and there is not enough input, make it ingredients, budget, time, helping hands for diversity, your Mama will make a standard Pizza, you might not really like it, but your Mama actually did a great job if you properly assess the feedback of the majority of those who were intended to like the Pizza.

If your friends go crazy about your Mama’s Pizza, you might suggest to her to start a Pizza shop, actually, If I were you I would suggest to handle the business end, communication, marketing/branding, sales and she just need to create this awesome Pizza and of course you get like 60% stake in the company, your Mama is too kind I know, anyway…

If your Mama is so confident about her ability to visualize the best Pizza that people would want to come to her shop for (Output) and she’s a genius at picking the right ingredients (Input) to make this specific output, and she is so skilled at handling the (Process) of turning the well selected input into a delicious output. Please, give me a call, I can offer you a deadly ecommerce platform to boost sales and I want want stock in your Mama’s Pizza Shop thingy.

Got that?

This simple analogy applies to anything you use, the car you drive, the kitchen machine, the robots, all in all are creations that achieves a specific output once they are given a specific input and they are designed in a way to transfer this input into output.

If you studied engineering like me, you probably have suffered while studying from Modern Control Engineering for Ogata and was forced into analyzing complex systems and expressing them with complex charts and mathematical equations. Oh my lord!

modeling

So, what does this has to do with Impact Assessment?

Impact Assessment is the same thing, while assessing impact, you don’t just collect opinions of random people and say it worked or not based on that. Rather you follow a scientific way in defining the desired output, the scope of your study, the most important variables in the study and then you gather as much data as needed, analyze and present this data in relation to these variables in a way that makes sense.

The function of an impact assessment by then is to define and study the most important variables in any operation that interferes in shaping the desired output, taking into consideration the objective and scope of the study upon which these variables are defined.

If you want to think proactively by then an R&D unit like the Impact Lab kitchen, can experiment with different variations of these variables until it reaches the secret sauce that works, that would make your Mama’s Pizza Shop not just break even but go IPO, if the operation is being consistently managed.

Away from this science and engineering models to assess impact, why would you need to do that with projects, programs, events and products targeting entrepreneurs?

The way Impact Lab came about is very much related to the famous Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Mapping Project, we wanted to study what’s being done to serve entrepreneurs and how to make it better and to make this data freely available for anyone to use it, not just as individual cases but to build the intellectual capacity and assets that would help in designing massively successful activities and accordingly raise the ROI of everyone working on helping entrepreneurs.

impactlabs

That’s basic R&D stuff, nothing fancy.

But anyway, what are the steps to perform an impact assessment?

Actually it varies whether you’re creating something from the scratch and accordingly still need to figure out the input and design the process, or it’s already done when you can just choose a scope of study and analyze known variables.

By then to do impact assessment for something that’s already done, you’ll need to:

  1. Define the objective/desired output
  2. Define the input/givens
  3. Define the process
  4. Define the scope of study and only pick variables related to this scope
  5. Research data related to each variable
  6. Objectively study variables and their relationship to shaping the output
  7. Extract report with findings and recommendations

So, if we want to do an objective impact assessment for a Reality TV Show for entrepreneurs, we need to go through the following process. Objectivity doesn’t lie, it actually smells if you’re deceiving in data gathering, no one will take you seriously, the only deceitful trick is to manipulate in defining the important variables, it takes a bit above average critical thinkers to figure this out.

And actually that’s why I considered the Reality TV Show in question a failure, because it’s so obvious that regardless of having massive input in terms of funding, 2 years of preparations, popular TV network, massive ads campaign .etc it failed to achieve its objective in hitting large number of viewers who’ll then be inspired to start their business and rather only got viewership through the regular TV network audience, targeted advertising and even “some” of the “usual” community interested in the topic.

Which objectively means that Bamyan Media has, so far, failed in achieving its objective of mainstreaming entrepreneurship through the Reality TV Show format it owned and launched through El Mashrou3.

Well, anyway, that’s getting lengthy, let’s try to define scope and variables in another day…

Among criticism from entrepreneurs, USAID-funded Bamyan Media launches Egypt’s first entrepreneurship Reality TV Show

Whether you are among the hundreds who had been involved in the preparations for the show in the last 2 years, since September 2011 ,or the few millions watching it on TV or hundreds of thousands watching it online, oh really?

