Telenor Velocity’s ‘DuckStories’ reached Karachi which brought together acclaimed innovators, industry experts, mentors, Telenor senior management and startups in large numbers to celebrate and learn from their failures.
DuckStories is a series of regular events where accomplished entrepreneurs and professionals share their career mistakes and failures with the audience. They share the instances of their lives where they had to ‘duck’, get back on feet and tread again towards their goals. The event apart from focusing on the usual recipe for professional success digs deeper into career mistakes of accomplished individuals to draw better insights about their success.
One of the prime objectives of the program is to eradicate the fear of failure and foster initiative and experimentation to strengthen the country’s startup landscape. Telenor Velocity calls for open admission of mistakes and failures but emphasizes on learning from the mistakes rather than being deterred by them.
The speakers of the third installment of the ‘DuckStories’ shared their life experiences and told about how they refused to be dissuaded by their career mistakes and failures in pursuit of success. Speakers of the event included acclaimed serial entrepreneur Faizan Laghari, digital & startup specialist Haseeb Sattar and entrepreneur and MIT graduate Saba Gul.
Faizan has worked on technology based startups for over 16 years. He is the force behind Pakistan’s 1st co-working space, an SMS interaction system called Textualy and Pakistan’s eminent on-demand delivery and logistics company, Forrun. Saba helps underprivileged and unskilled women get employment through her venture Popinjay. She has worked on low cost Solar Lightening Systems in Sri Lanka and taught entrepreneurship in the universities of Africa, whereas Haseeb is an engineer and founder of a number of successful startups.
DuckStories have a characteristic fun element to them which make the whole event both amusing and enlightening. This episode was no different where the speakers shared both laughs and sighs as they recollected their lifelong struggles. New as well as up-and-coming startups gathered countless pearls of wisdom as their role models unfolded the riveting sagas of their professional lives.
“Telenor Velocity believes that we learn more from failures than our successes and thus it is critical for us to share our mistakes & learning so others around us can benefit.” Durdana Achakzai, Chief Digital Officer at Telenor Pakistan said. “Most of the successful professionals and entrepreneurs often have a life chequered with mistakes and failures which, apart from dealing with obvious setbacks, also redefined their careers. Telenor believes in persistence to achieve excellence and that is what we try to impart into the upcoming entrepreneurs training under Telenor Velocity program. We are committed to carrying the Velocity DuckStories further to showcase fascinating stories of struggle, failure and renewed ambitions to bring hope to those who continue to struggle in their careers.”
The audience expressed their utmost delight and gratitude to Telenor Pakistan for organizing the one of its kind event and called for its continuation in the future. The previous two installments of the series took place in Lahore in December 2017 and at Telenor Pakistan Headquarter ‘345’ – in Islamabad in Jan 2018. Both of them were equally lauded by the participants and speakers. Telenor Velocity is Telenor Pakistan’s digital acceleration initiative, which is one of the most sought after programs in the country.