“You know I grew up in an [environment] that was like ‘Suck it up and move on… your business is difficult? Well, your grandfather and your great grandfather were imprisoned without trial.’ So, I grew up in an environment where my ancestors dealt with a lot more and so I kinda felt like… just keep quiet and keep pushing… but, I don’t think that is the answer.”

In this episode: THE IDEALISTS. speaks with Aisha Pandor, co-founder and CEO of SweepSouth, Africa’s first online platform for booking, managing and paying for home cleaning services (think Uber for home cleaners). Aisha is one of Africa’s top female tech startup CEOs to have raised over $20M, as well as, a former scientist who completed her PhD in Human Genetics at the University of Cape Town. A story we love about Aisha is while writing her PhD thesis, she also completed a Postgraduate Business Administration course… coming first in class in that course and becoming the first student to graduate from the University with two separate qualifications from two different faculties, on the same day. As you can imagine, Aisha is a force to be reckoned with. 

What we learned: While bootstrapping her company, Aisha and her husband sold off every asset they owned (home, furniture, car, etc.) and moved back into her parent's home with their four year old daughter. They ended up staying for three years. In this episode, Aisha details the sacrifices she made to build SweepSouth, while balancing her internal monologue that she has no right to feel challenged because her ancestors who fought apartheid sacrificed worse. Now, she is on a path of unlocking her inner self while helping her team lean into their own self-awareness.