Ghana as a country can foster a considerable number of working women who, despite their limitations with formal literacy, try to make ends meet while providing their families with all material necessities. This is the case of these diligent women who support their husbands in taking care of the home. There are countless single mothers who have taken on the dual role of mother and father, providing for the physical and spiritual needs of their children. The greatest contribution of these industrious Ghanaian businesswomen that has not received literary attention is their extraordinary business skills.
Ghanaian business women do not rush into any business venture. They carry out market research to find out the possibility of registering higher income from the proposed commercial company. They do this to find a sustainable supply of their tradable items, a potential target market, and successful distribution outlets. In addition, they carefully choose strategic areas to place their tents, kiosks or stores. They conduct a thorough search to learn about customers passing through the area, their preferences and interests in particular items that record fast sales before starting the business venture. Although they do not have well documented business plans, they have their business structured and well planned.
Interestingly, Ghanaian business women have a unique way of attracting clients. They have extraordinary relationships with clients. They speak delicately and respectfully to their customers, sometimes using flattering speech to entice customers to forge a lasting business relationship with them. They would hardly take their anger out on customers. This is unusual for typical Ghanaian business women! They hide their personal pain and agony and use, so to speak, their teeth openly to show friendship in order to win customers. They are also quick to apologize and correct products that customers complain of having industrial flaws.
Ghanaian businesswomen also demonstrate exceptional purchasing, sourcing and marketing skills. When their items arrive, they single-handedly help contract workers unload them from the vehicles. They would have their little mini-books to keep every little detail of the items received as well as those distributed at the supply point. Their limited mathematical knowledge would not prevent them from keeping clean and complete records of their business transactions. Even before their products arrive, they call their customers and let them know, while keeping track of their item inventory. They deposit their sales daily in the banks so as not to waste their business capital. When they run at a loss, they don’t lose hope or stop business. They quickly apply for business loans with flexible repayment terms to strengthen their businesses and keep them running.
The remarkable business and entrepreneurial skills demonstrated by Ghanaian women entrepreneurs must be hailed and recognized even as the world celebrates mothers this week. However, the Ghanaian government and ministry of commerce must implement measures to help these hard-working entrepreneurs overcome the dire challenges they face in starting their businesses. A cardinal problem has to do with recommending traditional banks for these women to do business with. It is disheartening to learn how young and unscrupulous financial institutions cheat these women and run away with their hard-earned money. These women are often tricked by promising very low interest rates on their loan facilities, as well as high interest returns on their savings. Traditional integrity banks must reach out to these hard-working businesswomen and offer them the best deals in terms of interest on their savings, as well as interest on the business loans they would apply for. The government must keep up its fight against the dissolution of all self-serving financial institutions created to cheat these hard-working entrepreneurs out of their business profits.
In addition, business and business institutions should regularly organize workshops for these illiterate businesswomen to help them improve their business and business skills. These refreshing engagements would also enlighten them on modern methods of doing business, as well as how to use simple electronic tools for storage and/or record keeping. Through these business seminars and workshops solid instruction can be given on how to avoid business risks and how to mobilize sales of your products through improved purchasing, marketing and supply chain management approaches. This would immensely help these hardworking and industrious Ghanaian businesswomen to contribute significantly to the Ghanaian economy.