Gossy Ukanwoke

Quote
"Don't enjoy to the point where you're not doing hard work again and don't do hard work to the point where you don't take a moment to enjoy just a little bit."

The Afropolitan Podcast spotlights Afropolitans who aren’t afraid to step into the unknown and walk in purpose. With this podcast we hope to empower Africans in the Diaspora to harness their full potential and contribute to the development of a bold and progressive black community.


Today’s episode features Gossy Ukanwoke, the MD of KingMakers, owners of the BetKing brand.

With Gossy at the helm of affairs, the brand is evolving to encompass sports entertainment and gaming services. “It’s not just a roadside gambling company, it’s a proper technology business. It’s a product in gaming. It can easily be a fintech company tomorrow, given the spread across the continent, the number of users, the number of transactions. It can roll it out and it can be anything.”

Gossy started out reselling Internet services in his late teens to wealthy customers, at a time when wireless routers were not yet commonplace.

The Internet service provider caught on to what Gossy was doing and in no time, he found himself out of business. “You know when they say, cut you at the knees, day by day, my clients were just dropping off one by one.”

It was a steep learning curve for him, but the lessons he learned would serve him well in the future.

Listen and find out what those lessons are.

You can also fuel your mind with Gossy’s impactful reading list.

https://www.amazon.com/Good-Great-Some-Companies-Others/dp/0066620996 Good To Great by Jim Collins

https://www.amazon.com/Talent-Never-Enough-Discover-Choices/dp/0785214038 Talent is never Enough by John C Maxwell
https://www.amazon.com/Sprint-Solve-Problems-Test-Ideas/dp/1442397683 Sprint by Jake Knapp




Show Notes:
11:05 Gossy mentions one of the things people don’t really talk about in entrepreneurship?

14:55 Gossy talks about his boat business and building confidence in a low-trust environment.

19:42 First and best entrepreneurial experience ever as a reseller of Internet services and lessons learned.

31:21 How he created Beni American University. Building out a school that will address the issues of access, quality and relevance.

42:19 From bootstrapping to fundraising.

46:10: BetKing's growth and expansion.

50:50 What’s important when it comes to recruiting the right talent.

52:33 Gossy’s biggest leadership lessons in managing people


The Afropolitan Podcast is hosted by Eche Emole, co-founder of Afropolitan.
Listen and subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Jamit, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Want to learn more about Afropolitan?

Twitter - https://twitter.com/afropolitan
Website - https://www.afropolitan.io/