What started out as selling snacks as a child has evolved into a knack for managing multiple brands and making major boss moves. With two successful companies under her belt, her formula for success is simple yet effective: Turn your passion into money.
In the 11 years since completing high school, Sympathy Sibanda Mazuruse has made a name for herself as a successful businesswoman who strives for excellence and does not back away from a challenge.
What Mazuruse has successfully mastered is the ability to juggle multiple business ventures while staying true to herself, and her accomplishments have all been fuelled by her desire to help people.
“I don’t want to cage myself or say, ‘This is exactly what I do,’ because I do a lot of things,” Mazuruse told The Weight She Carries. “I love helping…and this has given me an opportunity to meet the downtrodden in society and help them in terms of relief and developmental projects.”
For the past 10 years, Mazuruse has worked for the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) Zimbabwe, a humanitarian organization that works with people to provide relief from poverty and distress.
Mazuruse also owns a public relations and marketing company called Esteem Communications with her husband. The company, which the couple launched in 2014, is headquartered in Zimbabwe and extends its management services to artists in the United Kingdom, Malawi and South Africa.
“The company also deals with editing, writing, company registrations and brand management,” Mazuruse said. “My husband and I focus on image management consultancy.”
Esteem Communications’ list of clients include Zimbabwean musicians Wencilus Makungisa, Alick Macheso and Tryson Chimbetu, among others. The company has also managed companies like Kudiwa Place, ZimEnergy and Kitchen Link.
In addition, Mazuruse owns a manufacturing company called Amandla Peanut Butter – an extension of Esteem Communications.
“We have chocolate flavour, vanilla flavour and the original (flavour),” she said. “I think this one is still in its infancy, but we’re hoping that in 2018 we will be able to shake waves in Zimbabwe and beyond.”
Entrepreneurship is something Mazuruse learned at a young age. As a child, her parents would give Mazuruse and her siblings pocket money each month, and ask them what type of business they wanted to invest in.
“Sometimes we would sell freezits (freezies),” Mazuruse recalled. “I remember we would sell some chips called ‘Doink’. They were really loved during my time. We would sell those and make some money. It was really fun.”
When Mazuruse met her husband, she discovered that the two had a lot in common and shared a similar vision. The two became friends and eventually married.
“We love photography, we love writing, we love editing, and we love managing brands,” she said. “You know, these are the small things that other people think don’t matter. Sometimes people are shocked to hear that what they have can be transformed into money.”
“That dream that you have…people may laugh at it and say it’s not real and its beyond reality, but I tell you, one day because you have seen it and God has given it to you, you will attain it. Make sure you work hard, and you will attain it. God has given you something that you are visualizing, see it through to fruition.” – Sympathy Sibanda Mazuruse
Running multiple businesses is no small feat. That, coupled with the responsibilities she has to her family is a lot to juggle. But Mazuruse has a theory about balance that she lives by.
“People talk of balance. Balance is a state where everything is flowing, and I have never seen that in my life,” she said. “My life is made up of all these upheavals – there are always these deadlines that have to be met and clients that have to be met.”
“I never try to balance anything because balancing is offsetting something or trading one thing for another. Things that are equally important in my life should not be traded.” – Sympathy Sibanda Mazuruse
What she focuses on is making sure she takes time to have fun with friends, and sets aside one day of rest each week – Saturdays, the day she attends church.
[ctt template=”5″ link=”wS5b3″ via=”no” ]While women have made great strides in the workforce in recent decades, many find themselves fighting to be recognized in boardrooms.[/ctt]
According to a 2016 Forbes article, just 24 percent of senior business roles globally were held by women.
Women around the world can also relate to the pressure of meeting societal expectations, and many never fulfil their dreams because they are discouraged from achieving them if it means getting married at a latter age, or not at all. And for many women, the limitations placed on them can interfere with their goals.
“There is a space for every woman who wants to get to the top, but they have to go against societal expectations because some of these rules hamper progress. For example, some people feel women should not be leaders and this scares some women, so they settle to become general employees. And yet God created each one of us to have a space up there in the sky.” – Sympathy Sibanda Mazuruse
“I urge all women not to set boundaries for themselves,” Mazuruse said. “I am not encouraging a revolution against men and families, but I am saying do not embrace traditions that kill your passion.”
Mazuruse is not only concerned about her own success, she strives to make a difference in the lives of others, and does all she can to help the next generation of women leaders make it to the top.
“I believe every girl child should have access to education, be it formal or informal,” she said. “I’m not rich, and I do not have much at my disposal, but I use the people around me and my talents. When I see a girl child who has dropped out of school, I try to crowd fund for that child.”
One of the girls Mazuruse is helping now is a girl named Sheena. She dropped out of school when her father passed away, and her mother is HIV-positive and cannot work.
“I just crowd funded for her and now her (tuition) is all paid up until the time she will be in Grade 7,” Mazuruse said. “I hope we (can) continue to crowd fund for her so that she goes further and achieves her dream of becoming a doctor.”
The sky is the limit, and your dreams and passions are the key to living a fulfilled life, she added, but along the journey to success, we as women need to rally around each other and cheer each other on.
“We are not competing against each other. We should never compete, only complement each other. We are meant to take care of each other not destroy each other. Weak women are the ones who destroy each other. Weak women gossip about each other, but strong women build each other up, and they make sure they climb up the ladder with someone else.” – Sympathy Sibanda Mazuruse
For all the women out there with big dreams, Mazuruse has one piece of advice:
“When you dream, remember to wake up. I give myself enough time every day to just envision what I want for my life. And there are some things that I have watched turn into reality, not while I sat, but while I worked.”
*Interview conducted by Shamiso Patience Mbiriri
