Latest / King Dems Podcast | Growth Mindset, Leadership, AI and Business Insights / Ep. 9 with Vincent Adeoba

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Ep. 9 with Vincent Adeoba · King Dems Podcast | Growth Mindset, Leadership, AI and Business Insights

• 0:01
  Welcome to the Kingdom's podcast, sharing the stories of
• 0:05
  ordinary people doing extraordinary things.
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  This is a lifetime lesson, so start now.
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  Wonder if people you once again welcome to the King James
• 2:14
  Podcast and today I have with me a very special guest.
• 2:18
  He is somebody who goes way back to the days in great affair.
• 2:24
  He is an entrepreneur, A consummate professional and he's
• 2:29
  a businessman. They're welcome.
• 2:32
  Mr Vincent at the other. How are you, Vincent?
• 2:36
  Thank you great and super excited to join you on this
• 2:41
  podcast. Thank you for the right time.
• 2:44
  I'm really proud of the amazing work they are doing through this
• 2:46
  podcast. Well, thank you very much.
• 2:48
  I'm proud of you. You still live out of my leaves,
• 2:51
  right? You took it first.
• 2:53
  But there definitely I'm proud of you.
• 2:55
  That is why I have your body. So getting down to meeting to
• 3:00
  you right, First question of our lives is like how would you
• 3:04
  describe yourself in a nutshell? How we describe myself as an
• 3:09
  impatient, optimists right and always excited about the future
• 3:15
  right? And I try to live every day of
• 3:18
  my life based on the goals, the dreams and what my visions are
• 3:24
  for the future, right? And I tried to see the positive
• 3:28
  side of every event and every activity, right, Which is why I
• 3:33
  referred myself to an impatient optimist.
• 3:35
  Even in a situation where a thin probably didn't go up, didn't
• 3:40
  play out as planned, right, I still tried to see the positive
• 3:42
  side, and I focus on the positive side.
• 3:45
  And they've always been my energy, they've always been my
• 3:48
  motivation and my sensitive for working towards a better future.
• 3:53
  Fantastic. Now you being yourself, right?
• 3:57
  And for everybody, like whatever they become or whatever their
• 4:04
  personality has shipped out to be, is usually greatly inspired
• 4:09
  by that childhood. And that leads me to the next
• 4:13
  question. Like, how was childhood and
• 4:15
  growing up like for you as a person?
• 4:18
  Yeah, it was. It was really tough for me,
• 4:21
  right? Maybe my growing up is is the
• 4:26
  worst furniture I can ask for, right?
• 4:29
  Because I lost my mum, I think before I was 4, right?
• 4:36
  I never had the opportunity to meet my dad, right?
• 4:40
  I've never seen his future. I don't know what he looks like.
• 4:43
  And I remember when my mom passed on, my grandma, you know,
• 4:49
  was all the light. So she literally became my
• 4:52
  mother, right? And because she loved my mum so
• 4:56
  much, she couldn't just manage that time, you know, the pains
• 5:00
  of losing a child that was so dear to her.
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  So I think less than a year after my mum passed on, my
• 5:07
  grandmother passed, Alright. So just imagine, Imagine, I was
• 5:11
  fine. I've lost my dad.
• 5:13
  I was, yeah, I've lost my grandma.
• 5:16
  And it was really tough. It was really tough due to those
• 5:21
  losses. Subsequent events, of course,
• 5:24
  were impacted by, you know, those losses.
• 5:27
  And you know, it really shaped me to be who I am, right?
• 5:31
  Because it was a little, it was little and like I said, probably
• 5:36
  the worst start any I can ever have forgot again.
• 5:40
  I'm grateful that despite those challenges, despite losing those
• 5:45
  people that were important to me, right?
• 5:47
  Yeah, I am today. I'm still able to share my story
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  and I appreciate every opportunity to share this story
• 5:53
  to inspire other people outside there.
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  Just to let everyone know that the father I don't have the best
• 5:59
  upbringing or the fact that maybe the life you had when you
• 6:03
  were young wasn't the what the best you could ask for.
• 6:07
  It's never an excuse, right? You can always move something
• 6:11
  amazing out of any events in your life that happened that you
• 6:16
  never expected. So you know, just to cut the
• 6:20
  response doesn't make it very brief.
• 6:21
  Losing those people really cheap me at the side and even right
• 6:25
  now it is still shaping my life. Interesting, they say.
• 6:30
  What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger, I think.
• 6:35
  I think you're an ambassador of that statement because yeah, you
• 6:41
  for one or once you know, stronger individual and you've
• 6:44
  actually influenced a lot of people and we would be able to
• 6:48
  get get get to that, you know, over time in the course of this
• 6:52
  forecast, right. But then, like, what would you
• 6:55
  say were your early life influences and your early life
• 6:58
  mentors? I I think the first thing I
• 7:02
  would like to mention is my sister, Sister Morenika.
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  So after my mom, my dad and my grandma, you know, passed on, I
• 7:13
  think she was just a teenager. She was around 1819 at that
• 7:19
  time, and I'm talking about 199419951996, right?
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  This was a teenager that she should have been in school,
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  right? Of course, if her parents were
• 7:31
  to be alive, probably she would still be with her parents,
• 7:33
  right? But because we lost our parents,
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  she literally became my mother, right?
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  And when my mom passed on, I had a little sibling, our last born.
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  I think she was a year old around that time.
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  So since I'm running ahead of 19, became my mother and she
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  also became the mother to my little sister.
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  And I remember some of the not too good experience she had
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  because an event that she wasn't prepared for just happened to
• 8:05
  her right. Rather than accepting defeats,
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  right? Rather than being negative, she
• 8:13
  tried to look for the positive side of that event.
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  And because she needed to provide us with source of
• 8:19
  livelihood, she needed to be able to provide for everything
• 8:21
  we needed. She dropped out of school and
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  she started trading, right. And I remember then she will
• 8:27
  wake up as early as possible. Actually we hawk beans, right.
