Rabat - Hicham Belmaati is Associate General Manager of Consortium Market Maroc based in Rabat. He talks to Morocco World News about his experience as an entrepreneur as well as the idea behind creating a consulting firm in Morocco.
Rabat – Hicham Belmaati is Associate General Manager of Consortium Market Maroc based in Rabat. He talks to Morocco World News about his experience as an entrepreneur as well as the idea behind creating a consulting firm in Morocco.
MWN: Tell us a little bit about yourself and your professional background?
Hicham Belmaati: After my post-graduate studies in marketing at the University of Rennes, and further post-graduate education in business law at the Med V University, Rabat, Agdal, I undertook several internships in several major firms and also worked for several years as a consultant for many enterprises, management trainer, especially marketing and business management. After the last position, which I held as marketing director at Max technologies and before at Elegance Tours, the idea of creating a cabinet became a priority for me and for my other associates, who are in their own right very qualified experts and who have already worked in the fields of education and consultancy for many years.
MWN: What does entrepreneurship mean to you?
Hicham Belmaati: In my opinion, entrepreneurship is a way of thinking, which needs the capacity and willingness to undertake conception, organization, and management of a productive venture with all attendant risks, while seeking profit as a reward. Entrepreneurship should be characterized by innovation and risk-taking, and an essential component of a nation’s ability to succeed in an ever changing and more competitive global marketplace. For example, Akio Morita with Sony, Phil Knight with Nike, Walt Disney, Bill Gates and others are successful entrepreneurs who work with commitment, discipline, tenacity, vision, quantified reason for doing business and above all passion.
MWN: What is Consortium Market Maroc and why did you chose this name?
Hicham Belmaati: The word Consortium for us means an agreement between several physical and/or juridical persons with an objective of cooperation in a spirit of partnership which performs one or more operations. Consortium Market Morocco or abbreviated as C2M, is a training, counseling and analysis firm which enables companies to take advantage of the large group of services (training, counseling, analysis) operating in disciplines related to their strategic and operational business, that is to say in the areas of strategy, marketing, human resources, skills management and information systems.
Relying on our experts will help to start up, in the best conditions, while working on the weaknesses and deficiencies of the company’s management. The most common are related to the ignorance of potential aide and assistance, ignorance of financial and marketing techniques, as well as the legal, social and fiscal environment. Moreover, we make available a team of motivated, competent and committed experts to our clients.
MWN: How do you see the Moroccan business atmosphere? Is it easy for entrepreneurs to launch their own startup companies, or are there systemic restrictions and obstacles?
Hicham Belmaati: If you want to succeed, you have to work hard. I think it’s not easy to be an entrepreneur. At least that’s what most people think, especially in Morocco. Its blood, sweat, tears and dealing with financial worries. Your brain is always focused and at any time, you are obsessed about achieving your goals, growing your business and keeping your commitments to employees and customers. As Michael Raynor says, “The external environment in which we find ourselves is very uncertain, where changes in regulations, the economy, competitors’ behavior, customer preferences or new or disruptive technologies could each, or in combination, dramatically change the operating landscape”.
In fact, Morocco has made tremendous progress in many economic areas, which is changing the life of the young Moroccan entrepreneur. Nowadays we can say that there are more young Moroccans and degree holders who focus on business and entrepreneurship. We find that many Moroccan entrepreneurial businesses have low capital based on personal savings (most of the businesses are micro to small, more than 90% of the companies are SMEs) and thus low added value activities. An important part of the entrepreneurial activity is necessity related; new entrepreneurs are motivated by the crucial need to get some revenues and to get out of unemployment. However, many difficulties can face the Moroccan entrepreneur if he doesn’t have a sufficiently large number of skills. Well if you are really running a business, you must become skilled at things like marketing, human resources, accounting and many other skills.
MWN: Don’t you worry about competition?
Hicham Belmaati: You know, there are apples that cost five MAD per kilo, and those that cost 30 Dirhams per kilo. Each client is free to choose the product that suits him or her, according to his or her means, convictions and the nature of the quality sought. For our part, we do our very best to live up to the expectations of our clients with a multidiscipline team, supported by a network of experts in various specialties. In addition to the skills involved and being aware of the importance of accompanying the Moroccan company in its route to competitiveness on both the national and international levels.
MWN: What is your vision?
Hicham Belmaati: You know the field of training and consulting is considered to be a promising area, in full expansion. Currently, almost all of the public and private sector institutions prefer to outsource such activities and to resort to firms of specialized experts knowing that the environment in which private and even public institutions find themselves is characterized by a certain degree of uncertainty concerning technological evolution, competitiveness, social regulatory developments, globalization and more widely macroeconomics. Our vision without a doubt is to create the difference; a difference in the level of quality of service, professionalism, efficiency in a framework where we make the client our main priority and who we consider to be a real partner. Therefore, with a young, dynamic, experienced and highly motivated staff, we are confident that we will achieve these goals.
MWN: How do you see Consortium Market Morocco? Is it on the right path?
Hicham Belmaati: I will say that now we are in the launching phase. Consortium Market Morocco works with talented project managers in the creation of a successful enterprise. Our objective is to step back and view with perspective, while optimizing a project. Indeed, it is in this process of providing future business leaders with the tools and proven methods that will enable us to advance rapidly without forgetting to take into consideration all the questions inherent to this type of project.
We are making our way slowly but in a professional, thoughtful and careful manner. If we respect all strategic directions, and we will respect them, I believe that it will be among the best training and consulting firms in Morocco.
MWN: What are the valued and principles that governs your work?
Hicham Belmaati: We are fixated, obsessed by innovation. I think that Consortium Market Morocco represents a passion and an insatiable appetite to go deeper with Moroccan and international enterprises. We have incredibly wide peripheral vision, the ability to see and be inspired by things that happen in Moroccan enterprises. To do so, our challenge is to deliver excellence by exceeding our customers’ expectations, delivering exceptional quality and service, demanding the best from ourselves, learning from our mistakes and celebrating our successes.
In Consortium Market Morocco ,we Work Together, collaborate and maximize the power of diversity, inspire others to excel by making a Difference through creating, being open by communicating fully and honestly, encouraging and valuing differences, and sharing knowledge
MWN: Given the fact that you are a young entrepreneur, what is your message to Moroccan youth? And how can they overcome the limitations of lack of opportunity in Morocco?
Hicham Belmaati: Besides the social problems such as employment, Moroccan youth should believe in themselves, in their skills too. I wish that Moroccan youth would have the opportunity to create their own jobs; it is a real opportunity for improving the economy and business in Morocco especially by Moroccan skilled youth. But I suppose that this will happen only if the young entrepreneur truly believes in his business and in the goods and services that he or she sells. Planning every aspect of one’s home business is not only a must, but also builds habits that every home business owner should develop, implement, and maintain. Finally, if you don’t enjoy what you’re doing, you won’t succeed.
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