Kindly introduce yourself to us.
I am Otumbo Vincent. I value God, people, relationships, communication and authenticity. Education wise, I hold a first class undergraduate degree in Purchasing and Contract Management from Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, Mombasa Campus. I am the Co-founder, Sav Skills Limited. Our mission is to train, coach and mentor people to live a fulfilled life and hence, experiencing peak performance in their respective personal lives and industries. Our default settings as an organization is Personal Development under our program named Personal Mastery Program -PmP
So, what is personal development? Why do you focus on it, that is why is it important?
Personal Development is when I spend time asking myself this important question; `Who am I?’
To the above important question comes the following more questions;
- What is my message?
- What is my character?
- What is my capacity?
- What is my weakness, opportunity, strength as well as threat?
- How can I continuously grow and improve myself?
- What is the meaning of success?
- What are my values?
It’s about starting the never ending journey of learning yourself to grow yourself.
If you want to pursue success and significance in life, you have got to pursue yourself. Knowing yourself brings focus. Personal development leads to the following:
- Self awareness which is important in character and skills development.
- Worklife intergration – personal development helps you clarify and integrate your passion, profession, vocation and mission.
Clarity and intergration of the above leads to something I call a fulfilling life.
Life is to be lived today and not tomorrow: knowing yourself makes you live today excellently.
Personal development leads to personal branding. What is personal branding? Personal branding is not professional photography or hashtags but the ability and capacity to find your message to the world and the focus, consistency & commitment to communicate your message without giving up.
At what point did you realize that this is what you wanted to do? Did you start immediately? What were the challenges you encountered in starting this programme?
As it is said life is not a walk in the park nor a bed of roses: Otumbo Vincent has done a lot of things in order to at where he is. I started my journey ( at this time of course it was unconsciously started ) at lower primary school level. At primary school, I loved doing business and hence my first business was with my mum in Kijauri town, selling tomatoes and maize to the National Cereal and Produce Board, Kijauri branch.
I had my first employment at the same time in a hotel. Fast forward when I joined a boarding school in class seven third term at Nyakoe High Way Primary School, I started ironing clothes for our boarding master to swap school food for home cooked food. By then, I had had this passion of speaking to inspire as well as organizing forums and inviting speakers to speak. I loved reading personal development books by then.
Personal development grabbed my attention at second year of my university. This time I was employed as a business development manager, Ocean View Pharmaceuticals. The leadership of the organization opened my eyes that for any organization to realize its objectives and grow beyond the vision of the founder, something had to be done about the team.
It was not that clear, I resigned to pursue the clarity of what I was not very sure of. I tried lecturing and registered a sole proprietorship by the name `Passion Life’ with the objective of inspiring youths and helping organization with strategy. Sadly I talked but I did not make money. Next step? I love cleaning so I switched to Otuvin Cleaning Services. In the midst of all this, I used to hold youth leadership breakfasts in our church, and I was running a business club.
In my cocktail of career confusion; Should I seek a job with my degree, do cleaning business, venture into leadership, I met a gentleman by the name Mohamed Shariff, in a 15 minute interaction, he asked me what I do and I said cleaning business- he looked at me direct to my eyes and said, “You are wasting your time there” Over a couple of days, he sent me a 3-page document titled `Mentorship’, I did an analysis of my skills and my daily activities, defined success and my values.
Everything came to focus, I am a people personal and my passion, profession, vocation and mission is to guide people into finding their uniqueness.
So what is success? How do we measure and define success?
Success means different things to different people. In my dictionary, I hardly use the term success, I love the term Significance.
According to my belief;
Success is when everything is about me – no matter what everything is. While, significance is when everything about me has an impact to those around me, the community, the nation and the world at large. Significance is about impact and contribution at which level one is. To use the commonly used phrase, success is finding myself while significance is using myself for the benefit of the community and the world around me. I have conducted my own research within my network and I have come to learn that when you are on the other side, life is about significance and not materialistic, based on titles, celebrity or being famous.
So what should we do to encourage our own personal development?
How badly do you desire to be significant in this short life? How badly do you desire to live a fulfilled life? How badly do you desire to experience consistence peak performance or results. The key to living a significant life is found within yourself.
It’s time that each one of us sits ourselves down and asked ourselves tough questions about what really matters to you. Step out of your shell and step into your significance. Get a mentor, enroll into a personal development program.
How do you get to choose a mentor? Are there factors to consider?
In my life, I have never set standards of choosing mentors: I simply focus on the connection, check my value system and finally listen to my gut. There’s no bad mentor, each mentor comes with a lesson to teach you. The most important lesson of all is never to become a bad mentor yourself.
How do I get to discover my weakness, opportunity, strength as well as threat?
The best way is to enroll into a fully developed and tested program. Second option is to get a personal development mentor to guide you through the journey. I would also recommend you do a self-assessment using this link. The assessment will give you a glimpse of who you are. A journey of a thousand starts with a single step. The test can be your first golden step.
So Bw. Otumbo, what is your parting shot?
In a world where everyone is seeking the same opportunities, applying for the same jobs, pursuing the same ideas, singing the same song of love me, buy me, I am the best, the questions stands: Who are you?
The only way you can set yourself apart is to keep finding yourself, inversion in your uniqueness, continuously growing yourself and most importantly staying authentic with your personal brand. Always remember everyone is taken, so shall you take yourself with passion, commitment, consistence & persistence.