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  She was okay beans. Then there this very tiny local
• 8:35
  bins. During those periods you will
• 8:36
  live as they are possible and run them see there and she will
• 8:39
  be back at around 12 for the first tranche of the of the
• 8:43
  hockey will help you rest for a couple of hours and should be
• 8:47
  back on the road, right. So I was so mad that I learned
• 8:51
  the value of hard work, that I learned the value of of
• 8:54
  dedication. And so seeing him making those
• 8:58
  sacrifices at that period of her life, a girl 19 years old really
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  shaped my life. And she became my first role
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  model writer because I I saw how she was dedicated to giving us
• 9:12
  and the best life that she could afford, even though she was
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  poor, right? She she had no education.
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  She had to you know do miniature just to be able to provide for
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  us all through that. She was very strong.
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  Just imagine a lady of 19 years old in our generation being a
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  mother to a boy of five years old and a little girl over one
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  years old, right. And from her, from that event, I
• 9:38
  I saw a courage, right. And she's been the the biggest
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  expressing my life and also my uncle Mr Aniello, who also
• 9:50
  picked me up at some point, I did of 13 and you know I had
• 9:55
  opportunity to live with them for over a decade, right.
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  And also from him, I learnt a lot, right.
• 10:00
  He put in one of the best schools, you know, he was, he
• 10:03
  was a mentor, he was a role model.
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  So looking at those two people, they are the two biggest
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  influences in my life. My sister at the early stage and
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  my uncle becoming a teenager. Yeah, to the university.
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  So those two people, they will forever remain my role model and
• 10:22
  I'm internally grateful to them because without their help
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  efforts, without their support, without those sacrifices they
• 10:29
  made, right? And there's no way I would have
• 10:30
  been. I am today.
• 10:33
  I think it's it's a second, you know, themes actually shining
• 10:36
  through from your life story, right?
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  I for one, if you've listened to previous episodes of this
• 10:44
  podcast, I always say that I am very big on gratitude, right?
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  I strongly believe that an attitude of gratitude determines
• 10:53
  the magnitude of your altitude and life and that that is
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  something that I appreciate that you you have you know, presented
• 11:01
  in in the story but you know, looking at your early life
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  mentors, right? And your early life bro models
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  setting universal principles that are tribute able to
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  success, do shine through hard work.
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  Perseverance, determination, pride, resilience.
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  These things are teaching through and these are values
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  that I strongly stand for and I love seeing as a recurring
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  theme, you know, amongst. People who come.
• 11:30
  On board on this podcast, you know because when you see the
• 11:34
  the the theme of the podcast is about sharing the stories of
• 11:37
  ordinary people doing extraordinary things.
• 11:38
  And it doesn't just stop there, right?
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  It's easy with the aim to inspire people you know globally
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  especially the young up and coming from individuals to let
• 11:47
  them know you can actually make it you know really was not
• 11:50
  beating the day you see in the videos like yourself I see see
• 11:52
  your story is really really amazing and inspiring and you
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  know once again thank you very much you for coming about for
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  sharing your time you know and that that that actually leads me
• 12:02
  to is also to to the next question you know about your
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  academic background. Can you talk because I remember
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  my LS memory of you is in OU right.
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  But then how did your academic background, you know, shape up,
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  even looking at the instability that you had in your early
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  childhood? So, like, talk us through your
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  academic background. OK.
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  Thank you. Very, very important question,
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  right? Honestly, when I started out as
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  a child in primary school, I thought I was a dollar.
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  I had to be very, very honest, many events that made me
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  probably heard that I believe about myself.
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  And there was one particular one that I will never forget, right.
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  I think at the age of seven, at the age of eight I think I was
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  in primary three, primary four as Saint Joseph RCM Okaro in our
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  correct of course you know public school back there most of
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  the focus will always mathematics and English right.
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  And English first time is always dictation right.
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  So, and you know my dictation, I always have to zero, I mean 0 /
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  10, right? It was consistent what the
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  particular day our teacher thought was mathematics and we
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  did numerous. So those numbers, those words
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  were on the board, right? And it happened to be one of
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  them #8. So during dictations, those
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  mathematics number were still on the board and my teacher called
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  different ward right? I couldn't spell any of them,
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  but luckily for me, she called AIDS.
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  So it's and there was 8 on the board, I mean now, right.
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  And I was happy that all today. So I courageously wrote that
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  hate in my book. The other one I didn't.
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  I didn't make any effort to ever attempt to them.
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  I was gonna be satisfied with my with my 1 / 10, right?
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  So when she started marking and what we usually do then if you
• 14:17
  want to mark, you have to exchange with your seat partner,
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  right? You know the way we exchange our
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  exercise, but. I remember those days.
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  In my notes with my sister so it didn't bother to focus on
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  because he he knew that I always cause I always called her over
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  10 so when we got to that number to the number where they asked
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  us to spare hits my teacher house hey what among Euro the
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  hit on on the board right. And I was the first person to
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  put on my hand. I thought she wanted to praise
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  us and probably say, hey, you guys were smart.
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  Right. And she just said, of course she
• 14:54
  said it in Yoruba that two of you that I wrote the date on the
• 14:57
  board, you had dollars, right? And I was surprised that What do
• 15:03
  you mean? You asked us to spare it, that's
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  what. And she's like, no, it's that I
• 15:11
  ask you to spell is a verb HETE. They ask you to spell EI GHT,
• 15:17
  right. And you could probably guess
• 15:19
  what has scored at the again, right.
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  And for the first time, I think that was the first time
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  everybody in the class got to me because after my teachers
• 15:27
  discovered that I wrote it on the board, she was like, bring
• 15:29
  your notes, right. And she, when she saw my notes
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  she saw that have been consistently scoring there over
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  10. But because I didn't want her to
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  know I wasn't doing my correction.
