Salah Abo El-Magd in 10 Seconds

It’s 2005. I’m that ambitious yet confused, eager yet distracted fresh graduate from a small town in Egypt called Al-Mansoura. I had just graduated with a bachelor’s degree in law, and my path to get there wasn’t easy or paved. I loved studying law, but I wasn't too fond of the way it was taught. I struggled a lot with it. The traditional teaching methodologies just didn’t suit the way my mind works. Later on, I discovered I wasn’t alone. Many students felt the same and didn’t know what to do.

Like many fresh graduates, my first step was to apply for jobs. My first dream was to become a pilot. I got a hard no because, funny enough, at 193 cm, I didn’t fit into any plane. “Okay, one dream down, 99 to go,” I told myself as I moved on to the next one.

My parents, Nadia and Magdy, talked sense into me, urging me to take the normal route and apply to law corporations as a full-timer. I listened but added my own tweaks to the plan.

Yes, I stepped into the corporate world, but not as a lawyer. Back then, I believed I had one skill that could turn me into a billionaire, but I didn’t know what that skill was. I joined multinational companies in different roles until I figured it out: it was sales.

Within just two years, I went from junior to leading a team of over 1,000 members, generating a staggering sales ROI of more than 20 million Egyptian Pounds. It was unbelievable! I continued working in sales, but despite my success, I felt unfulfilled.

Corporate life didn’t feel like me. My dreams were wilder and bigger.

While my corporate career was going well, I was still bothered by the teaching methodologies I had experienced in college, so I decided to help struggling students who reminded me of my younger self. Alongside my corporate career, I started teaching law students how to become A-1 students on their own terms.

I taught my first group, and the results were beyond amazing! Students finally found someone who understood their struggles and could help them approach their studies in a way that worked for them.

The requests started pouring in, and more students kept coming

My law teaching center didn't distract the entrepreneur inside me! My mind couldn't stop thinking about ways to combine my experience and knowledge in law, sales, and teaching. The urge to launch my next business was stronger than ever. SSo, I founded the Advanced Consultation and Training Academy (ACTA), focusing on English teaching and soft skills for successful careers. Since then, I haven’t stopped founding businesses and applying my sales skills to every one of them.

It’s 2019. I was barely surviving. I was in complete darkness. Things reached a point where they became much worse than I could ever have imagined.

Corona hit the world. Depression hit me.

Sometimes, depression and the pandemic got the best of me, and I disappeared for weeks. Other times, I fought back, going digital to teach my students for free through my YouTube channel. Back then, lockdowns were happening all over the world, and Al-Mansoura was no exception. At some point, the feedback from my online students was the only thing keeping me going.

By now, I had two master’s degrees, one thriving business, another that had ended for good, my experience in sales, my legacy in teaching, and my depression and broken self.

My therapist and close circle advised me to leave my small town and head to the land of opportunity, Cairo. It was time to become a sales trainer in Cairo while continuing to teach law in Al-Mansoura. And because I’ve always embraced parallel lives, I also became a keynote speaker at colleges across Egypt, building youth success mindsets.

By day, I was hustling, and by night, I was a depression patient who didn’t know if he’d make it to the next day.

It’s 2021 now. My word-of-mouth reputation as a corporate sales trainer started spreading, first beyond Cairo, then beyond Egypt. I went international! We received a request for a major event in Sudan, one of the countries closest to my heart.

And then came the hardest question ever: Was it time to let go of one of my parallel lives, the law instructor one? It was the start of a new semester, and I needed to decide. Would I go back to my hometown, or would I start my first tour in the Middle East? It was a decision that broke my heart, but it also taught me the power of letting go and how to see opportunity in the unknown.

However, I never completely let go of my teaching career. Instead, I blended my most successful teaching methodologies with my most effective training techniques and created my SA signature sales training methodology.

Moving forward to 2025. Finally, I feel all of my parallel lives are coming together. They’re making sense now—Salah the salesperson, the teacher, the trainer, the advisor, the entrepreneur, the public speaker. I can finally bring it all together to define my new identity: the most in-demand sales consultant in the Middle East.