We go back home — to villages, townships, hostels and informal settlements — to equip struggling entrepreneurs and aspirants with the practical business governing skills they were never taught.
Meredith Institute for Business Founders (Pty) Ltd. was established from a lived, underprivileged entrepreneur's experience. We exist to provide an alternative elementary-level business skills development service — practical, jargon-free, and designed from the ground up for communities that have been left behind.
Our approach is built on 3 Key Fundamentals of Entrepreneurship: Production Breakdown Analysis (step-by-step diagnosis and implementation throughout the entire business planning process to create sustainable business systems), Business Governing Skills (incorporating basic Business Management, Administration, Entrepreneurship and Significant Leadership), and Business Funds Management Devoid of Accounting Jargon (accounting jargon-free budgeting, costing, pricing and savings plan breakdowns).
An opportunity for all entrepreneurs and aspirants — of all ages and business sectors — to be screened and introduced to practical business governing skills. Open to everyone. Sessions run 08:30–15:30.
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Screening of potential entrepreneurs and aspirants
Introduction to the 3 Key Fundamentals of Entrepreneurship
Business sector identification and profiling
Q&A and next-step guidance
A focused deep-dive where we conduct a thorough needs analysis on each entrepreneur, their products and/or services, and their business. Sessions run 08:30–15:30 over three consecutive days.
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On-site needs analysis per entrepreneur
Product and/or service diagnostic
Business assessment and profiling
Customised action plan per candidate
Our flagship 360-degree, one-stop programme. 3 days of classroom training per month plus 3 weeks of at-home assessments per phase, supported by one-on-one hybrid consultation, coaching and mentorship. The final outcome is your own leather-bound Business Founders Legacy Document — a detailed, self-compiled business plan, road map, growth map and expansion map.
Register Now Register NowWhat's Covered
Candidates' on-site business visits and profilingAccounting jargon-free costing, pricing and savings plan breakdownSustainable production processes and proceduresWorkplace, workspace and equipment budgetingEmployees work plan breakdownBasic project managementPrior business commencement planMarketing plan and sales plan breakdownPitch deck developmentLearning Management SystemsBusiness Canvas ModelBasic Microsoft Office skillsFinal outcome: Business Founders Legacy Document (A3 leather-bound portfolio)We believe in balance — a holistic and inclusive socio-economic development, transformation and empowerment across our communities, provinces and country. Our programmes are open to youth, women, people living with disabilities, LGBTQIA+ family and men, aged 18–75.
Entrepreneurs already trading but stuck in hand-to-mouth, learn-as-you-trade cycles.
People with product or business ideas who want to learn before incurring compliance costs.
Individuals forced into entrepreneurship by circumstance — poverty, unemployment or illiteracy.
Entrepreneurs who are beneficiaries of support grants (e.g. R370 grant) needing skills to sustain growth.
Retrenched, laid-off, dismissed or retired individuals venturing into self-employment.
Future leaders and philanthropists who deserve to build right from the start.
A hybrid, alternative elementary-level programme that cuts across all business sectors. One class, every solution.
Our jargon-free approach removes the barrier of accounting and mathematics challenges, making business planning accessible to everyone.
Not theory. This programme was designed and developed from 14 years of real, struggled entrepreneurial experience — so you know it works.
We accommodate candidates of all educational and lifestyle backgrounds. If you have the will, we provide the way.
Ms. Ntsako Lulama Magano was born and raised in the rural town of Acornhoek, Tintswalo Village, Mpumalanga Province. Like so many South African entrepreneurs, she started her business — Décor Excellence — without knowing the fundamentals of entrepreneurship, forced into a "start with what you have" approach that led to 14 years of trade-as-you-learn, hand-to-mouth business practice.
Décor Excellence offered interior decorating services and manufactured globally competitive bedding sets for hotels, hospitals and homes, training and employing 14 people from 14 underprivileged communities. As a proud beneficiary of R600,000 Technology Transfer Funding, Ntsako experienced firsthand how 85% of grant beneficiaries failed — not from lack of effort, but from lack of the right foundational business skills.
In November 2014, she began developing the alternative elementary-level business skills programme she wished she had before starting out. By February 2023, she had completed the full 12-month programme. From July 2024 to March 2026, she facilitated pro bono workshops to 479 struggling entrepreneurs and aspirants — in partnership with SEDFA, COPT TRUST, YOUTH LIFE, Innovation Hub-EkasiLabs, Gauteng Enterprise Propeller, United Way South Africa, and more.
"Together we can unlock ourselves out of endless entrepreneurial mazes into building sustainable generational wealth."
— Ntsako Lulama MaganoUpload Photo
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Click to choose from your deviceTo be an effective global business success and zealous business founders' prime vector of choice.
Provision of a sustainable transformation of hypothetical business education and development into practical, quantifiable, functional and effective profitable success.
We aspire to develop the same programme and learning materials in Braille, and to facilitate in sign language — to promote inclusive economic transformation for people living with disabilities.
Whether you're ready to enrol, exploring your options, or looking to partner with us — reach out and our team will get back to you promptly.
Monday – Friday · 08:30 – 15:30
Weekends by arrangement
Pro bono community sessions available