• 15:39
  You know, after how the dictation mathematics has
• 15:41
  supposed to do your correction and you support, you submit your
• 15:44
  note to your teacher. They will look through the
• 15:45
  correction to be sure that you done the right thing and they
• 15:48
  will market right. So she saw that Raul Medina
• 15:51
  correction because I didn't want her to know that was scoring 0 /
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  10 right? And that day she she just put my
• 15:56
  note up for the entire class of say, hey visitor discourage 0
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  consistently. And you could imagine the
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  response from everybody in the class, right?
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  So. That is embarrassing.
• 16:08
  Yeah, yeah, so it was not really a good experience for me, right?
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  But again, I didn't give up, right?
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  I I told myself if people could be scoring 10 / 10 / 10 right at
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  high equals, you know, do it. And I started dedicating more
• 16:24
  time to read right on. It improved my academic
• 16:28
  performance, right? By the time I graduated from
• 16:33
  Federal Government College of Gulu in 2009, I was one of the
• 16:36
  best students, right? I wrote my jam again admission
• 16:40
  to Aberfan Malawi University, where I studied management and
• 16:42
  accounting. And I would say the only reason
• 16:45
  why I didn't make first class when I was in the university was
• 16:49
  because I combined so many extracurricular activities with
• 16:53
  my academic right. I know you already sold all the
• 16:56
  business that I started on campus.
• 16:59
  Besides that, I was also actively involved in politics, a
• 17:03
  writer. I was the president of Nigeria
• 17:05
  University College Student Association.
• 17:07
  I had an NGO just to manage to manage group that I also managed
• 17:13
  when I was on campus. We were going from school to
• 17:15
  schools and to share our story and to inspire those young kids
• 17:18
  in those public schools and just to let them know that there's
• 17:23
  nothing they can now achieve regardless of what they were
• 17:25
  going to write. So combining those so many
• 17:29
  extracurricular activities with other programme or the only
• 17:32
  reason why I couldn't graduate with first class because in my
• 17:36
  second semester in the university I had a 5.0 which is
• 17:40
  the highest CP you can have in a single semester.
• 17:43
  I wish me I had a in all my courses rather than I was really
• 17:47
  excited about it. But again I was like I don't
• 17:50
  want to focus just on academic guy, I want to balance lifestyle
• 17:54
  some possible. Because of that I also you know
• 17:56
  dedicated some of my time to all that struck regular activities
• 17:59
  and today looking back, I have no regrets, right?
• 18:03
  You know I I graduated with many skills that probably if our
• 18:08
  focus on my academic alone, I wouldn't have been able to
• 18:10
  develop those skills. Like life skills are actually
• 18:15
  very very important, right? That usually this balance
• 18:19
  between you know academics and. Being.
• 18:23
  Practical and I think that's the reason why a lot of it could be.
• 18:29
  The schools basically lately have been focusing more on
• 18:32
  practical business skills instead of, you know, having a
• 18:37
  lot of academic knowledge being handed out to people, especially
• 18:41
  people that are doing the the masses in business
• 18:44
  administration. This podcast is sponsored by the
• 18:47
  Urban Business School and they have ensured to bring in Jesus
• 18:51
  leaders you know from various top organisations, especially
• 18:56
  startups that became unicorns. The lack of the fathers of
• 19:01
  YouTube, founders of ways founder of Wikipedia right their
• 19:05
  their their teachers on this programme right And then I for
• 19:09
  one I'm a student of the programmer and I've seen how
• 19:14
  beneficiary tease to have practical skills as against you
• 19:19
  know just the academic of focus it helps you to be able to go
• 19:24
  into the. World and you know.
• 19:25
  Produce results unlike just, you know, loading yourself with a
• 19:29
  lot of, you know, academic knowledge.
• 19:32
  So I remember either LED you've always been entrepreneurial,
• 19:36
  right? And that actually led to me
• 19:39
  creating this, this next question right.
• 19:41
  Like what actually inspired you early venturing into
• 19:44
  entrepreneurship and you know, talk us through your early
• 19:47
  entrepreneurship and endeavours. Yeah.
• 19:51
  Thank you. So my my first exposure to
• 19:54
  business I think was at the age of seven or at the age of 8,
• 19:57
  right? I had a short stay with one of
• 20:02
  my. Aunties, right?
• 20:06
  And I had to hawk right then I this popular break before the
• 20:11
  garlic bread in isola inaccurate.
• 20:15
  So that was the first item that I hooked, right?
• 20:19
  And from there I hope other consumables right.
• 20:23
  And at the point system. Rennick also stopped talking
• 20:27
  upper beans and she moved to a popular market in Ukraine.
• 20:32
  They call it Obada Markets. Ajoba operate on about digital
• 20:37
  Rd. So I joined in that market I
• 20:40
  think at the age of nine and I started Hawking vegetables,
• 20:46
  right? Like I hope or crawl all paper,
• 20:49
  I hope to not. I have tomatoes and other items,
• 20:52
  right? And I remember back then I used
• 20:55
  to tell her just buy my own item for me, let me walk and make
• 21:00
  profit. I don't want to work for you,
• 21:01
  right? So.
• 21:02
  I won't be this matter. The key, right.
• 21:09
  And I think I did that for like for like 5 years.
• 21:12
  It was really a great experience for me, right.
• 21:15
  So that was my first exposure to business.
• 21:17
  I started learning how to write from there, how to manage
• 21:20
  people, you know, how to manage your business income, how to
• 21:24
  manage and losses, you know, down to expenses, how to I
• 21:28
  develop my negotiation skills from there as well.
• 21:30
  Because then of course, people will always want to negotiate,
• 21:33
  right? And your negotiations, you need
• 21:35
  to be top notch if you are going to be able to convince people
• 21:38
  you know to to buy at the quoted price, right.
• 21:41
  So that was my early exposure to business and from there I was
• 21:46
  able to consolidate on that, right.
