When I look back, I know with certainty there are many things I should not have done. But they are part of me, part of who I have become, and they have a place in the context of my life. They are reminders that mistakes can be built on, that journeys are filled with learning and that the right path, whatever ‘right’ may mean for you, is often only a step away.

We don’t need carrots and sticks to incentivise people. We need those with a deep understanding of our values - that is what guides us. And if we’ve got people who are not living the values, they might have to work elsewhere.

Denzel Washington, cited in:

Show me a successful individual and I’ll show you someone who had real positive influences in his or her life. I don’t care what you do for a living - if you do it well I’m sure there was someone cheering you on, or showing the way. A mentor.

Before I made the decision to leave MTN and move to Altron, I spoke to Sifiso Dabengwa, whose wisdom I value. As usual, he helped me to connect with who I am. He guided me to find my own answers. We meet once a quarter and he gives me a fresh perspective, or confirms that I’m on the right track. One of the greatest values of mentors is their ability to see what you may not be able to and to help navigate a course. Meetings with Sifiso leave me motivated and that’s what mentorship is about.

By studying some of the most beautiful examples of people whose latent potential popped into view when they came into frame, I became increasingly attuned to seeing and sensing the encodings and fire of those around me.

Then one day, I woke up to realize that my entire emotional state had changed, not just in my work, but across my entire life. Instead of feeling frustrated with what people are not, I’d made a monumental shift to feeling grateful for what they are. I wish I’d made this shift decades earlier but as the Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter pointed out, “Wisdom too often never comes, and so one ought not to reject it merely because it comes late.