Anyone who’s ever worked in the entertainment or creative industries will tell you first and foremost that the uncertainties can be crippling. Fortunes can change and pay cheques can stop abruptly.

And in the new digital world that is increasingly moving towards online content streaming, the uncertainty has, if anything, increased.

To make the sector sustainable, and to give those working in it more clarity and security, we need more creatives to also have a grasp of the principles of business and finance. We need to be trained in the art of leadership as well as the art of entertainment.

Unfortunately, as creatives, we tend to be dismissed as having no head for business. And this is partly true. It’s a shortcoming I’ve had to confront in my own career. But it’s not like being a creative person means you can never be business-minded – in fact the two have more in common than you might think. It was my role as a brattish young advertising executive that first inspired me to think of myself as a businessman and I’ve subsequently discovered that business done well is also a creative process.

What’s more, marrying the two skillsets can make for a powerful combination that has the potential to create social cohesion and build the economy.

As creatives, we know what it is to face rejection and failure and pick ourselves up again and again. I was lucky enough to get a role on Generations, the hugely successful SABC1 soapie that drew in some 7-million viewers a night. . I had the job for three years, until its controversial ending in 2014 with the firing of 16 cast members. 

In business, this same determination to succeed is required. For example, when I started my first business communications company, Gateway Media, in 2013 it dawned on me that I lacked some essential business skills. I realised I didn’t know how to manage a business or even finance one. All I knew was how to sell.

But there is always a remedy for things if you are prepared to work through them. I took myself back to school – most recently to Henley Business School Africa where I graduated with a postgraduate diploma in management practice in 2020, but I am sure it’s not the end of my learning journey.

One of my favourite sayings is by Alvin Toffler: “The illiterate of the future are not those who cannot read or write but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.”

In life, every day is a day of learning and an opportunity to seek that which we do not know. But we live in a system that says we need to conform, so that often stops people from being creative, from trying something new. Not so for those in the creative sector where we naturally think outside the box.

Right now in our economy, we are starving for innovation and for new ways of doing things. If we can empower a new generation of creative entrepreneurs to step up, we can potentially unlock new solutions and ways of doing things that can help build the economy.

Creative entrepreneurs also have a key role to play in building social cohesion and inspiring hope. T Great art – be that a play, a TV show, a painting or a photo – can move us to tears and can motivate us to be our best selves. In today’s times when there are so many problems in the world and in our country, this ability may be more important than even before.

This is powerful stuff.

Young creatives have the skillset and the mindset that can help us to reimagine and rebuild SA, but what they lack is access to education and skills, particularly business skills, needed to build successful enterprises. Let’s find a way to bridge that gap. If we can help match young creatives with the business skills they need, we can create a powerful force for change in this country.

• Molamu is an actor and founder of Leaders in Motion Academy (LIMA), a digital creative skills academy and production hub in Eersterus in Tshwane and Alexandra