Bisila Bokoko

Philanthropy has been a calling

We are very excited in this issue to feature the phenomenal businesswoman, Bisila Bokoko, renowned for taking companies from local to global, here she tells us her story of becoming an entrepreneur and the joy she gets from her philanthropy.

Who is Bisila Bokoko?

Well I believe that I am still a little girl because I continue to have this passion to do everything, and I am very curious about everything. When you have the power to connect to your inner child it gives you the ability to keep going forward in a great state of joy. I would also say, I am a mother, a daughter, a sister, a friend, a wife… I am many things but in essence, this is who I am, a woman in progress.

What made you become an entrepreneur?

That’s a long story, I had no reference regarding how to become a women entrepreneur at all. My mother was a nurse and always had a job, she knew that she needed to be there at certain times, and she would have that job for life. I remember when I attended her retirement party a few years ago I said to myself Wow I admire her because: She pursued her dreams, the only thing she wanted to be was a nurse and she has done it. She was radiant, very happy and satisfied. She wanted that kind of safety where you got a salary every month. My dad was an entrepreneur, but I always wanted the level of safety my mum had. When I finished college, I said to myself I want to become a Civil Servant. This was something which had crossed my mind because we were immigrants, my parents in Spain, and then me in the United Stated, so I really wanted this level of safety.

Entrepreneurship was not in my radar at all. I was Executive Director of the Spanish US Chamber of Commerce, it was a kind of safe job, in a way I could have made an easy transition to any other company because it had a big network, so I felt safe. But I got fired under very difficult circumstances which I had provoked myself and that reality provided a change of direction. I decided, I didn’t want to be fired again. I had deserved to be fired, I had been a rebel, doing what I wanted to do and not following the rules. However, I realised the only way to do things the way I wanted to do them, was by becoming an entrepreneur. I was afraid then to do it and if I am honest, I am still afraid today, I still don’t feel fully comfortable about it. Every month is like a rollercoaster, but I have learned to live with that uncertainty, it has become part of my life, and at the end of the day, when you have a passion, you have to follow it.

Who did you surround yourself with to give you the tools to become who you are today?

Three years before I got fired everyone in my network was complaining about their bosses, the atmosphere they worked in and their jobs. People would come to me to ask if I had any jobs and I would say, I’m not the labour office, but I always seemed to be getting people coming to me. Eventually I realised it was me who was attracting these conversations.

Once I had decided to go my own way, the people who turned up in my life were entrepreneurs. They were super excited about their projects and these people become my mentors. I could not single out one person, many helped me. One friend inspired me by how she put everything together, another had a social conscience and wanted to do good. These people were my support system.

I also read a lot, and these books helped me walk my path, I believe it was a mixture of my network and friends, which inspired me.

What is your advice to someone starting out?

You have to adopt the persona you want to become at the beginning. It may feel uncomfortable, as if you are an imposter, that you need to study more, do more, be more, but it isn’t like that. You have to believe in yourself that you can achieve your goals and become successful.

Maybe you have an important day, a meeting with investors or directors and you feel inside you’re not ready yet, don’t! You have to own it and with practice you will learn you can do it. But to begin with you may have to fake it, until your confidence grows, and you become the person you know you could be.

Everyone goes through this process, and we need to learn to be more compassionate with ourselves and not feel as if we are cheating, it is just the procedure we need to go through. We learn by doing, we will make mistakes at the beginning, and we will learn from them.

I remember being invited to a conference and feeling I wasn’t ready, I felt sick. Then I said to myself. Stop this! Thinking like this will only bring negative thoughts into your life and you will not grow from it. You may be at the beginning, but the universe has given you the opportunity to be at this forum, a chance to start training, so train! And you keep doing it until one day, it becomes natural, and you feel comfortable with your life, because you earned it.