• 21:47
  So right from the. Start interrupt you.
• 21:50
  Sorry to interrupt you, right. I I just remember the fact that
• 21:53
  you are a chartered accountant. I am a chartered accountant as
• 21:56
  well and we we we know that in accounting we have the five
• 22:01
  elements of the financial statements, right, the five
• 22:04
  components of the financial statement not now let's talk
• 22:06
  about the components of the financial statements, talking
• 22:09
  about assets, you know liabilities, equity, income,
• 22:13
  expenses. You mentioned you touched on
• 22:15
  some of these things, right? And you being on the streets,
• 22:21
  right, you you, you did that to use that, you know, St wisdom
• 22:26
  and you apply your street credibility, right?
• 22:28
  The street wisdom was you doing these things that we do in
• 22:33
  accounting and your street credibility basically was you
• 22:37
  doing branding and marketing, but you did not realise that.
• 22:41
  What would you say that study management and accounting helped
• 22:44
  you to refine those, those skill sets that you had actually
• 22:48
  picked up, you know, on the street?
• 22:50
  Absolutely, absolutely. I think you know that what I
• 22:53
  would say because like you mentioned as a child I didn't
• 22:57
  know anything about accounting, I didn't know anything about
• 23:00
  Massad. You know there's, you know
• 23:05
  others are items, right. But I was just doing business
• 23:09
  right and I was just trying to learn as much as I could on the
• 23:12
  street, right. And if you've ever had
• 23:15
  opportunity to trade in the market, in an open market, like
• 23:18
  a job in a correct, right. You need to be very, very smart,
• 23:22
  right. You you need to be smart.
• 23:25
  Ignore exactly. Very happy when I started
• 23:32
  studying management and accounting at the Buffalo
• 23:35
  University, right. And it was one of the reasons
• 23:37
  why I started the business that I also managed when I was on
• 23:43
  campus, right. And I know you read a lot of
• 23:45
  story about how I grew their business from selling consumable
• 23:50
  to using that I made a lot of money from, right.
• 23:53
  So yeah, you know that those those experiences in the market
• 23:57
  was very, very vital and when I studied accounting and like wow,
• 24:01
  what better way to consolidate and all those military.
• 24:05
  All the residents US is right, but then I've got interrupt you
• 24:09
  again, I'm so sorry about that, right.
• 24:11
  So in account speaking about accounting, right, you know we
• 24:15
  have liquidity and we have solvency, we even have liquidity
• 24:20
  ratios and solvency ratios. So for the sake of those people
• 24:23
  who are laymen that are listening to this podcast,
• 24:26
  right, liquidity is the ability of, you know, a person or an
• 24:30
  organisation, right, an entity basically to meet up with their
• 24:33
  financial obligations in the short run.
• 24:35
  And solvency is the ability to meet up your obligations right
• 24:40
  in the long run. So you've been on the streets,
• 24:43
  how did you, how were you able to balance, you know, achieving
• 24:47
  strong liquidity and still achieving solvency?
• 24:51
  Because you know, you could be liquid, but you may not be
• 24:53
  solvent and you may be solvent and not the liquid.
• 24:57
  So how did you manage your assets on the streets to achieve
• 25:02
  a balance between, you know, both?
• 25:04
  Both. So you remember, right.
• 25:06
  You know I mentioned that I wouldn't do that on my own,
• 25:09
  right. Of course my sister Monica was
• 25:11
  also in that market, right. So I think a leverage on our
• 25:15
  experience and knowledge to do everything that I did back then.
• 25:20
  I just. I just wanted to be independent.
• 25:23
  Can you just buy my own vegetable for me?
• 25:26
  Let me manage everything myself. Let me sell.
• 25:29
  If I make any profit, I'm gonna keep that profit and I'm gonna
• 25:32
  pay you back any amount to spend as capital, you know, to buy the
• 25:38
  vegetables. I want us to share the profit.
• 25:41
  I also thought I was going to. I was going to be more than
• 25:44
  happy to share profit. Distribution.
• 25:48
  Alright, so to be honest at this point in time I had no knowledge
• 25:51
  of anything like you know there are liquidity ratio, sovereignty
• 25:55
  ratio, you know all the stuff I was doing the basic things right
• 25:58
  until I got into accounting, you know then I was able to put
• 26:02
  everything that I did back then into context of the of
• 26:07
  accounting, right. So you know, actually did it
• 26:09
  actually did this management card I would have to manage
• 26:12
  receivables and you know, you know those days were very, very
• 26:18
  useful and it actually helped me in my country.
• 26:20
  But just to answer your question, I didn't really manage
• 26:25
  all those things myself, right, systemic more like mentor and
• 26:30
  role model. She had more experience managing
• 26:33
  those things, right. I I just wanted to be
• 26:35
  independent and I also want to learn from making mistakes and
• 26:38
  just I wanted to know if I was going to be able to manage, you
• 26:41
  know, selling vegetables on my own rather than having to sell
• 26:45
  for her. And I'm just order
• 26:48
  apprenticeship. So yes, I'll I'll just put it
• 26:50
  this way. I was under apprenticeship but
• 26:53
  with some level of independence. Be interested.
• 26:57
  Interested. So Speaking of the your
• 27:00
  entrepreneurship days back in OAU, right?
• 27:03
  And then transitioning into trance to talk about the
• 27:09
  journey. Yeah.
• 27:11
  So like because of my upbringing and those elites stages for your
• 27:16
  business, I I I grew passionate about business.
• 27:21
  I wanted to do business. I always look for business
• 27:24
  opportunities around me. When I started that business in
• 27:27
  my room back then in university air rooms, Block 6, Room 11,
• 27:36
  yes. Yeah, Blocks, it's a Room 11.
• 27:39
  I just started with some little little items like just sachet
• 27:44
  water, granola and sugar, right. And I started it and I started
• 27:50
  seeing a lot of business opportunities there.
