Entrepreneurs have been advised to make their products and services valuable to attract finance so they do not go searching for donors.

According to the Chief Executive of Premium Africa Holdings, Farouk Khailann, investors are more concentrated on getting value that can help them propel their ventures.

Speaking at the maiden edition of the Joy Business Campus Roadshow at the Valley View University, Mr. Khailann encouraged the students not to give up even when there are no funds, but rather become valuable, so that they will attract funding.

He said, “money will chase you if you have value. When I see value in you, I’ll invest. Now there are corporate professionals out there willing to invest in start-ups they believe are hungry for success. So, finance shouldn’t stop you, otherwise, it will keep you from doing a lot of things. Keep pushing, if you don’t get finance, attract it.”

Chief Finance Officer at the Valley View University, Dr. Williams Peprah also shared the opinion of creating value and being valuable, urging entrepreneurs to think outside by being creative.

He indicated that career guidance is gradually shifting from interests to identifying values one represents.

“Emphasis on career guidance has been on the student knowing their interests and skills set, but currently what is missing in our industry is to have the right value or principle the student should live on. At Valley View, apart from teaching or helping the student to know their career, we tell them that in the modern world now what is needed is your attitude and the value you hold in life,” he emphasized.

Meanwhile, the Founder of Hacklab Foundation, Foster Akugri has suggested the importance to work in a group to achieve collective results.

According to him, it is good to involve others who understand the goals and vision of the business and leverage their prominence to succeed.

“Put in efforts to be seen. Create avenues that will put you out there. It is okay to create a nice flyer and make friends with huge followings to post for you. When you’re attracting people to you, you need a medium to do that. You need to rely on external platforms to create inbound traffic,” he advised.

Head of Joy Business, Odelia Ntiamoah also believes in the need to create strategic relationships to be successful.

According to her, keeping good relationships influences one’s success, and that is the way to go in this modern era.

“Keep relationships, categorise your relationships. There are some people you should never ask for anything. Sometimes you have to keep your pride, you can be ‘broke’ but keep it to yourself. You’ll get to a point where some of these people will be asking you what you did to make your life better,” she said.

The Joy Business Campus Roadshow is an outreach programme that seeks to enable tertiary students’ access formal sources of career guidance in order to help them make adequate occupational choices.