Everyone agrees that…

Egypt just witnessed the launch of the highly anticipated #1 Reality TV Show for entrepreneurs. Yah and Erm! actual entrepreneurs, whom the show is supposed to be about had been passing around wild comments as the first episode of the show aired on Egypt’s popular Al Nahar TV Network.

Comments ranged from the show being overly commercial, abusing entrepreneurship and passing the wrong image about being an entrepreneur in Egypt, even questioning the allegedly massive USAID funding and the intentions behind it.

BasmaAlbanna

Basma Albanna, Co-Founder of Sirkil

AbdulrahmanAlaa

Abdulrahman Alaa, Founder of X-Project Student Organization, El Mashrou3 Partner Organization

AmrSaleh_Abuse

Co-Founder & CEO of Integreight the creator of 1Sheeld the 850%+ Goal Achiever on KickStarter

AmrElShair

CEO & Founder of 3alemni

SherifElGazar_Brand_Yourself

Co-Founder of Brand Yourself, El Mashrou3 Partner Organization

OmarAysha
Omar Aysha, Former Editor at Wamda.com, well, with 20+ likes to his status!

Also, on Twitter, remarks of being a competition show rather than an entrepreneurship show.

Twitter_Feedback

 Including Mohamed El-Tahawy, CEO of Smartology

That’s only some of the feedback gathered…

Okay, now, let’s be frank, why would I write this analysis, and why would you be interested in reading this, given that…

Away from the self-flattering facts of being the founder of a 5+ years old brand promoting entrepreneurship in Egypt, with deep passion to spread the virus in Egypt, under any brand as I would claim, plus, experiencing 6+ months of formatting a similar reality TV Show back in 2010/early 2011 .etc

Let’s state the real reasons here:

Egypreneur, the entrepreneurship gig that I’m in charge of terminated its superficial partnership with the organization behind the show back in December 2012 on the ground of copycatting some of our products and shifting their strategy from being a (TV Show) into being a (TV Show + Egypreneur) and using our intellectual property in the process, well, add to it the fact that when we threatened of legal + public action in response we had been untruthfully misguided by their management team that this won’t happen, they ended up avoiding it by being foxy, calming us down until it is too late to launch one and going on with the stuff they have stolen and even more details we volunteered during assessing a potential partnership framework, after all this we were too kind to let it go and just let Karma do its job.

Yes, yes and right now Egypreneur HQ made a public notice that the model of the resources section on their website is stolen from our famous Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Mapping Project which worked on mapping entities and resources helping entrepreneurs in Egypt and this particular part was planned to be released through an information product called Ebda2 platform, they ended up releasing it under the same title, and it’s true that there is a case of intellectual property violation (Violating Egyptian Law #82 for year 2002, Undisclosed Information Articles) being raised against the company managing the show/website and individuals involved.

All this is true, there is even more, if you want me to share, but that’s enough to make my point…

Now, why would you even continue reading given this background?

impactlabs

Well, one of the not-so-secret arms of Egypreneur is Impact Lab, where we started an impact assessment project through which we gather and analyze information including feedback to assess the impact created by the product (TV Show) and everything that follows, so we started gathering and analyzing feedback but you know professionally , it will be claimed non-objective if articles or reports being released through Impact Lab, while both organizations are having all this heated issues behind the scenes, I couldn’t attract third parties to join Impact Lab for the project so far, so it will remain undisclosed until this changes.

And you know what I thought? As I have access to the information anyway and it will be claimed non-objective by the ones who are ready to do so anyway, why not to release it under this poor personal journal, and oh man, I don’t mind if you consider it non-objective or a personal view. I will do my best to make it objective later, but it’s a personal journal, I’m free to do what I wish..

Well, I even could have launched this as an opinion piece through Egypreneur Community, but I preferred to do it under my own name, will make sure it remains as such along the way…

I will start following the systematic process of Impact Lab starting with the next post, till then let’s go with couple of initial observations.

First: Initial Viewership

Well, whether you love it or hate it, in TV business there is only one thing that doesn’t lie and you can’t get around it, numbers and viewership…

I did a basic analysis to number of views for Reality TV Show competitions before you can find it HERE, if you search youtube for episodes from any of the Reality TV Show competitions we witnessed you’ll find a rough average of 2-3 Million views per episode, Search YouTube for Arab Idol, MBC The Voice, X Factor Arabia, Coke Studio.

