Are you book-smart or street-smart?

The stereotype is that the book-smart person, the well-educated person, tends to be more successful than the one who did not, for instance, get a university education.

Education, many of us grew up hearing, is the only key to success.

But is this the fact? What about the many street-smart people who are successful in their own right yet are not university graduates for instance? Is it possible to be both book and street-smart? Where would you rather lie?

Kelvin Karonji

Age: 28

Founder: Tisement Media, an advertising and Marketing Agency

“Growing up, I was constantly reminded that education was necessary if I wanted to succeed in life. On the same breath, my father would remind me how difficult it was for graduates to find jobs and how frustrating it can be if you are underemployed. Although I cannot attribute the career decisions I made to those sentiments, by the time I joined Form Two, I knew that advanced education was not for me, especially since I knew several graduates who were at home, idle because they were unable to get jobs.

To my parents’ objection, I sought transfer from a boarding school to a day school. To be honest, at that point, I had already lost interest in education and was not even keen on getting good grades. I was busy thinking of what business I wanted to do after completing secondary school. I did not go beyond secondary school.

Today, I have an advertising and marketing agency, Tisement Media, which offers services such as graphic design, branding, marketing, content creation and sound engineering. All these skills I acquired working for various firms and through observation.

One thing I have learnt is that in the street, it is possible to acquire many skills and be competent in various areas without going to school to train for a particular course.

Then, there are those abilities that even my graduate friends confess to having not learnt in class. You get to learn from your own mistakes and from other people’s mistakes.

You also learn to make on-the-spot decisions and judgement depending on the situation you find yourself in. While most institutions focus on imparting knowledge to the students, little is done on the organisation or use of the knowledge.

I established my company in 2016 when I was 26 years old, and I can tell you for a fact that no single client has asked about my academic background.

This is because I am confident and good at what I do. Embracing the fact that academia is not an option for me, I am keen to learn all that I can from others in the business and from those who furthered their education. I think that at the end of the day, it goes down to how good you are in a particular field, in fact, I think that I am at a better place career-wise than most of my age mates who have a university education yet are still job-hunting months, or even years after graduation.

Victor Lwanga

Age: 25

Machine Learning Specialist

“I consider myself both book and street-smart – I have two degree certificates, an undergraduate and master’s degree.

I am a graduate in Master of Science-Information technology and business intelligence. I co-own a software development company with a friend.

When it comes to education, I want to study various courses and become an expert in my field. It is important for me to understand the different concepts in my field of study. I grew up admiring knowledgeable individuals.

My father, for instance, is a doctor, a well-educated man that I consider very intellectual. He made me like books.

After graduating from Strathmore University where I studied Bachelor of Science in Informatics and Computer Science in 2016, I took a year-long break and then returned to school the following year to study my master’s.

I am considering studying another master’s degree or enrolling for a postgraduate doctoral degree.

Being in class or constantly learning about a particular topic gives me a lot of fulfilment. When on break from class, I spend most of my evenings researching or putting into practice whatever I have learnt.

My pursuit of education has opened many opportunities for him. Recently, I got a job as a part-time tutor in one of the colleges in Nairobi.

I teach python programming, data visualisation and machine learning. When I got the position three months ago, I did not have any teaching experience, my academic papers are what got me the job.

While at the university undertaking my undergraduate studies, I learnt that individuals doing well academically were expected to end up as lecturers or in employment while those who were not gifted in academics would go into business.

This is a misconception because it does not always happen this way.

When I established this company with my friend, which we run on a part-time basis since he works fulltime for a software development firm, it was a completely new world for him.

There are various skills, I realised, that you have to learn by yourself. For instance, even though at school I was taken through a negotiation skills course where we would go as far as haggling for better prices, pay, or convince a client to purchase a product at a particular price, when I went into business, I learnt that I was still far from being a negotiator.

I have also learned that to be well knowledgeable in a particular area, you have to practice and be able to sometimes adopt different approaches from those learnt in class.

The teaching opportunity has also been a good training ground for me to be a good communicator.