Women should be more compassionate to ourselves. We need to stop comparing ourselves to others, maybe thinking another woman is getting ahead and we will never catch up. We must stop doing that. We all have our own rhythm; our own pace and we need to realise that. It might take three years or five years, it doesn’t matter. You need to love yourself and celebrate every step it takes to get there.

These days you are a businesswomen, was it easy to learn to delegate?

Actually I think I got good training at the Chamber of Commerce because I had already been working with a team. Delegation is all about trust. You have to surround yourself with the best people. I recognise there are many things I don’t know and don’t need to know. So often time is wasted trying to do something you are not good at. So rather than do that, get someone else who is good at it, to do it!

My job is to make sure deadlines are accomplished; the best type of leadership is where people are left to achieve the goals in their own way. As long as the deadlines are achieved, then everyone is happy, doing what they love to the best of their ability.

The keyword is trust! Not interfering with people’s creativity and innovation. I like to surround myself with a diverse group of people, it allows me to see different perspectives. The important thing is to listen and appreciate other people’s ideas.

How do you take care of your mindset , body and spiritual being?

For may years I have followed my rituals and routines. Meditation is part of my daily routine. First thing in the morning, I take 20 minutes to myself, before I check my phone, so I can concentrate on being centred.

Some entrepreneurs work differently and are connected to their phones at all times. I will not do that. My mornings are sacred and are dedicated to myself and being centred. Every morning and evening I take some time for writing and journaling. My journal is divided into different categories. One for my affirmations, one for feelings or emotions and one for my wishes, the things I want to accomplish and one for notes of gratitude.

I usually wake at 5am, this is time for my myself and my family. I take a walk for an hour, or do Pilates or yoga. Sometimes I have breakfast in my pyjamas which I enjoy too - I love it at the weekend with the whole family and sometimes during the week with my husband. Normally I start my day at 09:00 or 09:30 am. I finish about 3pm when I have my meal . Before I was spending all my time being busy. These days I like to focus for four hours and then enjoy my day .

I try to arrange my agenda so the most difficult things are solved between Monday and Wednesday, then on Thursday and Friday I can relax, maybe do some interviews, like this one! Or meetings which don’t take up too much of my energy, or start new projects. On Friday’s at 3pm, I am finished, and it is time for my family and to enjoy life. Maybe a lady’s lunch which I enjoy, I love connecting with people who are creating amazing work for the world, I love that kind of inspiration.

I do try to eat as healthy as I can (laughing) even though I love sweets.

How have you managed the Covid situation in your company?

Well the first month was shocking to me, I saw my finances going down and disappearing . Before everything started, I had a busy month going on

tour with my conferences abroad, then I came back to New York and the news said we would be in lockdown. I decided to stop worrying and start doing something about it

So I did these two things: Number one: I decided if I had all this time, I was going to use it to study and prepare myself. I started working with some different coaches. I got three different ones and mentors. I am a coach myself, but I decided to be a student this time. It was incredible, I used that time to make a better version of myself. I used that time to see and change, to shift things around, let go of other things, let go of control and perfectionism. A lot of these things you are not completely aware of but then you stop and feel and have the moment for yourself you start seeing them. I took time to heal myself.

And number two: I said to myself, well if I cannot do conferences, I will create a YouTube channel and learn. So I started figuring out how to be useful to others.

A great advantage of this time was to spend more time with my family, I love cooking African food or Spanish food, so everyone was delighted. It was a good time, but of course in other ways it was a difficult time for a company. In the end we made the best of it, and I am sure that this is what you have to do in life .

You cannot change the circumstances, but you can change your attitude.

What was the inspiration behind your first non-profit organization?

I don’t think it was an inspiration, I think of it as more of a calling. I had not considered being a philanthropist. It had not been in my plans. I had only considered being an entrepreneur and businessperson to make money. But something must have shifted in me. The first time I went to Africa I was 35 and it was an incredible journey. First of all for the first time in my life everyone looked like me…everyone is black. I got to the airport, and I was WOWed I said to myself I am in AFRICA.

