Ahmed El Alfi, chairman of Sawari Ventures and the Greek Campus, and co-founder Flat6Labs: My Morning Routine looks each week at how a successful member of the community starts their day — and then throws in a couple of random business questions just for fun. Speaking to us this week is Ahmed El Alfi, chairman of Sawari Ventures and the Greek Campus, and co-founder Flat6Labs

My name is Ahmed El Alfi, and I’m the chairman of Sawari Ventures and the Greek Campus, and co-founder Flat6Labs. All three of our companies support entrepreneurs to transform their ideas into successful companies. I spent a significant amount of my life in the US but after seeing the huge potential of the tech startup scene in Egypt to generate homegrown solutions and create impact, I decided I wanted to be part of that and moved here in 2006.

I wake up early, between 5 and 6 am, check for messages from my kids who live abroad, read the news and wait for Enterprise to hit my inbox. I then head to the Gezira Club with my wife Manal to walk or play golf for an hour or two. We have breakfast together and then I drop her off and arrive at Sawari between 9:30 and 10 am. A couple of afternoons a week I go to the Greek Campus, a hub for startups in downtown Cairo. There are around 140 companies based there and we will be opening in several new locations across Egypt this year.

The highlights of my day are the conversations I have with people I work with, who challenge me daily to look at things from a different perspective, and seeing the cool new ideas entrepreneurs are coming up with. The worst part of my day is having to work on problems that many of the startups face and bureaucratic hassles that all of us face in Egypt.

One of my recent favorite TV shows is Inside Bill’s Brain, the three-part Netflix series on Bill Gates. In my opinion, he is the most impressive person of my generation. I particularly admire how he actively chose each one of the steps to transition from being a techie to the leader of a great company and the richest man in the world to focusing solely on solving some of the most pressing problems facing humanity and leaving the world a better place. This is something that I am constantly thinking of: How I can use the resources I have to improve the world around me. One of my attempts was to start Nafham, an online educational platform that gives free video tutorials covering the Egyptian, Saudi and Syrian public school curriculums.

One of the best books I’ve read recently is The 40 Rules of Love by Elif Shafak. It's a book about Jalal El Din El Rumi and Shams El Din El Tabrizi and it follows Rumi's journey from a rigorous scholar to a spiritual Sufi. I don't think I can recommend a book more. It touches on this notion that all of us have a chance to evolve and improve as human beings.

Sawari Ventures is a EGP 1 bn venture capital fund focused on Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco. We invest in companies that have a team, a product, and customers that need capital to grow. Venture capital is the prime source of funding for high-growth companies because debt doesn't work for them. They’re growing so fast that they can’t afford to take on the risks of borrowing money. Our company allows them to take risks.

Flat6Labs comes in at an earlier stage than Sawari. It takes entrepreneurs and helps them launch their plan through funding, training and mentorship. Flat6Labs has a sub-division called StartEgypt, which provides general entrepreneurship training to people across Egypt who are finding creative solutions to social problems.

We don't just give money to people. We like to think of our investments as long-term relationships that include the financial support and guidance necessary for creativity to flourish and risks to be taken. People often think that VCs go in, take over companies and run them, but it is more akin to a marriage where we work alongside companies as a form of support.

Technology is certainly the biggest force for change in the industry. I think 2020 is going to be a breakout year for tech in Egypt and you’ll see some amazing products and services that will compete at the global level. Fintech in particular is a promising avenue for young entrepreneurs due to the level of government support and its ability to reach a broad audience. I think fintech should be thought of as infrastructure — like a fiber optic cable or a highway — because all three of these things increase the ease of doing business.

My generation has left a lot of problems for today’s generation, but I’m confident in the resilience and creativity of young people to solve many of these. Our role in supporting them should be to empower them to do this and forge new economic paths, rather than steering them toward a predetermined 'stable career path'. We must encourage and empower this new generation to take risks.

The best business advice I received came from my father who taught me that leadership is a privilege and that you have to be worthy of the people you lead. An additional piece of advice that I often give people is that optimism is a choice that one makes every morning.