Sharing secrets of his success

WHEN he left full-time employment to become an entrepreneur, his father said he was too lazy to work.

"I told him I can be a better man," Anda Maqanda says.

Today, he is the owner of the AM Group, an engineering company with a special focus on engineering consulting, the design and construction of electrical overhead power lines, renewable energy and automation.

Maqanda, 30, started the PE-based AM Group in 2010 and employs more than 25 people and does work all over the country.

As last year's winner of the South African Breweries (SAB) youth entrepreneurship programme, SAB KickStart, Maqanda was a guest speaker at The Hookup Dinner, an entrepreneurial networking event which was launched in the Eastern Cape this week.

Speaking to the group of entrepreneurs in Port Elizabeth on Monday evening, Maqanda said networking was essential to business success.

"There are so many incubators and services for entrepreneurs but in PE we are sleeping on the job. We need to grab these opportunities, work at it and partner with other entrepreneurs. We want to conquer Cape Town and Joburg but the money is right here in PE. We need to start knocking on the corporate doors and look for opportunities out there," Maqanda said.

He urged entrepreneurs to "not just sit back and wait for tenders but to throw proposals at the big companies".

Maqanda, a qualified electrical engineer with a master's degree, said his success in business did not happen overnight and that he had to work at it, and fail at least once before making a success. He started a company in 2008, which failed and he had to go back to being employed before trying again in 2010.

"My first contract only came after six months, to do an installation for the City of Cape Town. I still remember it was a contract worth R5000. Your work should always speak for itself and you should never promise something you cannot deliver."

He advised entrepreneurs to manage their finances well as the future of their company depended on it. Separating business and personal expenses was vital, as well as paying employees and the taxman on time.

He said entrepreneurs should also outsource parts of their business that they did not have the capacity for, as he did with human resources at the AM Group.

Maqanda said it was important for entrepreneurs to work within their discipline, which was something he had to learn the hard way the first time he entered the SAB KickStart programme in 2009 with the idea for a T-shirt company instead of an electrical engineering business.

"It hit me that I was just looking for an easy way out. It is not an easy journey to be an entrepreneur; it can be lonely. We need to eat, sleep and dream about our business."

He said the SAB KickStart programme helped him to grow the AM Group from six employees in 2012 to 25 today.

The prize money, a R500000 grant, was spent on a crane and tipper trucks. His other prize is an all expenses paid business trip to China, where he will learn more about the renewable energy sector.

He will be leaving for China in two weeks' time.

Another SAB KickStart alumnus, Sapho Maqhwazima, was a guest speaker at the East London launch of the Hookup Dinner. - Cindy Preller