The first time Joyce Mbaya stood to speak to a gathering of professionals and business executives, she instantly knew she had found her calling. Soon after that first experience, she curtain-raised for Robin Sharma, the renowned international speaker, when he visited Nairobi in 2011. She had just launched her coaching company, GIBÉBÉ, after walking out of a lucrative job at the age of 27. “I was so nervous to stand in front of so many people. More so, being a young person addressing an audience of senior executives,” says Mbaya. As the opening speaker for a famous coach and author, she felt pressure to deliver an outstanding performance, and was relieved to get very positive feedback after the event. She has never looked back.
GIBÉBÉ – from the Swahili word jibebe, meaning uplift yourself – has trained and coached staff at a number of multinational and domestic companies in Kenya. The company also offers consultancy services in strategy, branding, innovation, project management, product development and information technology. Mbaya is a motivational speaker and has been featured at major events across the continent. Her first inspirational book, which is titled after her company, motivates people to reach their potential by sharing her own story of personal success. “I emphasise that to win, you must have a good strategy and execute it well,” she says. Strategic thinking and a high level of self-awareness helped Mbaya win the Apprentice Africa ticket in 2008. The experience became a turning point in her life. “You need to know your strengths and understand yourself well enough to know how to communicate your unique selling point against so many who are also talented and smart,” she says.
For Mbaya, a computer science and mathematics graduate of the University of Central Missouri in the US, coaching is more of a passion than a commercial venture. GIBÉBÉ is also shorthand for the company’s coaching model: ImaGIne, BElieve, BEcome. Mbaya encourages her clients to identify their goals, believe they can achieve those goals through positive thinking, and then use success skills to make them a reality. “We deliver our coaching in the form of classes that run over a period of time, depending on the coaching area,” she says.
GIBÉBÉ’s flagship product, “Awaken Your Potential,” an intensive eight-week coaching programme, has been running since 2010. The coaching classes incorporate interactive and fun presentations, videos, activities, creative ideas and the arts to make the experience fun. “What we do is intensive and life changing but it does not have to be depressing, and we make it our mission to deliver innovatively,” says Mbaya.
Coaching is a developmental strategy that enables people and businesses to realise their visions and goals. It is less directive and more informal than training and takes a long term and continuous approach of empowerment. “Having a coach is like having a personal referee, someone to cheer you on and guide you towards your greatest achievement,” she says. As Mbaya tells it, people who want to accomplish great things often get stuck along the way, and coaching helps “un- stick” them. “It gives you a different perspective and direction that you may not be aware of but could be the missing link for you to make your aspirations a reality,” she says. “When people in an organisation are empowered through coaching, it leads to a more result-oriented culture. People believe in their capability to achieve and understand the greater cause they are working for.”
Mbaya’s life changed when she was selected from a pool of 50,000 applicants for Apprentice Africa. People she met wanted to know how she managed to clinch a spot on the prestigious show at just 25 years old. She answered their questions but soon realised that many of her interlocutors really needed a coach to guide them through the obstacles of life.
Ever the risk-taker, she left a fast-rising career as a value-added services project manager at a major telecommunications company – where she led the development of new mobile services – and went into business as a coach, speaker and consultant. “To start a business you not only have to have a great idea but your great idea must ‘bother’ you to the point where you have no choice but to do something about it,” she says. “I had a dream to write my book and create this framework that can empower many others and make a difference in their lives. Unfortunately, my corporate work schedule was too intensive for me to pursue both at the same time. I knew that in order to realise this goal, I must make the tough decision to follow it through full time. Fortunately, I’m still able to successfully offer consultancy services in my technical line of work.” Her friends thought she had lost her mind, she recalls, and found coaching particularly puzzling as a choice of business. Their reaction did nothing to deter her.
In many ways Mbaya’s book is a demonstration of how to overcome obstacles to success. “When I finished writing the book, I did not have the funds to publish and launch it, but I was determined to get it out. So I decided to launch it in digital format. I used my IT skills to set up the digital book,” she says. She was among the first Kenyans to launch an e-book. Available on Kindle reader, in two years it had helped raise funds for a hard copy. The print book, published in early 2013, not only tells the inspiring story of Mbaya’s own experiences but borrows heavily from her coaching classes to give readers a road map to their own success.
Mbaya says the inspiration to reach her dreams comes from her grandfather, and she incorporated in her book the story of her extraordinary relationship with him, including a particularly powerful anecdote of a conversation the two had not long before he passed away over a decade ago. Her grandfather urged Mbaya to go out and achieve her full potential by exploiting her special talents. “He truly inspired me to believe in myself and I want to do more with my life in order to create a positive impact,” she says.
Mbaya interacts with people in need of career, business or general life guidance. She is happiest when meeting someone whose life has been transformed by her classes. “The truth is, all those I’ve coached are memorable to me. I really take my work to heart and connect with the people I empower,” she says. “They all inspire me when I hear their stories and see their courage in working to learn and apply the strategies we teach. What I love most about my work is that I also get deeply inspired every time I coach others. Like Albert Einstein, she believes “it takes a different kind of thinking to solve a problem than the kind of thinking that produced the problem. “I urge people to use what they have to get to where they want to go. It is not about how much money you have but being innovative,” she says. ” She says coaching can also benefit organisations, motivating staff to achieve corporate goals.
Today, Mbaya’s star keeps rising. Using lessons she learnt at her telecoms job as well as the experiences she gained through Apprentice Africa, Mbaya is building a successful enterprise in an area from which many entrepreneurs have shied away.
But the ride has not been altogether smooth and Mbaya says it can be difficult getting people to appreciate why they should pay a coach. Coaching, she says, is an industry, like other service industries. “There is work involved in developing quality products and programmes and delivering them effectively,” she says. “Successful coaches often joke that when they meet people who became millionaires after they were empowered by their programmes, they are tempted to ask themselves if they should not have charged more for the services!”
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