• 27:52
  And I told myself it means I can actually scale this business,
• 27:56
  right. And masculinity and I made a lot
• 28:00
  of money from it, right. So when I graduated from the
• 28:03
  university, I had opportunity to also work with PW in Nigeria.
• 28:08
  And while I was working with W in Nigeria also had a side
• 28:12
  hustle. I was buying cars for people to
• 28:15
  drive on Uber ride or rentals. Some people got into rental,
• 28:19
  they pay weekly rentals, some people just on higher purchase,
• 28:22
  right? So I was doing that for along
• 28:25
  with my job with my 95 job right now we all remember in 2021 with
• 28:30
  the whole pandemic. So it affected the the shared
• 28:34
  mobility space badly, right. Our businesses were shut down.
• 28:39
  Of course we all had knowledge of what happened back then,
• 28:42
  right. So at that point in time all the
• 28:45
  car that I had were not able to work on you on Uber, right.
• 28:48
  So I was asking myself what can I do because I had a lot of
• 28:52
  investor that I must be able to meet up with my obligation,
• 28:56
  obligation that they had to them, right.
• 28:58
  So I noticed that the government gives some flexibility to
• 29:02
  shuttle mini buses and which is popularly known as Koroki in
• 29:06
  Lagos State, right So. I.
• 29:08
  Started divesting after all diversity my investment in Uber
• 29:15
  into those short minibus flexibility right and I started
• 29:20
  within I think within a year I was able to buy like I think 10
• 29:23
  to 15 or do some short too many buses.
• 29:26
  I I don't I can't remember the exact number of our buses that I
• 29:29
  bought now but it was between 10 to 15 and the return were
• 29:33
  consistent right. Because in order to get the
• 29:35
  operate more in the informal market or like the Uber that
• 29:40
  both are, they focus more on professional and people that can
• 29:44
  afford them, right? That the driver were delivering
• 29:47
  their weekly rentals. And the issue that the
• 29:50
  investment even have a shorter payback period, right, because
• 29:54
  the initial capital today was around maybe 1.8 million, right?
• 29:58
  And with the weekly rental the drivers were paying, I think I
• 30:02
  was able to recoup my initial capital outlay back within 9 to
• 30:08
  12 months. For the rest.
• 30:11
  The race, it was a, it was a return on investment and you
• 30:15
  know the the numbers were were positive.
• 30:17
  So when I compared to the investment that I had on Uber,
• 30:22
  you know, I bought a saloon cars and those ones were more
• 30:25
  expensive. The payback periods of that
• 30:27
  could be as high as like three years, right.
• 30:30
  And the return on investments worth in that was in that
• 30:34
  competitive, right. But I was just doing that
• 30:36
  because of the passion that I had for anything business.
• 30:40
  And one day I just ask myself why is it that nobody has built
• 30:43
  a mobile app for this short minibuses?
• 30:46
  Why can't I be in my house and request for or reserve receipt
• 30:50
  on the shuttle minibuses at is close to me?
• 30:53
  Something similar to what? Ohh, what about?
• 30:56
  Uber and hold to a dealer. This United informal market,
• 31:01
  right, right. So that was where the idea of
• 31:04
  our transfer, that was where it came from.
• 31:07
  It was not probably like I really had the idea somewhere,
• 31:11
  you know? No, it was not.
• 31:13
  He saw markets got by. He's ready to fill that gap.
• 31:19
  Which of the are what I did right?
• 31:21
  And you know, we started, we bought those bosses, we tried to
• 31:25
  improve the quality of service. We build the mobile.
• 31:27
  App and. You know, running that business,
• 31:30
  you know, it was, it was a good experience.
• 31:33
  For a while. Interested.
• 31:34
  So like, what have been the the highs and lows of Transera, The
• 31:38
  challenges? And of course you know the
• 31:41
  successes as well, because every startup has its highs and lows.
• 31:45
  So what would you say have been those highs and lows for the
• 31:50
  transfer period? OK.
• 31:53
  So for us, of course, we all know that the business
• 31:58
  environment in Nigeria is not that conducive, it's not that
• 32:00
  friendly and governments have a lot of work to do to improve the
• 32:04
  ease of doing business in Nigeria.
• 32:07
  Of course, the market for the Save You is that Lagos is as a
• 32:13
  population of over 20 million people right now.
• 32:16
  Transportation is an essential. People need to move from one
• 32:19
  place to another every day, right.
• 32:21
  And the current number of players we have in that market
• 32:26
  are not able to meet the demand, the daily demand, right.
• 32:29
  And for that guy that we saw that we decided to invest into
• 32:33
  that space. Of course from the learning
• 32:35
  perspective, I would say it was a good experience, right, Bought
• 32:40
  from an operational perspective, it was not really a good
• 32:44
  experience. We had a lot of challenges from
• 32:47
  challenging with the NRW so to last month to task force, you
• 32:55
  know to many of those player in that space, especially people
• 32:59
  who see as regulators, right. They were our biggest headache
• 33:03
  and honestly there was nothing we could do that we didn't do.
• 33:06
  We had a lot of meetings with these stakeholders, even with
• 33:10
  government. I remember back then that we
• 33:11
  even had the opportunity to meet the Commissioner for
• 33:15
  Transportation in Lagos State to share with him some of the
• 33:20
  challenges we're facing, especially with the NRW right
• 33:24
  on. Unfortunately they were.
• 33:26
  He was not able to help, right? And also the other stakeholder
• 33:29
  that we met were not able to help.
• 33:30
  So when we saw the challenges, we tried to assess our risk
• 33:36
  right now. We also tried to assess our
• 33:38
  sustainable, that business was going to be in the long term.
• 33:42
  We saw that it was not, it was not going to be sustainable.
• 33:44
  Except has said the government is ready to play an important
• 33:50
  role in that space. From what I've seen in the last
• 33:55
  couple of years, I don't think the government has the courage
• 33:58
  to do what is experience for them to do in that space, right.
