When you first enter the Good Glass shop nestled on Bukoto Street in Kampala, you are greeted by the sound of glass windchimes. Trendy cubed shelving is filled with shining displays of glasses, candle holders, cheese plates, and various household decor. It’s hard to believe that the products in the store were once discarded bottles collected in a restaurant garbage bin — or half-buried in the dirt.
Good Glass is a social enterprise owned and managed by Angela Inglish and a team of eight Ugandan staff. The company strives to improve environmental awareness and provide employment opportunities, all the while designing and producing unique glass products made from recycled bottles.
“The original idea came from an American-Japanese woman named Yuka. She had this idea to make the drinking glasses from old bottles. . . She moved, but she gave the idea to me,” Inglish explained.
A winding career path had led Inglish to Uganda, and to the moment when she would receive Yuka’s idea and run with it. From working at a charity hospital to working for a microfinance organization, Inglish had become increasingly disillusioned on her quest for sustainable development programs.
“The charity hospital was really good work, but it’s not sustainable. Most of the doctors were expats, and the funds were coming in from elsewhere . . . When I was in microfinance I thought it was the way forward for Africa, but it wasn’t,” Inglish said.
“In America, ten percent of people are entrepreneurs. The microfinance model expects 100 percent of the population to be entrepreneurs. It’s not fair to expect that of people just because you’re giving them a loan, and it doesn’t make for a balanced society. People need to be employees.
Yuka’s idea to design products made from recycled glass bottles also appealed to one of Inglish’s earlier pursuits and passions of becoming an interior designer. That career path was “too shallow,” she believed. Jokingly, Inglish “didn’t want to stay in America and help people replace perfectly good couches.”
The idea of designing glass products and creating a new company tapped into Inglish’s artistic creativity, her desire to create employment opportunities, and her drive to take on new challenges. Yuka handed Good Glass over to Inglish in January 2012.
At first, Good Glass was focused on supplying products for other stores. However, Inglish quickly discovered the difficulties of being a producer in Kampala.
“I never thought I would open a shop because the rent in Kampala is so crazy…What we were working towards was being in as many venues as we could, but that’s also a nightmare because no one buys your stuff,” she said.
“They sell it on commission, so they’re not invested in your product. That’s really a problem in Kampala, I think, and a barrier for small companies that want to sell in other people’s shops As a producer, it’s really difficult.”
While Good Glass products are still found in various stores around the city, in September 2013 Inglish opened her own shop.
“The shop has increased our sales more than double of what we were doing before. There’s challenges to owning a shop, but it’s so much easier,” Inglish stated.
While Inglish has faced the external challenges of dealing with other stores and negotiating rent with landlords, she has also faced the internal challenges of managing a staff of eight people. Her ability to cross cultural barriers and tap into local employees’ potential is a notable accomplishment. When asked, many foreign business owners in Kampala cite cultural differences between themselves and the staff they oversee as a major challenge, lamenting the Ugandan emphasis on hierarchy and rote memorization. Inglish, however, sees Ugandan culture as an asset.
“Yes, I’d agree with other managers that there is a strong focus on rote memorization in the education system … But I think in Uganda people find solutions, and it’s amazing. The attitude here, you see it everywhere, is: ‘You think we can’t pack 50,000 pineapples into a truck? Well watch — we will. It’s going to happen,'” Inglish said.
When asked how she works so well with her local staff, when so many other foreigners have failed in that area, Inglish revealed key practices she implements to maintain positive staff morale. First, she encourages her staff members to experiment with their own ideas.
“I design the products, but our employees will also find something and try something out and then they make something amazing,” Inglish explained.
According to Inglish, in order to have staff experiment and come up with solutions you must expect them to produce solutions.
“Just being able to say things like, ‘Here’s a problem that we have, or something a customer wants, or something I think we should make but I don’t know how’ . . . If you jump in to propose solutions, or suggest that it can’t be solved, you’ve given them an out. But if they know that you as their boss don’t have a solution but expect them to come up with one, they will. Sometimes nothing comes, but most of the time there are solutions being offered,” Inglish said.
The problems Inglish puts before her staff range from minor issues to major concerns that affect the direction of the company. Inglish makes a point of keeping her staff aware of the “big picture” of Good Glass and its future vision. She makes employees aware of successful months as well as times when resources are going to be limited.
In order to allow staff to feel invested and to create an environment where they can experiment with their own ideas, Inglish is careful not to micromanage.
“I think it’s about giving people the chance to show that they can do it, and letting them know that you believe that they can do it, not questioning them or doublechecking everything. I’m not a micromanager . . . All of my staff have a great capacity for leading,” Inglish stated confidently.
Finally, Inglish recognizes the value of building strong relationships with her staff members. While personal connections help create positive work environments anywhere in the world, it is particularly valuable in a culture that is very relational.
“You have to treat people well; they have to feel that you’re invested in them. You celebrate their baby’s birth, or when their wife is sick you care, then they’re also interested in your life. Good Glass is a family,” Inglish explained.
Good Glass is moving forward from a business standpoint and in terms of social outreach. The company is preparing to set up an online store in the United States and is currently looking for partnerships in Europe and North America. As a social enterprise, Good Glass hopes to create more job opportunities, expand its current internship program for disadvantaged youth, and increase awareness about recycling through outreach to Ugandan schools.
While Inglish dreams of Good Glass moving forward, she confesses to having mixed emotions.
“While I want to grow and expand, another part of me really loves where we are right now. It’s like a family.”
This family atmosphere is what sets Good Glass apart. As the world becomes increasingly connected, the challenges of cross-cultural staff management is of growing importance. In the world of social enterprises, a world that tries to provide employment to the people that need it most, cross-cultural relationships can be difficult to navigate. Good Glass stands as an example of a business that succeeds in this area, and the principles Inglish applies can be adopted by companies of any size.
“I think that it’s all about how you treat people,” Inglish summarized. “You can’t treat them like they’re dumb or that you don’t trust them. I’m not in the workshop going around counting glasses every day. I trust them completely. We’re all in this together.”