When I started lecturing, I thought that it will be all about sharing my knowledge with my students, but I discovered that it goes beyond that.

The opportunity is continuously equipping me with communicating skills and other principles such as time management, patience and perseverance, which are very relevant in the ‘street’.

I believe that I can thrive anywhere as long as I have the skills.

Ezekiel Mumo

Age: 27 years

Director, Bee Farmers Hub

In 2008, Ezekiel then 16 and in form Two, dropped out of school to go into business. Like some of peers, he felt that the education system was not working for him so he decided to try his hand on entrepreneurship.

“I was a bright student, I, in fact, topped my class, but my parents had enrolled me to a day school yet I had a calling letter to join a boarding school that I was keen on. I wanted to transfer to another school but my parents objected. To get back at them, I dropped out of school,” he explains.

In 2009, armed with a camera he got from his uncle, he ventured into photography. He considers himself affable, which was a plus because he needed to market his services, however, he did not find the venture lucrative enough, and when he turned 18, he looked for a job.

“I had a short stint working in a bookshop and then got a job at a hardware store. Then, I was earning Sh10,000 on a monthly basis. I learnt a lot, from how to engage customers to the various ways to invest and save money, however, even with the knowledge I had acquired, I still felt dissatisfied,” he says.

News of his former classmates joining various universities motivated him to go back to school.

“With my meagre salary, I knew that there would always be a huge disparity between myself and my agemates. Their future was promising but I could not say the same about mine.

My former teachers would come to the store and talk me into going back to school. After three years, I gave in and returned to school.”

His only goal then, he confesses, was matching up with his agemates by going to the university.

He wanted to be at par with them so much that he devoted most of his time to reading. In 2013 when he sat his Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education, he topped his class, coming second in Masinga District, Machakos County.

“In 2014, I was 22, I joined the university and studied Bachelor of Business Information Technology at Multimedia University. I graduated last year. For a few months, I looked for a job in earnest but most of the offers I got were discouraging – I felt that the starting salary was too little. Eventually, I decided to go back to the “street” and try my hand at business.

I am the founder and director, of Bee Farmers Hub, a company that specialises in beekeeping equipment, honey and training bee farmers,” he says, and adds,

“While the university opened my eyes to the various opportunities that exist in the job market and in entrepreneurship, the street molded me. It is there that I learnt the power of multiplying money and saving. Still, the knowledge I acquired in school is still instrumental - I am in the process of creating a mobile app, for instance.”

Ezekiel believes in focusing his attention where his passion lies and advises his peers to do the same.

“I attend various mentorship and networking forums and while engaging with others, I encourage them to pursue whatever fields they are best qualified. If you are good in academics, go for it. If you are good in business, choose that, however, it's important to get basic education.”

Annastaciah Muthoni

Age: 25 years

Entrepreneur

After completing her secondary education in 2010, Annastaciah did not manage to go to university even though she had qualified to join a public institution because her parents could not afford to pay the tuition fees.

I decided to learn computer packages, but midway, I dropped the course. I felt that I was not benefitting much from it and I knew that it would be difficult for me to get a good job without any academic papers from an institution of higher learning. Nevertheless, I got a few contractual entry level jobs but they were not well-paying and had no room for promotion. I decided to quit employment and venture into business,” she explains.

The 25-year-old now runs an online business, 26th_affairs on Instagram, from where she sells men’s clothes and shoes.

“I started my business three months ago after five years of employment in different capacities. At some point, I even ran a charity organisation. Although it might be too soon to term my business successful, it is doing well. I started with just Sh2,000 but now, I am able to pay my rent from the business and also save some of the profit I make,” she says.

“Running a business teaches you something new daily. In the few months, I have been running my online shop, I have acquired skills that could have probably taken me longer had I been in class.

They include money lessons such as the importance of saving, investing and keeping a proper book of accounts.

I have also learnt how to effectively interact with. However, I intend to return to school and pursue a course in psychological counselling.

From what I have read about it, it is an interesting course, and I would like to become a counsellor.”