Well, El Mashrou3 was not less supported, it’s hosted on one of Egypt’s most popular TV Networks and it received funding from USAID, Silatech and Samsung, so they have everything to go wild, and they did…

The launch of the first episode was very well supported from all angles, they organized a fancy event at a five stars hotel and invited all fans, partners and friends into a gig with the soon-to-be TV entrepreneur super stars – doesn’t look right, isn’t it? – to get their support and digital footprint into promoting the show.  They also got the giant Facebook page of Samsung Egypt with over 5 Million fans to post their first episode, beside Al Nahar network Facebook page with over 2 Million fans…

Not only that, it seems like they also did the old trick of inviting pages with large number of fans to post their episode on YouTube, even if irrelevant, you can find it even in (Eftekasat Masry Om El Agnaby and a Fake Bassem Youssef Page)

Surprisingly, still they also seemed to invest in Facebook Advertising again, after investing massively across the last year to gain close to half a million fans, they still ran a Facebook Ads campaign to bring viewership to their first episode.

Episode_Sponsored SamsungAds

Thinking that should blow up the counter and strike massive viewership and digital footprint?

Surprisingly, the first episode today January 2nd at 6PM after over 12 days of aggressive promotion has barely reached 31,000 views , which is nothing compared to other Reality TV Shows with the same investment or even less, hitting 2 Million views in average, reaching 15 Million for a single episode in some cases!

ep1_jan2_6PM

This didn’t seem to be the case with the first episode only, the second episode after 5 days of release has only reached a bit more than 5,000 views.

ep2_jan2_6PM

 

Erm! How disappointing now, by standards of the media and TV business, despite all the budget spent and commercial packaging, you know, they call such viewership a massive failure.

Second: Attitude towards feedback, delete.

Don’t get me wrong, the feedback was not all negative, negative, not at all and who would expect that with allegedly over 1000+ volunteers around Egypt to support the airing of the show, mostly students given the benefit of being around future TV super stars, who even entered into heated debated in several posts against entrepreneurs sharing their views about the show.

If you visit their Facebook page you’ll find everything is going great. The smart social media managers got me smiling for the witty PR tricks asking audience”What is your positive feedback on the last episode” leaving space only for positive feedback, furthermore, couple of posts mentioned “deleting” negative feedback on their page and the comment mentioning that actually got the most likes indicating intentionally removing negative comments from their page.

Deleting_FeedbackDeleting_Feedback2

That made me remember the days when I was running the first digital marketing campaign for Birrell, they launched a wicked campaign called BirellMan and oh boy it was being stormed with negative comments, I played an honest trick of making comments “pending approval” and waiting for confirmation to approve or delete from the company itself. I can understand the position of a social media manager being stormed with negative comments. Oh boy, by checking BirellMan YouTube comments now, even after 3 years, seems like they are still following my not-so-honest trick, check it out there all positive, positive.

BirrellMan

Anyway,

As promised, I will not try to make this look as fancy as an Impact Lab report, but also won’t go super random and biased with personal opinions in all posts, actually I will partially use an assessment framework created at Impact Lab to analyze the project from all its angles, will see you in posts to follow with more in-depth look on:

  • The Entrepreneur behind the show
  • The Funding
  • The Beginnings ( 2 Years of Preparations)
  • The TV Show Format
  • The Viewership
  • The Grassroots Movement
  • More…

Have fun! And just enjoy the show 😉

Talent Discovery TV Shows – Social Media Presence

Talent Discovery TV Shows – Social Media Presence

In the last 3 years with DSL connections going mainstream and increasing consumption of online video content and with YouTube is the hub for video content in the region, I interestingly tracked down some of the popular YouTube channels for number of subscribers and views, here I provide a quick comparison in numbers between some of the popular TV Shows for talent discovery in signing.

Using the #NewBasecamp to stay organized!

It’s an ongoing challenge for most of us to remain organized, using 37Signals suite for all my organizations and project management efforts, I’ve created couple of projects to both manage my executive tasks across all organizations and another one to manage my personal life.