• 34:03
  And we have to leave that markets.
• 34:06
  Of course it was. It was so sad because we've
• 34:08
  invested millions of naira. But when you know you're
• 34:12
  bleeding cash, right and the first is to stop the right, you
• 34:17
  can't. That's why that's professional,
• 34:21
  you know, went to divest, right? You'll also be an accountant and
• 34:26
  also some experience when you come to a risk assessment and
• 34:30
  risk management and just like no, we just have to leave this
• 34:33
  market and thankfully we let the market very early, right,
• 34:37
  because some of our competitors, they left the market very late
• 34:40
  and they lost over $5,000,000 to that to that market right.
• 34:44
  They've invested heavily and ahead of the the same challenges
• 34:47
  we had, but they seemed challenging.
• 34:50
  They also faced faced right and they just have to leave the
• 34:53
  market and I hope probably at the point of time maybe somebody
• 34:56
  in in government is going to come across this podcast.
• 35:00
  I think the government just needs to be more ratif.
• 35:02
  There's lots of opportunity in the transportation space in
• 35:05
  Lagos State, right? Are you across Nigeria?
• 35:07
  Right. And it's the spirit that can
• 35:10
  help to improve the GDP of Lagos states, right?
• 35:13
  The quality of service in that space right now is very poor and
• 35:16
  very sure. You use the yellow buses back
• 35:18
  then when you were in Nigeria and you can never compare, don't
• 35:23
  fool, yeah, downpour, call them down for you can't compare them
• 35:26
  to what we have in London. I can't compare them to what we
• 35:29
  have here in New York, right. So government will do more to
• 35:33
  create an enabling business environment in that
• 35:35
  transportation space so that they will be able to attract
• 35:39
  investment into that space. Transportation is very critical
• 35:42
  for every economy. People need to move around,
• 35:46
  goods need to move around and if you don't create that enabling
• 35:49
  environment, if you create on unnecessary bottleneck.
• 35:52
  Because I see the TW unnecessary bottleneck and I think probably
• 35:56
  because of their our political Ramadan Allah with government.
• 36:01
  Our government has not really taken a very strong position on
• 36:03
  how to reform those guys. And if they're able to reform
• 36:06
  those guys, I'm telling you a lot of investors are going to
• 36:08
  come into the transportation space in Lagos State and they
• 36:11
  are going to improve the current and quality of service.
• 36:13
  You are calling Lagos State the mega city and all those yellow
• 36:17
  buses is what we have on the street.
• 36:18
  Then to me, to be honest, I think you know the idea of you
• 36:25
  calling the ghosted in Mega City.
• 36:27
  I'm based in New York and. I I see the quality of service
• 36:30
  that we have when it comes to public transportation, right?
• 36:33
  And if it can be done in New York, if it can be done in
• 36:36
  France, if it can be done in London, council be done in
• 36:39
  Nigeria, right? But government needs to do more.
• 36:42
  Government needs to do more. Yeah, the the, the role of the
• 36:46
  government is actually to create an enabling environment for
• 36:50
  businesses in which they should thrive.
• 36:53
  So office Speaking of like the government of Nigeria, right?
• 36:56
  Like if you were to give a recommendation as to you being
• 37:00
  an entrepreneur, you being a finance professional, what would
• 37:03
  be the top three teams you would advise the government in Nigeria
• 37:07
  to to put in place? Yeah, in order to create an
• 37:12
  enabling environment for businesses to thrive in the
• 37:16
  country. OK.
• 37:17
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 37:18
  So I I think the first one will be around policy, right?
• 37:22
  I think there's there's need for some strategic policy,
• 37:27
  especially in the transport space, right?
• 37:30
  And this should be policies and reform that we attract
• 37:34
  investors, right? And one of the issues we also
• 37:37
  had while trying to run transfer was Lagos State government
• 37:42
  asking us to process licence on an annual basis, right?
• 37:46
  And because of that, licence runs into millions, right?
• 37:50
  I'm like if young people like us want to contribute to the
• 37:53
  economy, we want to create jobs, right?
• 37:56
  The least you can expect from any government is a form of
• 37:59
  support, right? And we see the way it is done in
• 38:04
  the developed countries, right, where government partners with
• 38:09
  our private investor to create some accelerator programmes and
• 38:12
  this accelerator programme. What did they do?
• 38:14
  They invest in these young people, right.
• 38:18
  The idea is not that somebody is going to start Business Today
• 38:22
  asking them, of course there should be some basic fee they
• 38:25
  need to pay to government, right.
• 38:26
  But you shouldn't ask them to be paying something that is is
• 38:30
  unreasonable, right. So policy reform, right that our
• 38:35
  strategic right, there can be tax holidays for people that are
• 38:39
  happy to invest in the transportation space, right?
• 38:42
  Create incentive for people to come into this space, right and
• 38:45
  invest right. So I think that's the first
• 38:48
  thing if I'm going to do that, I'm going to do.
• 38:53
  And #2 is we also need to need for us to improve
• 38:57
  infrastructure, right? That that was what I might.
• 39:02
  Yeah. Because the the poor
• 39:05
  infrastructure in Nigeria. Crash.
• 39:11
  So on necessary expenses, that can be avoidable, right?
• 39:17
  Let's assume you drive on Lagos Road because the road is bad,
• 39:20
  you have to kind of change your tyre every three months, right?
• 39:24
  That literally reduce your profitability.
• 39:27
  Well, imagine the roads are good, right?
• 39:29
  And you don't need to run into a portal or you know your your
• 39:33
  tyre doesn't probably need to, you know get pointed at every
• 39:38
  other month, right. That's really the cost.
• 39:40
  So government needs to do more on improving the infrastructure,
• 39:45
  especially the road infrastructure.
• 39:47
  There are many places in Lagos that have had opportunity to go
• 39:50
  to that they are not even more terrible and you are calling
• 39:53
  Lagos State a mega city, right. And let us in terms of landmark,
• 39:58
  Lagos is a very small, it's a very small city, right?
