BusRainaAndrew
Raina Andrew
My Business Consultant Training
Collaborated With A Business In The Developing World
Our team reviewed the economic, social, political, and environmental factors that impact our partner business to design a launch plan and identify how to bridge the gap between our business partner’s current and desired conditions.
Earned a Development Grant to Enact Solutions
In order to fund the proposed business, our team composed a detailed plan and pitched our proposal to request seed funding from the Leadership Initiatives Grant Committee.
Collaborated With Business Development Experts
After researching the socio-economic conditions facing our business partners, our team worked with the Nigerian development staff to create effective solutions to the challenges our business partner was facing.
Divine Alfred
About Divine
Divine's venture into the business world lacked conventional structured training. Rather, her initiation stemmed from familial ties, as she embraced her mother-in-law's established enterprise following her marriage. Motivated by her profound affection for culinary arts, Divine opted to forgo alternative career pursuits, immersing herself in her mother-in-law's business.
Through a simultaneous process of training and hands-on experience alongside her mentor, Divine gradually honed her skills in the food industry. This narrative underscores the pivotal role of familial influence and personal passion in shaping Divine's entrepreneurial path.
Divine Alfred
Business Goals
For Divine, the most cherished aspect of her involvement in the food business lies in the harmonious blend of passion and financial reward. Finding fulfillment in both realms, she delights in the ability to earn a living while pursuing her culinary passions.
Divine holds several significant aspirations for her future, each reflecting her deeply rooted values and aspirations. Foremost among these dreams is the desire to own a house—a milestone her own parents never achieved due to financial constraints, necessitating a lifetime in rented accommodations.
Divine Alfred
Obstacles
Divine hopes that her business will grow to a point where she sells 500 portions of food each day; if she can achieve this, she will have tripled her output and made a higher income for her business. This is crucial and important to Divine because she does not want her children to go through the difficulties she went through growing up.
A text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">She wants to make sure that her children get to experience having running water in the house, a good bed, and even watching TV. These are the reasons why she is determined to grow her restaurant, she wants to learn various food recipes from different cultures around Nigeria and even beyond so her restaurant would serve people from all regions.
Divine Alfred
Home & Family
A text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">Divine, a 29-year-old native of Okigwe in Imo State, Nigeria, leads a bustling life alongside her husband, Mr. Samuel Alfred, and their three children, aged two and six. Currently residing in Bauchi State, Nigeria, Divine's days are filled with a whirlwind of responsibilities and commitments.
Mornings commence with her ensuring her daughter is ready for school, followed by the preparation of breakfast and lunch for her family. Together with her husband, they embark on their joint venture—the operation of a restaurant.
Divine Alfred
Our Partnership
Divine hopes that her business will grow to a point where she sells 500 portions of food each day; if she can achieve this, she will have tripled her output and made a higher income for her business.
In Divine's own words, "with a growing business, I will be able to employ other young women in my community and providing them an opportunity to make an income for themselves.”
My Grant
Proposal
Divine Alfred, our business partner, wants to expand Alfred’s Kitchen, her flourishing restaurant. Her business specializes in Northern Nigerian cuisine and offers exceptional-quality meals. While maintaining a professional appearance, she also displays a laid-back atmosphere toward the working class, providing an appealing attraction.
The marketing team created a catchy tagline, “Tastes like home,” to differentiate Alfred’s Kitchen from other eateries. This tagline highlights her passion for helping customers enjoy satisfying meals. Flyers, business cards, and signs were also created to promote her eatery.
To help advance her business, the marketing surrounding her restaurant must be improved drastically. By promoting her restaurant with flyers, signs, business cards, and other materials, we can show her community that her brand is reliable and professional. She needs to modify her infrastructure and change her marketing strategy. In addition to choosing a location for her restaurant, we decided we needed to provide Divine with the necessary kitchen equipment and other crucial facilities to help her store succeed.
My Grant Proposal
Presentation
In the International Leadership and Business Internship, I worked directly with some of the world’s leading developmental experts in order to build my partners business and brand.
At the conclusion of this internship, our team pitched the final proposal to a panel of esteemed judges from the Leadership Initiatives Nigerian Development Team and the Leadership Initiatives Grant Committee. This formal pitch allowed our team to practice our skills and utilize our entrepreneurial toolkit, all while showcasing our efforts to transform the business we partnered with.
At the end of the pitch, we were able to receive feedback on our proposal for our business partner. Over the next year, our business partner’s venture will be made into reality and monitored for sustained success and growth.
Internship Highlights
- Business Meeting
- Embassy of Guyana
- Rwandan Embassy
- Expert Assistance
Our team began the business development process by having a one-on-one Zoom call directly with our business partner,Divine Alfred, and our Nigerian project coordinator to ensure productive collaboration.
We learned more about their life, family, and desires for the proposed business venture, as well as the challenges they were facing. By discussing first-hand the challenges our partner faced, our team successfully and efficiently began to brainstorm solutions to launch her business.
Each morning we held constructive discussions about our ideas, the advice we received the day before, and the timeline necessary to begin implementing our ideas in real-time.
The on-staff project coordinators and business development experts helped facilitate the ideation process and ensured our team asked the right questions to produce tangible results.
I had the unique opportunity to visit the Guyanese Embassy, where I learned about diplomatic relations between Guyana and the United States.
The embassy serves as a hub for collaboration with partner countries and international organizations, which facilitates the creation of solutions to address global issues, such as poverty, gender inequality, and climate change.
Guyanese diplomats and officials work closely with local communities to identify needs and design programs that empower individuals and enhance overall societal well-being. This community-centered problem-solving is something my team and I aspired towards while crafting our business proposal.
I also visited the Rwandan Embassy to learn about the role that Rwanda plays in domestic and international development work. We discussed critical topics including investments, international trade, and human rights.
While touring the embassy, I learned about the wide range of policy issues and gained a better understanding of the embassy’s role in international development through sustainable and inclusive initiatives.
My visit to the Rwandan Embassy was not only educational, but inspiring. It allowed me to see Rwanda’s pivotal role in advancing international development and how I can implement their ideals into my own work.
Our team met with leading experts in the fields of business and economic development from Johns Hopkins University, the State Department, and GlobalGiving.
One such expert was Carla Brooks, Business and Development Officer at Johns Hopkins Center for Communications Program. She provided us with a crash course in advertising and marketing, in which we learned essential components of an effective marketing campaign.
Our work with Ms. Brooks was essential in preparing us for our culminating pitch deck presentation. With her and other expert guidance, we streamlined our initial ideas to further our efforts in launching the venture our business partner envisioned.
By the end of the week, we had incorporated the advice of leading experts from across the globe for our business proposal to empower and transform the life of our business partner.