I grew up in Valencia in Spain and a lot of my work has been in Madrid, then I moved to New York which is very diverse. I had not connected with my African roots until I was in Ghana for the first time. This trip was magical because as I was travelling and looking at the situation. Many magical thing happened; I meet a magical person who was the chief of Kokofu a village next to Kumasi. To make a long story short he proposed for me to be the Queen of that town. I just heard the world Queen and I said yes but then when my ego calmed down, I asked what he wanted me to do. How can I serve. He said to me, think about it and call me in three days… So during those three days I was thinking, and a thought came to my mind. I thought, well, I know Africa because of books. When I was a little girl, my parents gave me African books and made me read them and learn everything about Africa because they thought this was the best way I could stay connected with our roots. So after those three days I was thinking they could get connections with the other continents through books. That is how the library was born, when Bisila Bokoko African Literacy Project was born…It was like a calling.

The moment I did it I also saw the gift it brought me. After a year of working towards it we opened the first library and I went with a team of friends and people from New York, and I saw and felt the reaction of the locals, the children and everyone together cheering and sharing the happiness. I felt so empowered, full of energy, happy. That was when I realised that being a philanthropist is not an act of generosity. it is selfishness [and here she started laughing] because you feel so good by helping others that you want to do it again and again.

It is amazing, the power of giving. So we kept going, more libraries: Uganda, Zimbabwe, Kenya, Guinea Equatorial, Nigeria - different places and it has been such a beautiful journey.

Please tell us about the Pikolino project?

Wow that was one of the first projects I was involved with as an entrepreneur, and is very deep rooted in my heart. I actually loved it because the engineer of this project was Rosa Escandel, she is a really good friend of mine and she is the one who had the great idea to match the Masai people with Pikolino .

Pikolino is a company based in Elche, Alicante. I remember it was 2005 when she spoke about it, so I have been a part of it since then. We work together creating sustainable and conscious tourism in Masai Mara, we organise beautiful

safaris and we also support the schools through volunteering. Doctors come and donate their time too. I work very closely with the Masai women to help empower them.

It is amazing, the power of giving

The project started in 2011 with Pikolino and developed into something much bigger with many corporations getting involved. It is a magical place where we have inspired children to expand their ideas and exchange thoughts.

Tell us about your kids and their education

I have given my children space to grow up. I grew up in a house where no one left me alone and my teenage years were a nightmare. I didn’t want them to have the same experience. As a child I would follow the crowd and I wanted to fit in, so I didn’t really know who I was. My kids are my teachers, they know who they are. I remember one Halloween I asked my daughter what she wanted to wear, she said she would go as a homeless person. She loves video games, which I hate. She knows what she wants and as a rebel, she is wiser. I given her space and she has amazed me with the person she has become. As a parent, we need to put trust in our children.

I wanted to be in show business and my father wanted me to be a lawyer, but I didn’t want that. We have this limited belief that there is only one way to make money, but there are many ways to make money. And we need to learn to raise children by being happy parents.

What is your next milestone?

We want to launch a campaign to go to Africa to go to Masai Mara and gather mindful leaders and bring Conscious Tourism to Africa. The project for next year is to continue lectures about diversity which is important for companies because they could work better. Inclusive leadership is the most important tasks for the next year. I will be doing Latin-American next year as well. Women need inspiration to know they can do it too.

Venezuela is also a country that I would love to add to the countries we would like to support I want it to be part of my work .

What is your best piece of business advice?

The first thing to realise is that most limits are in our mind. We should think about how to be a better person, we always focus on how to make business better, but everything starts from within. So in order to be great in business you have to do your inner work first. If you want to give your best in business, first you have to be the best human being you could be. So my advice would be to work on your personal development .

I remember when I started out as a businesswoman and the business was not right because I was not aligned. You have to align the mind and the heart in order to be great and to understand that behind your fears are opportunities. Be vulnerable, feel frustrated if you have to, being strong means that sometimes you admit that you are sad, embrace your emotions .