Nairobi, Sept. 8 -- Richard Kimenyi tried retirement. Then he tried consultancy. Neither felt suitable for him. And so, nine years ago, he stepped out of retirement. At 77, Kimenyi has no plans to leave the stage.

The stage, in his case, is the hotel business, where he has spent more than five decades and still prefers the demands of day-to-day management to sitting in a boardroom. He likens hoteliers to rock stars: "Good hoteliers are like rock stars," he says.

Today, he is the country manager for Hemingways Collection in Rwanda, overseeing the Hemingways Retreat Kigali - a boutique hotel - among other businesses.

"When I retired from Fairmont [in 2015], I wanted to do consulting," he says. "But for me, consulting is to get involved a...