Abdo Executive Tasks

Abdo Personal Projects

These projects helped me to put everything I should do in one place for a while, till it became quite hard for me to follow-up with both of them in a timely manner, having the New Basecamp introduced, I’ve decided to merge both projects in one relying on the fact that both include tasks and discussions that I’m the only one should have access to.

I’ll be experimenting with using the project to organize both my personal life and executive tasks and will keep you posted on how things go, how do you stay organized yourself?

Microsoft Geeks Day, Entrepreneurship Session

Microsoft Geeks Day, Entrepreneurship Session

So, I was invited by some awesome Microsoft Student Partners to speak about entrepreneurship during an event they organized called Microsoft Geeks Day. Being a Microsoft Geeks Day, I thought Bill Gates would be the best figure to discuss. The whole session was just a punch of videos with comments and discussions around them, that I believed conveyed the image better than a thousand words can.

Some of the videos I presented during my session are below, I guess you can figure out the whole content from the videos, Enjoy!

Bill Gates from Pirates of Silicon Valley
Bill Gates Negotiation Skills, makes a big difference from Pirates of Silicon Valley
It’s not about how big you start, but how big you THINK
You want Xerox to consider something called the Mouse
People skills from Pirates of Silicon Valley
Dalia Said, Professional Volunteerism

Dalia Said, Professional Volunteerism

In such stage we’re living in Egypt when we’re talking about building the New Egypt and thinking of models, ideas and ways of getting stuff done to incorporate in the Egypt we’re building, a few individuals make some principles very clear and enlighten the path for us.

As a firm believer in entrepreneurship being the way forward for my country and dedicating most of my time in the last year working on Egypreneur, I’ve expressed in that blog how I see few individuals as icons that can enlighten our way.

I’ve mentioned Amr Deabes and how his Ability Contact Center is shifting the paradigm of our society to look at abilities other than disabilities, the model of passion and dedication in Walid of Bey2ollak with a daily job of getting everyone home as early as it can be, Sherif Ahmed and how with his positive energy; he’s evolving his surrounding and how Hanan Abdel Meguid is inspiring my generation and showing a role model for Egyptian ladies getting down to business.

Today I write about the unkown solider of some of the recent projects we’re rolling out at Egypreneur internally. I was lucky enough to get to meet Dalia Said during an event she called Super Heroes Mixer where people working in community development came together to discuss how to align efforts and develop synergy among organizations tackling the same issue. After an impressive activity I kept in touch with Dalia eager for an opportunity to work together.

October last year as Dalia was back to Egypt after completing a Masters degree in Education from Harvard, we had the chance to discuss what’s happening in Egypreneur and we had the pleasure of Dalia joining our Crew to work on building synergy among ecosystem entities and passing opportunities from them to entrepreneurs.

During this time, Dalia showed an impressive amount of dedication, commitment and professionalism and regardless the instability of switching our model, Dalia was a source of stability and progress to Egypreneur work during this period. Experiencing the work of volunteers in different organizations, I’ve never met someone who comes any close to Dalia’s added value to a starting organization.

When I get to think about the New Egypt we’re building I can clearly see that individuals with the dedication, commitment and professionalism who’re actively putting their passion to work and make a difference every day is what’s really needed for the country we’re building together.

It reminds a pleasure for me having the chance to work with Dalia and I wish we get done with a cloning mechanism soon to have more Egypreneur(s) like her evolving our country into the New Egypt we all dream of.

Sally Fetouh, Realizing our Dreams!

Sally Fetouh, Realizing our Dreams!

While everyone is wondering, debating and claiming about the perfect model of an Egyptian lady, a few ladies can clearly demonstrate that through their passion, actions and commitment. I had the pleasure to meet one of them, Sally Fetouh.

I first met Sally when I was recruiting volunteers for Egypreneur Crew back in April last year. I was lucky enough to run by Sally with experience and track record that was impressive enough to join our crew as a main player of how and what we’d communicate to inspire a new generation of entrepreneurs rebuilding the country after a glorious revolution that gave us the chance to put our passion into action while building the New Egypt.

Beside our work on Egypreneur, I get to know a role model demonstrating a rare combination of passion, resilience and endurance. From a stable career path, Sally discovered a need and passion for combining her strong IT background with law, as technology is progressing very fast and with the startup industry starting to show-up in the MENA region. There is an ever increasing gap between law and technology. Sally discovered her passion for this rare, needed speciality and wanted to fulfill her passion by studying law.

