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Kudzai Mubaiwa Business Hub
There is a wise Shona saying: “Chara chimwe hachitswanyi inda” or one finger cannot kill a louse, meaning that you need more fingers to get the job done. The same is true within the start-up, small business and innovation space scene. Community involvement and collaboration is an important thing, and every innovation hub or incubator will profit from such industry affiliation.

The benefits
The first benefit of being part of innovation or incubation bodies is the opportunity to learn and implement best practice.

While every space has the leeway to shape itself according to its community and ideals, there are many aspects that are generic such as facilities management, business training and counselling, client selection, admission and graduation processes and more.

Coupled with best practice is knowledge, many participants and workers in this space will be green and learn on the go, often industry associations will offer scheduled training, or have resources available as material for sale or aggregated news from around the world on a blog, valuable resources for ongoing learning.

The networks are another valuable reason to be part of an incubation or innovation body – meeting and knowing like-minded people allows people to have the opportunity to get different perspectives, complement each other according to strengths and that awareness enables exchange of ideas and resources, as well as providing a vast database for future partnerships.

This is especially true for local spaces, that can easily interact, but I have also been pleasantly surprised to see it work across borders with innovation spaces that have twinning arrangements and traffic is moving between countries as well as active ideas exchange.

Finally, as innovators and start-ups grow under the banner of their host incubator/innovation space, they can leverage the network in reaching new markets as they will have people who understand them, understand the markets they are targeting, ready to help them launch and find a footing in unfamiliar territories.

There is every reason for an innovation space to participate actively within its local, regional and indeed global context.

Here are some important bodies for Zimbabwean incubators and innovation spaces to be aware of and possibly align with for the above stated reasons and benefits.

Global bodies
The National Business Incubator Association (NBIA) is arguably the largest international association pushing the business incubation agenda and they are in my view the best institution for ongoing knowledge and training through their annual conferences and training institutes.

They also offer excellent material that can be accessed online and run a certification program – which I have gone through myself and highly recommend.

In addition, they run an email based interactive platform where industry professionals are available to respond should one have questions as they implement their programs or is seeking opinions or generic documents. Joining this network is fee based, with several tiers of membership paid for annually.

Another international body is the Global Innovation Gathering, which is like a practical annual bar camp for innovators and hub managers and there is also ongoing interaction on social media platforms and email groups.

As a member, I find it to be a breath of fresh air, it is very representative of all the continents and you get insights into some very interesting stuff that can easily be replicated in Zimbabwe, such as makerspaces in South America whose market is agro-based like in Zimbabwe.

There is no fee required to join, but members can come through by introduction and recommendation.

Regional body
Coming closer to home, there is Afrilabs, which is described as follows by Wikipedia: “AfriLabs is a pan-African work of technology and innovation hubs promoting the growth and development of the African technology sector.

“The labs serve as an accessible platform for bringing together technologists, investors, tech companies and hackers in the area. Each lab shares a focus on young entrepreneurs, web and mobile-phone programmers and designers. AfriLabs also connects tech hubs with investors and entrepreneurs.”

It was founded by a couple of technology hubs from east and southern Africa and has grown in membership to include hubs across Africa.

During my tenure with a local hub, we were affiliated to it and it was very beneficial to receive the periodic emails that would outline what was happening in other countries and be able to tap into opportunities for utilising volunteers, second some of our clients for programs, receive articles on innovation within our African context.

To join this body, interested parties complete an online form motivating for their membership and then get interviewed.

There is no admission cost.

National body
Finally, at home there is also opportunity for innovation spaces to be part of a growing community called Catalyst.

Though in its formative stages, this is a promising initiative as it is the collaboration of local incubators and co-working innovation spaces like Emerging Ideas, Hypercube, Area46, Stimulus Hub, Social Entrepreneurship Bootcamp, Neolab, Skihub and of course our very own iZone.

We are cognisant of the fact that all of us are working within and for the strengthening of the same start-up/small business ecosystem, and in as much as we build the ecosystem around our clients, we would want to build an ecosystem around ourselves and stimulate innovation and entrepreneurship in the Zimbabwean context as well as speak to institutions that want to be a part of this rising with one voice.

We best understand the local context and will shape the support services available to local innovators accordingly.

Each of the participating institutions has a unique focus area and as we grow, we would interact closely in ensuring the Zimbabwean innovator gets the best value and support from our community.

Local bodies

Though I am not aware of any local bodies, I believe there is a compelling case for all innovation and entrepreneurship promotion spaces to collaborate in communities and provinces.

Not only is this efficient use of resources, there is greater benefit for clients when economic development agendas are shared visions.

It is my hope that as many of us build innovation hubs and incubators in our areas, we actively seek to work with others in the field.

As Henry Ford said: “Coming together is a beginning, keeping together is progress, and working together is success. Together, we can do more”.

In the next articles, we shall start looking at the case studies of successful innovation spaces around the world, the different types and lessons we can learn from them.

Kudzai M Mubaiwa is an economic development professional and managing consultant with InvestorSaint (Pvt) Ltd, a financial education company. She is also a certified incubator manager and cofounder of iZone. You can reach her via email on [email protected] or twitter handle @kumub