Kamau Nyabwengi, the founder of YEN Africa and YEN Golf, at his office in Runda Mall, along Kiambu Road.
While studying at the university more than a decade ago, Kamau Nyabwengi would often overhear fellow students discussing where they could get a job or the money required to start a business after school.
Although the opportunities were there, many young people did not know who to approach or which places to visit to access the opportunities, which they desperately needed to develop their careers.
“Networking is a powerful tool for career development, but young people often face significant barriers to networking that hinder their career prospects and personal development,” said Nyabwengi in an interview with Powering SMEs.
Wanting to bridge this gap, in 2015, Kamau launched Young Entrepreneurs Network (YEN Africa), a business that would connect aspiring and budding entrepreneurs to the knowledge, resources and social capital they need to succeed.
Initially, the entrepreneur did not have the resources to launch a fully operational business with a physical location and staff; therefore, to start off, he would leverage social media platforms such as Facebook, to organise virtual networking sessions.
Physical networking events
With time, the business grew and he was able to recruit a team that would help him to organise physical networking events, capacity building programs and engagements with entrepreneurs and professionals. Kamau did this for two years, then in 2017, as he was thinking about what strategies he could adopt to expand the business further, he came across golf, a sport that is often associated with networking.
“When you play golf, you play with a maximum of four people, and as you are playing, you spend about two to four hours together, depending on whether you are playing a nine-ball or 18-ball,” said Nyabwengi.
“By the time you are done with those 18 balls, you will have shared ideas, exchanged contacts and built relationships. You also exercise the body since you have to walk for about 10 to 12 kilometres to complete the 18 holes,” he added.
Kamau Nyabwengi, founder of YEN Africa and YEN Golf, during a golf training session at Windsor Golf Hotel and Country Club in Ridgeways.
However, although the sport offered numerous benefits, many people were not participating in it because of entry barriers such as high golf club membership fees, as well as the high cost of golfing equipment.
“In most clubs, membership can be a bit expensive for the ordinary Kenyan. Equipment is also a bit expensive, with the cheapest brand new set of clubs going for about Sh60, 000,” stated Nyabwengi.
Nyabwengi wanted to change the belief that only the rich could afford to play golf, therefore in 2017, he launched YEN Golf, a program whose goal would be to make the sport accessible to people from all walks of life.
“We would partner with various golf clubs so that interested parties could join our training program without having to acquire membership. We would also provide equipment so that members wouldn’t have to buy new ones,” said Nyabwengi.
Through an eight-week program that would run on weekends‒ the company would teach people how to hold and swing a golf club, how to identify the correct golf clubs to use on different parts of the course, as well as how to play the different parts of the course.
Single digit handicaps
“YEN Golf would help beginner level golfers to learn the very basics of how to play golf, then introduce them to tournaments where they could build their own networks,” posed Nyabwengi.
Eight years since the program started, YEN Golf has trained close to 4,000 new golfers. Some of these golfers, says Nyabwengi, have transitioned to become single-digit handicaps, meaning they have become really good at the sport.
“As a networking platform, we have been able to build a really big community of golfers who happen to be entrepreneurs and professionals that have done business together, exchanged contacts and services, or even become friends,” said Nyabwengi.
In as much as they have been able to train this large number of people, the entrepreneur says that they still do experience challenges in terms of consistency in the number of trainees they get.
“The high cost of equipment is also an issue for us because, since we train beginners, we experience a lot of wear and tear, as well as breakage of clubs on a regular basis,” notes the businessman.
Kamau Nyabwengi, the founder of YEN Africa and YEN Golf, during a golf training session at Windsor Golf Hotel and Country Club in Ridgeways.
Currently, YEN Golf, which comprises a team of golf admins, digital marketers, coordinators, business development people among other professionals, does training at Windsor and Ngong Racecourse golf courses at about Sh33, 500 for adults and Sh22, 500 for children.
“We also do golf consultancy for organisations looking to organise golf tournaments or team building exercises, as well as golf tours, where we take alumni and people interested in playing in different places, out of the country,” said Nyabwengi.
Walk-in clients
Back in the day, golf clubs were very restrictive and it would be very difficult for one to get in unless they were a member or were invited by a member. Some clubs still have that restriction, but most of the clubs are now more open to walk-in clients, who can access the golf ranges, albeit at a cost that may be slightly higher than that of members.
“What many people don’t know is that you do not need a membership for you to play golf, it’s not a cheap sport, but it is affordable depending on how you look at it,” said Nyabwengi, explaining that there are clubs whose membership cost as little as Sh22, 000 a year, when you spread that over the 12 months, it becomes a relatively affordable amount, he argues.
The entrepreneur would like to see more people take up the sport, so that people from all walks of life, and not just those who have money, can access the benefits it offers, such as networking for professional development.
“We also want to have a situation where we can have our very own Kenyans winning competitions such as the Kenya Open Golf Tournament that happens every year. That has never happened before,” stated Nyabwengi.
This, says the entrepreneur, could be achieved if the government could implement policies that can help to lower the cost of equipment, as well as roll out initiatives to help develop talent in the sport at an early age.
“We have schools that have a lot of space, where the government can pilot training programs. When you start developing the sport at that level, by the time these kids are grown, they become really good,” posed Nyabwengi.
