Perhaps one of the most overlooked privileges is not wealth itself, but having enough margin in your life to respond to reality. Over the last few years, we have become fluent in the language of privilege, speaking easily about financial privilege, pretty privilege, racial privilege, passport privilege, educational privilege and social privilege, and in doing so we have become increasingly aware that people do not all start from the same place and that some doors open more easily for some than for others. Yet there is one form of privilege that seems to receive far less attention, and that is the privilege of being able to do something with the information you have, not simply knowing, but acting, because the truth is that information alone changes very little. We like to imagine that if people only knew better, they would do better, and entire industries are built around this assumption, from self-help books and documentaries to podcasts, awareness campaigns, public health initiative...
A few days ago, I witnessed something that left me shaking my head in disbelief. I was translating for a Chinese client looking for salespeople familiar with the Kenyan market. He got a candidate’s number from someone, invited him for an interview, and even picked the meeting location—a coffee shop. The Kenyan sales guy shows up, experienced, knowledgeable, and with an existing client list. Clearly, he’s an asset. But then, things took a turn. First, the Chinese guy shows up 30 minutes late. No apology. Then, he lets the Kenyan pay for his own coffee. Keep in mind, he reached out to him , not the other way around. But here’s the real kicker—the sales guy, despite holding all the cards, asks for a salary of KES 30,000 and freely spills inside information about his former company, which happens to be a competitor to the Chinese guy’s new business. What kind of self-sabotage is this?! This isn’t the first time I’ve seen this happen. I know of another Chinese-owned company where Kenyan wo...