“One of the many challenges when it comes to doing business anywhere in the world is the know-how. It’s one thing having a business idea. When you go across town, everyone has a business idea but it is another thing knowing how to translate that idea into success at the end of the day” said Head of Joy Business at Joy FM, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah about the business mentorship program MY BUSINESS 2011 which kicks off on Monday October 10, 2011. Explaining the concept for the business reality show on Multi TV’s pm: EXPRESS, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah said the program, which is in its second year, was mooted to fill a clearly identified gap in the business world. The Multimedia group he noted strongly believes in business because businesses create job opportunities and hope for people adding that it is not enough to just encourage people to go into business. “It is also important to identify the challenges businesses face and to try to find solutions to them” he added. The 10-day program which takes a classroom format will air on both Multi TV and Joy FM and is designed to provide business mentoring for 10 selected young entrepreneurs with the view of developing their capacities to increase their chances of succeeding in their businesses. Although the television and radio show will last for 10 days, the mentoring for the 10 selected entrepreneurs will continue for a year, at the end of which the mentees are expected to have grown their businesses to an appreciable level using the lessons received from their mentors. Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, who is also host of Joy FM’s Super Morning Show, said the success of the economy, to a large extent, depends on empowering people to create jobs and not relying on the government to deliver on job creation promises. “This program whips the whole idea of let’s think business”, he added. 800 people applied to join this year’s mentorship program but the number was finally scaled down to 10 applicants who will enjoy the year-long mentoring. Organisers and facilitators of the show hope to increase the number of mentees as the show progresses and have thus called for support to expand the program. Managing Partner of Trust Consult and one of the facilitators of the program, Charles Mensah, who was also on the show, noted that it is not ideal for people to source loans to start their business. According to him, it is always wise for people to do start ups with their individual savings, which will then act as the foundation for their businesses. He stressed that “the pillars of the business maybe be support from family and friends. The bank loan is the roofing that comes on top” adding that when the bank decides to withdraw its funding, “the worst case scenario is that you will lose the roof, but if the bank is the foundation and they pluck it, the whole business is gone”. Explaining the importance of the mentorship program, Charles Mensah recounted that “speaking with some of the young people at the interview [for the show], I picked up that, some of them don’t really need the loan, all they need is the ability to know that I can go and speak to this particular supplier to give me supplier’s credit and I could speak to my customers and arrange for them to pay me early”. Mr. Mensah thus encouraged entrepreneurs who start their businesses as informal businesses to register them and to track their finances, a situation he said helps in the case of loan applications or when the business changes ownership or hands.