Yesterday I had a wonderful opportunity to attend and experience a business building workshop organized by the Bangladesh Startup Lab aptly titled Government Policy and Compliance, as part of their ongoing accelerator program.
The half-day long event was composed of a training on legal framework and procedures and on how startups can brave those critical situations by Anita Ghazi Islam, Barrister-at-Law, Advocate, Supreme Court of Bangladesh and Founder and Counsel at The Legal Circle and a talk on Leadership and communication by G. Sumdany Don, Chief Inspirational Officer at Don Sumdany Facilitation & Consultancy.
Inside
A total of 30 participants, mostly women entrepreneurs and startup founders, attended the workshop. I tried to find out the demography and sectors these young and aspiring people working on. Most the entrepreneurs are into eCommerce and f-commerce along with few hard tech startups. This also tells a story about where we are heading towards as a fast growing startup ecosystem in Asia and the important trend about interesting sectors people are working on.
3 is a magic number. I always say give something at least 3 years before you make up your mind/decision, be it business or a relationship!
The event was specially designed to help entrepreneurs with tidbit of legal information, education them on legal process and more.
Ms. Anita Ghazi Rahman, Barrister-at-law and Advocate, Supreme Court of Bangladesh spoke about legal issues with specific business type including proprietorship, partnership and company. She suggested how to get the registrations and expenses involved. She advised all startups to be frugal and try to avail legal advice without fees. She also shared her advice on Intellectual property issues like trademark, patent, and copyright that are also important for tech-startup especially.
In a particular burst of inspiration Ms. Anita asked the participants why they want to do what they’re doing and suggested to stay in the game for a longer period of time before making one’s mind. “3 is a magic number,” said Ms. Anita, “I always say give something at least 3 years before you make up your mind/decision, be it business or a relationship!”
Later G. Samdani Don took a session on leadership and communication session. Mr. Don shared his own experience on achieving goals and his take on leadership and communication and quipped that leadership is nothing but a mindset and attitude and not giving up when every other one does.
Mr. Don also put importance on communication and said, “communication is the heart of everything. The biggest problem with people is that nobody listens, not only in your professional life, but also in your personal life. Starting from your clients, to your employees, if you don't listen, if you reach a conclusion of your own without listening, you won't succeed!”
Takeaways
The program was hands on and talked about the things that are critical to startups but often considered to be less important just because of their complexity!
“I learned a lot about legal aspects of forming and running a business. What needs to be taken care of before starting a business, what leadership qualities I should have and how I can cultivate and use those,” said an attendee.
Bangladesh Startup Lab is an accelerator program started by BetterStories Limited and supported by US State Department. The program, specially designed for young and women founders, aims to prepare early stage companies investment ready, provide them market access support, and give them hands on training on technology adaptation to take their businesses offline to online and vice versa.
Communication is the heart of everything. The biggest problem with people is that nobody listens, not only in your professional life, but also in your personal life. Starting from your clients, to your employees, if you don't listen, if you reach a conclusion of your own without listening, you won't succeed!
Image: Bangladesh Startup Lab