In a beautiful pieces written on Egypreneur blog, Sally expressed how she sees pursuing career goals and conceives risks of leaving a stable path into an entrepreneurial direction you discovered a passion for. In Be Who you Want to be Sally wrote:

The cynics out there might frown and wag their fingers. Impulse can be risky business but so can an unfulfilled life; living to be only half the person that you are.

While we’re talking about a bright New Egypt we should not only praise the example of Sally, but we should closely study and educate it to give the chance to millions of Egyptians finding what they’re truly passionate about and what they can give their best to.

I remember that every time I learn that Sally is flying the oceans for an exam, gearing up for a new semester or tweeting thoughts of passion, patience and persistence. The same quality without which we’re standing no chance to reach our full potential as a nation, when every Egyptian reaches his/her full potential.

It’s a new entrepreneurial story I’ve learned, a new person who continued to inspire me and I’m sure will continue to inspire all of us on how we should be when we discover our passion and decide on our goals. We’re all dreaming of New Egypt but – as Sally states it – we won’t realize that until it becomes matter of survival for everyone of us.

That is what realising dreams is all about. It becomes a matter of survival to be the person whom you were always meant to be.

Read Sally’s article on Egypreneur blog here: http://egypreneur.com.eg/be-who-you-want-to-be/

Hanan Abdel Meguid, Inspirational Leadership

Hanan Abdel Meguid, Inspirational Leadership

While everyone talks about inspirational leadership, I can see few examples who really resemble what it takes to be an inspirational leader at work and in the society. For me, one of the most visible examples for inspirational leadership in my surrounding is Mrs. Hanan Abdel Meguid, CEO of OTVentues.

When CEO is heard, what usually gets into people’s minds is the positional power of being in charge, the characteristics of being sharp, decisive and busy (unavailable) person. On my Twitter stream, Mrs. Hana clearly breaks these perceptions and represent a model of simplicity, openness and inspiration.

With positivity tweeted daily in the morning with #Club7, to #InnerThoughts of deep reflections on what’s happening in the surrounding  to a very responsive and supporting tone when approached with a question or a request for help.

I believe that presents a model to follow for us entrepreneurs stepping up to leadership positions in our starting enterprises, seeing that connecting with people with a simple and helpful attitude is not only a desirable quality in people we like surrounding ourselves with but it helps getting stuff done in business and to be effective in your society.

As we’re all seeking a new Egypt, we should realize that it can only by driven by leaders who show an example to follow and that everyone of us do have a duty towards his/her small society at work in, with family and friends and even online to be a role model to what we need to see in our New Egypt.

You can start learning more and following the example of Mrs. Hanan Abdel Meguid on Twitter here: http://twitter.com/HMeguid

You can learn more about her by Googling her name.

Walid of @Bey2ollak, Helping tens of thousdands get by!

Walid of @Bey2ollak, Helping tens of thousdands get by!

We’re all suffering from traffic in Egypt, six Egyptian entrepreneurs gathered to create one of Egypt’s most popular and useful mobile applications, Bey2ollak!

Bey2ollak

As it’s described: “Bey2ollak, howa mobile we internet community te2dar menoh te3raf aw te2ool 3ala el shaware3 wel ma7awer wel kabary eza kanet za7ma aw fadya. www.bey2ollak.com”

In case you haven’t used Bey2ollak before, through the app used by more than 100,000 users, you can take better decisions and save plenty of time while navigating through our chaotic traffic.

For the application to be useful; a constant supply of updates, or tweets with #Bey2ollak HashTags should be be posted regularly, users who believe in the idea and use the app are constantly updating the traffic status wherever they go, Walid Mostafa Bey2ollak’s Operations Manager dedicated his time day and night to make sure that process is going smoothly and accurately.

I had the pleasure of meeting Walid multiple times and had some very insightful discussions about finding solutions to the traffic dilemma we’re experiencing everywhere in Egypt, as we’re strapping to launch Za7ma Campaign.

With someone as insightful, dedicated and effective like Walid and with bringing talents, expertise and resources together, I’m sure a difference can be made in our traffic experience in Egypt, in the short and long terms.

