PRACTICAL SKILLS FOR ENTREPRENEURIAL SUCCESS BOOK: THE LAUNCH

The day was a busy day, I had an exhibition in the morning, a meeting in the afternoon and a book launch to conduct in the evening. Being a very particular guy with the details of the launch I found a bit of a challenge of the hotel where we were launching as they made some last-minute adjustments to our initial arrangements. But even before the book launch itself, there was the issue of invitations.

The event was an invite-only event with a very particular audience who formed part of the invite list. So naturally, we sent the invitations but as the day progressed, some people cancelled and not a lot was confirmed by way of replying to the invite via email or SMS. So in the evening when I got to the venue, I was a bit tensed up as the people who were to attend did not send confirmations. Another reason I was tensed up a bit was the fact that the prepping wasn’t going at the pace I had anticipated it to go and I had to negotiate with the hotel to really ensure that my plan goes as near perfect as I had visualized it way back in 2017.

One thing I was excited though about was my branding and media. I spent a significant amount of money and social capital to ensure that we had great media coverage and an even greater branding experience and from the photos, you can tell the branding was well thought through. Anyways after all the setting up and the readjustments, we were ready to launch. I was happy when I started to see my guests arrive all glammed up and ready for the launch, my media team and my DJs were also already on site and everything was set to go. Even as the programme continues, I was still coordinating the programme lineup and ensuring some logistical considerations were underway. I was lucky though that I had my volunteers and best friend help with the coordination as well. So the first part of the event was the photo session, networking and book signing.

As this session was happening, I realized the room arrangement had way more seats that the invited guests so as a way to quickly readjust the room setting, I skillfully got everyone out of the main hall to the media room for photos and videos and got my volunteer team quickly rearrange the room configuration reducing some of the seats. and guess who was there giving those directions and helping, me. I did this quickly, changed to my official senator suit for the day and was now ready for the launch to flow. The photo session was handled by professionals Circuite Photography and Front Pixel Studios. And after an exciting set of photo, we were ready to go back for the second session which was entertainment and cocktails.

In the entertainment I had two friend poets of mine who went on to do incredible poetry pieces on me and my journey and Kitunguu Machoni gave a particularly moving piece. As the entertainment continued, the event only played the best of African house music with the incredible Mundu Wa Nyumba also known as Simon Chege. After the entertainment we all went back for the main session speeches, the book launch and unveiling and amongst the guests of the day was my father who was accompanied by my sister.

Before that my best friend Oduor Kevin gave introductory opening remarks and then the speeches began. The first speech was by Baba Muli, my other father who spoke about our African nature and our contribution to leadership and entrepreneurship as Africans. Next was my father who gave a moving speech on one of my near-death experiences when I was kidnapped at 4 years old and the ordeal he went through to get me back. Then I went in to finalize on the book and why it was important. The event was moderated by a powerful mc don the black.