• 40:02
  It's a very small. So government needs to be more
• 40:04
  deliberate. Let's invest in infrastructure.
• 40:06
  Understand that all these things cannot be done in one year or
• 40:09
  three years, right? Or there should be a road map.
• 40:12
  There should be a clear vision on what we need to do, where we
• 40:15
  want to get to in the future, right?
• 40:17
  And for every progress that we make, every year there is need
• 40:21
  for us to consolidate. Because what I've been able to
• 40:24
  identify and what I've seen in most occasions, sometimes
• 40:28
  government will take a step forward and they will take
• 40:30
  three-step backward, right. And because of that you are, you
• 40:35
  are not able to consolidate on the progress that we are making.
• 40:39
  And I understand that some of these issues are politically
• 40:42
  motivated, right, because of lack of continuity in government
• 40:45
  robots. See, the people need to come
• 40:48
  first, right? Regardless of your party, the
• 40:51
  people, the masses, the people that put in government need to
• 40:54
  confess. You need to do something that
• 40:57
  will improve their quality of life, right?
• 40:58
  So I'll talk about some basic reforms.
• 41:01
  I've talked about infrastructure and I think probably the the
• 41:07
  third one that I will probably talk about is that there is also
• 41:12
  a need for government to also make capital to be easily
• 41:15
  accessible, right. You see young Nigerians that are
• 41:18
  never able to raise any money from that same Nigeria where
• 41:22
  they operate. They get into textile, they get
• 41:26
  into why combinator and some of these accelerator programme and
• 41:28
  these people are raising $20 million right from investor that
• 41:33
  are not even in their country. So if this investors for any
• 41:39
  vessels I've seen opportunities in Nigeria, if they have seen
• 41:43
  reason to invest in young Nigerians, then why can't people
• 41:47
  in Nigeria and I'm talking to both government and private
• 41:50
  investor now do more to also invest in these young people,
• 41:54
  right. And that has always been the
• 41:55
  challenge if why Combinator invest $10 million into a
• 41:59
  Nigerian startup, right at the point why Combinator will have
• 42:03
  to repatriate their money back to the economy with profits,
• 42:06
  right. So you are literally going to be
• 42:08
  moving capital from your country right into another country,
• 42:12
  right? But imagine if government
• 42:14
  creates more like a startup bank.
• 42:16
  Bank where young people with innovative for disruptive ideas
• 42:21
  can access capital and I mean capital that will be friendly
• 42:25
  not capital where you ask young people to come and access
• 42:28
  capital or facility from bank and you're asking for collateral
• 42:32
  like 100 million right. Forget they have assets or
• 42:36
  collateral that 100 million they will never have any reason to
• 42:39
  even. Come to this.
• 42:42
  That sometimes, you know, government even creates some of
• 42:44
  this policy by the end of the day when you look deep into some
• 42:49
  of the basic requirement like most young people are
• 42:53
  disqualified, disqualified, right.
• 42:55
  So government need to make capital easily accessible.
• 42:59
  It is not sustainable anywhere in the world.
• 43:01
  When you ask young people that have innovative idea or
• 43:04
  destructive idea to go to commercial bank, commercial bank
• 43:08
  are set up to make money their business right.
• 43:11
  And you want to access loan from commercial bank and they're
• 43:14
  asking you 30% please. If the commercial bank can also
• 43:18
  make 30% based on their investment strategy, right then
• 43:22
  we will give that money and individual or to start the
• 43:25
  Punjab right. So you can't ask young people
• 43:27
  that are just starting a business, the business they
• 43:29
  don't know if it's going to fail.
• 43:30
  It's good to see you're asking them to pay 30% interest on
• 43:34
  facility that you want to give to them to run such business.
• 43:37
  And the fact that some of the terms of some of the facility
• 43:40
  and never friendly from the first month you asked asking me
• 43:43
  to pay back interest and capital, a capital that have not
• 43:46
  utilised. You are already depleting the
• 43:48
  capital because I'm paying you back on a monthly basis, right?
• 43:51
  But if government can create loans, right, that are more
• 43:54
  friendly grants, I think we see what the developed countries are
• 43:58
  doing. You see the spirit, the
• 43:59
  entrepreneurial spirit of America today, right, Because
• 44:02
  government has created that environment.
• 44:04
  You see young people getting into space.
• 44:08
  I'm looking for a solution to problems.
• 44:11
  And that's why today you talk about Tesla, you talk about
• 44:13
  Amazon, you talk about Facebook, you talk about NVIDIA, you talk
• 44:17
  about Netflix, right? These companies are from
• 44:22
  America, right? So And if America is turning out
• 44:25
  all these innovative businesses that are creating.
• 44:28
  Innovators. Right.
• 44:31
  And that are creating wealth? Then we should ask ourselves a
• 44:34
  fundamental question. Why can't we do this in Nigeria
• 44:38
  as well, right? I will look at some of the
• 44:41
  destructive ideas here from younger from the university.
• 44:45
  Muzaffarabad was in the university when he came up with
• 44:47
  the idea of idea of Facebook, right?
• 44:51
  Go read about Palantir, young people, innovative young people,
• 44:54
  entrepreneur with entrepreneurial spirit, right?
• 44:58
  They look for problem and they trying to find solution And to
• 45:02
  be honest that is the purpose of education, right?
• 45:06
  Education should help young people to think of solution to
• 45:09
  their problem, right? But today you even look at our
• 45:13
  system in Nigeria, it's more of great oriented.
• 45:17
  Right. I didn't see many.
• 45:18
  Should and value and quality the quality?
• 45:21
  The quality you need to be able to incentivize young people to
• 45:24
  solve our problems. And Nigeria is a nation with
• 45:27
  many problems, which means there are so many opportunities,
• 45:29
  right? Because like the West of, he
• 45:34
  said, whenever you see a problem, you see a business,
• 45:37
  right? So you have many problems that
• 45:41
  Nigeria is facing today and I believe with a business thinking
• 45:45
  we are going to be able to solve those problems.