This is an applause to Walid for his impressive dedication and insights and for every Egyptian who steps up to make our lives easier.

Follow Walid on Twitter from here: @Rezo007, check Bey2ollak website http://bey2ollak.com and download the mobile application from here: http://app.bey2ollak.com.

Sherif Ahmed of 7elme; Push your dreams forward

Sherif Ahmed of 7elme; Push your dreams forward

Yes, being an entrepreneur in Egypt is very challenging, the most challenging bit is finding energy and positivity to persist and keep pushing until you reach your destination and get what you want to get done, done!

I had been exploring ways to spread positivity for myself internally and in public and came to a few practices that includes waking up early, going for morning jogging, join fellows in tweeting positive expectations of the day using #Club7 Twitter HashTag. Personally, I enjoy living in the future more, when something undesirable happens, I speak in a future tone about what we’re going to do about it, how we’re going to fix things and make it right.

Egyrpeneur logo

Last April, while recruiting for Egypreneur Crew, the special forces that will be spreading positivity and entrepreneurial thinking in Egypt through Egypreneur a network of entrepreneurs that I started. I had the pleasure of meeting Sherif Ahmed and after a few minutes of casual chat, he was in.

Throughout my work with Sherif as a part of Egyrpeneur, his energy, dynamism and persistence in getting stuff done had been truly impressive that I expressed to him once that I wish to have a cloning mechanism to have 10 like him that would make a huge difference in the projects and organizations they join.

While having discussions with Sherif developing strategies and planning for projects one of the most frequent words he used is the word “Push” and there is an interesting story behind that.

Sherif Co-Found 7el.me a network of dreamers where you can submit your dreams and receive support through a “Push” button from fellow network members, as you navigate through the network now, you’ll see plenty of dreamers and dreams who would probably appreciate a push, a remark of support towards achieving their dreams.

7elme push your dreams forward

Let’s imagine what the future would be like when everyone of us is pushing the dreams of his/her surrounding? How Egypt and the world might be when we find a sign of positivity, hope and potential we all go … Push, Push, Push!

Giving birth to new companies, social ventures, ideas, talks, successes and dreams coming true.

Here is a video interview with Sherif about his vie about the kind of people to getting stuff done while working on his startup 7elme.

You can follow 7elme on Twitter, join their Facebook Page and post your dreams on their network 7el.me

Amr Deabes, Entrepreneurs Driven NewEgypt

Amr Deabes, Entrepreneurs Driven NewEgypt

Being involved in the entrepreneurship scene in Egypt, running Egypreneur; I’m certain that entrepreneurship is the vehicle for the bright future of Egypt.

Having the opportunity to speak at TEDxTanta, I used it as an opportunity to reflect this meaning by reflecting entrepreneurs as the “Modern Knights” who are already and will be leading Egypt towards the desired change in the social and economic fronts, you can watch my talk from here.

Hopefully, there are plenty of bright examples that’s making a difference economically and socially right now. One of my favorite is Amr Deabes and Egyptian entrepreneurs who found Ability Contact Center; a contact center that’s fully operated by Egyptians with special needs. We usually consider Egyptians with special needs a load on their families and on their society accordingly.

While everyone is working on mobilizing different forms of “support” for those with special needs; Amr Deabes stepped up to giving them a chance to shine and turn their abilities, passion and patience into a productive tools in the society. I met Amr first time during Startup Weekend Cairo and had this interview with him for Egypreneur:

Reda one of the bright employees of AbilityCC, gave an inspiring speech during the weekend:

Seeing examples like Amr and Ability CC ignites my energy to work further on developing Egypreneur and mobilize as much support as we can to participate in creating the environment to more entrepreneurs to step up to solving social problems, while making an economic impact; Imaging how our new Egypt will be with thousands like Amr.

Google Ebda2 – Project Management Tools

Google Ebda2 – Project Management Tools

s a part of Google Ebda2 Crash Course to entrepreneurs who passed the competitions initial phase, I would like to share the resources I mentioned during the presentation and chat more about project management and available tools.

I wanted to strengthen on the fact that project management for entrepreneurs should be approached as a very simple subject to get stuff done, by then project management for a startup entrepreneur is not a complete body of knowledge to educate – at this stage – but it’s only about deliverables.