2015-05-06Staff Report 2 Meet an intellectually intrusive young woman, full of life and ever seeking new challenges. She is a survivor of many trials and continues to live in abundance whilst meeting every challenge positively. Born in 1983 in rural northern Namibia near Oshikuku, Alisa Amupolo is a multi-skilled strategist, Techpreneur and Aspiring Industrialist, serving as a Managing Director of Uuyelele Technologies (Pty) and a Founding Chairperson of Amustra Investments Group. She attended high school at Oshigambo near Ondangwa and preceded to the capital city of Namibia in search of tertiary education, where she graduated with a Bachelor’s of Arts in Media Studies from the University of Namibia (Unam). Amupolo’s interest was mainly on anything tech and digital, predominantly internet and communication solutions. Throughout university she literally became the key lady for the computer lab in their department and started helping others learn computer and internet as well. “During my days at the University of Namibia, study loans only catered for part of the cost, they weren’t comprehensively covering all costs. Parents needed to fork out the rest, and if you lived in the university dormitories, cost was even high, so that in itself was a challenge and I wanted to meet my parents half way. So that in itself drove me to always seek job opportunities during university holiday and other opportunities of growth such as being part of the House Committee at university, and member of student parliament for two consecutive years,” she says. Though her career started off with a non-paying and volunteer work, Amupolo got her first paid job towards the end of her first year at the Ministry of Education Information Centre. “We literally went knocking on strangers’ doors with a bunch of friends looking for holiday jobs, after being sent from pillar to post, and from one office to the other totally naïve about administration,” she relates the experience. Finding a job is not the only thing that was a challenge for Amupolo but coming face to face with the harsh reality of the world for the first time, having always been in a protected environment, both at high school and at home. “You come to the city with a naïve outlook on life because you only expect the world to be good, because that’s the confidence that has been instilled in you. However, I have come to learn the hard way both the good and bad, the high and the lows, which has taught me endless valuable lessons,” she says. Amupolo adds that gratitude keeps her going and seeing life purely as a blessing and a true gift on earth. “ Even if I do not have everything the world has to offer, nor the fancy of title nor richness or money, gratitude spur happiness for me which is the essence of life,” she amplifies. Besides being a multi-skilled strategist, Amupolo also founded Nation Technology Solutions cc, better-known as Information.na, which also became a launching pad of Uuyelele Technologies. She is pursuing her true calling in business and leading an impactful career by creating jobs. She believes in the power of technology in harnessing innovation; hence her tech start up Uuyelele Technologies, sought to pioneer new approaches to deliver innovative solutions and services that are creating sustainable eco systems. Her expertise is in information, communications, technology, strategy, leadership, governance, transformation and international business. She previously worked as a consultant managing the transformation process from Namibian Communications Commission (NCC) to Communication Regulatory Authority of Namibia (CRAN). She served in a development finance environment with the Namibia Global Fund programme under the Ministry of Health and Social Services (MOHSS) and Commonwealth Secretariat in London. Amupolo was also a recipient of Canon Collins/Chevening Scholarship, which helped her acquire a Master’s Degree in International Communications from the University of Leeds. She also underwent an intense leadership and business programme at the London Business School. She encourage the youth to educate themselves beyond accreditation, which gives a good foundation and theoretical understanding of the world but at the same time to be open to learning from the school of life , because the theoretical and practical experience combined is a winning combination. “Life is journey and there is really no arrival to a destination, we just keep evolving and learning more about ourselves and becoming better at what we do. So have faith in yourself and in the world, it helps to believe the world is a much more wonderful place than it’s portrayed to be, because if we are open minded to look in all corners we will discover the treasures of the world.” 2015-05-06Staff Report 2