• 45:48
  But there is need for government to create that incentive.
• 45:51
  They need for them to create that environment right from the
• 45:55
  university to even approach university intervention, right?
• 46:01
  Create a startup bank. We need it.
• 46:03
  In Nigeria, I've had opportunity to engage with a lot of young
• 46:07
  people because I do a lot of mentoring for young people.
• 46:09
  And sometimes these young people, they share their idea
• 46:11
  with me and I'm always wow, innovative idea that can solve
• 46:15
  some of our fundamental and existential problem in Nigeria.
• 46:18
  But do you know the challenge is always capital, right?
• 46:21
  Because, yeah, some of them are from very poor home.
• 46:26
  Where do they want to? Do they want to raise
• 46:28
  15,000,000? How do they want to raise 30
• 46:30
  million? That's on there.
• 46:31
  Nobody in their family has ever saved 10 million naira before
• 46:33
  and they want to start the business of 100 million, right?
• 46:35
  So there are many innovative ideas that are dying on the
• 46:38
  streets of Nigeria every day. Why?
• 46:40
  Because capital is very difficult to come by.
• 46:45
  So Speaking of capital, right, like do you have any plans like
• 46:48
  in the near future of probably being an Angel investor?
• 46:55
  To fund. Some of this innovative ideas
• 47:00
  that would be that would be a way, you know, as an individual
• 47:03
  to to contribute to, you know, our, our, our fatherland.
• 47:07
  It's it's quite, it's quite you know difficult but we need to do
• 47:11
  something you know to to make progress in that city.
• 47:16
  You know especially us as professionals and business been
• 47:20
  you know in the in the diaspora. So in terms of your
• 47:25
  entrepreneurial endeavours, are you like currently involved in
• 47:28
  like other businesses in the meantime after our Trust tour?
• 47:32
  OK. Yeah.
• 47:33
  So just to answer that first question on, you know what role
• 47:36
  I'm also happy to play within that space, right?
• 47:39
  Because it is one thing to just come on podcast like this or any
• 47:42
  other platform and just rant about the problem that we're
• 47:45
  facing the country without also making a conscious effort or a
• 47:50
  deliberate effort on what role we as individuals also want to
• 47:54
  play, right. Of course, I've been doing a lot
• 47:58
  within space, right. And one of my our goals, which
• 48:03
  is what our muscle right in the in the US is to run an hedge
• 48:08
  fund, right and. No, OK.
• 48:12
  That's not the percentage of that hedge fund.
• 48:14
  We're going to investment in Africa, not just in Nigeria,
• 48:18
  right. If you see any opportunity, we
• 48:20
  see young people in any country in Africa doing amazingly well
• 48:23
  trying to solve problems, they're going to invest in them
• 48:26
  right now. We're not just going to invest
• 48:27
  in them and we're also going to provide a a mentorship platform
• 48:30
  because it is one thing to just give people a capital was able
• 48:33
  to invest in business. It is another to evidence to
• 48:36
  close a knowledge gap, the knowledge gap that might exist
• 48:39
  because probably did not have prior experience.
• 48:41
  So I'm I'm working on starting something within the hedge fund
• 48:46
  space. I'm planning to start very
• 48:48
  small. They will continue to
• 48:50
  consolidate whatever success we have and part of what we are
• 48:52
  going to be doing is to identify young entrepreneurs with
• 48:58
  innovative and disruptive ideas across Africa and invest in them
• 49:02
  and not just invest in them. Help them to succeed so that
• 49:05
  they can also use their story, I mean their success story to
• 49:09
  inspire other. Young people and.
• 49:12
  Let the young generation know that regardless of the
• 49:14
  challenges that we are facing as a continent, they always there
• 49:18
  are opportunity on our continent and our young people will
• 49:21
  continue to make efforts to contribute to the success story
• 49:25
  of the continent. Fantastic.
• 49:28
  It's actually good to see that you're paying it forward, right?
• 49:32
  It's, it's, it's, it's, it's a great one because you know
• 49:34
  there's no such thing as a success without a successor and
• 49:39
  OK, so, so can you talk us through on how you are able to
• 49:43
  balance being a corporate professional and to being an
• 49:46
  entrepreneur? Yeah, I think it it requires a
• 49:50
  lot of discipline, alright. Either you're poor, you are
• 49:54
  rich, you are tall, or you're short.
• 49:55
  You're black, you're white. We all have 24 hours, right?
• 50:00
  It's been 24 hours that the poorest Monet house, it's the
• 50:04
  same 24 hour that the richest man on health also has, right?
• 50:07
  I think time is the only thing that God gave to all of us
• 50:10
  equally, one of the few things that God gave to all of us
• 50:13
  equally, right? So it is about discipline.
• 50:16
  And I I know that one of the biggest challenge of this
• 50:20
  generation is there are so many distractions, right?
• 50:24
  Distraction from social media. You know you want to spend 30
• 50:29
  minutes on Twitter before you know you in three hours.
• 50:32
  From there, you jump to Facebook.
• 50:33
  From there, you jump to Instagram.
• 50:34
  From there, you jump to TikTok and at the end of the day you
• 50:38
  discover that you spent eight hours on social media, right?
• 50:42
  If you do that consistently for 75 years, by the time you have
• 50:45
  75, you could have spent 25 years of your life on social
• 50:48
  media, which is the lungs. And if you dedicate that 25
• 50:53
  years to acquiring a skill, right, you've probably become an
• 50:58
  expert, right, 25 years, right. So it is more about discipline
• 51:05
  or it is more about time management and somebody that is
• 51:09
  very, very deliberate about how I manage my time.
• 51:12
  You got to be honest, right? Most of the job we most of the
• 51:17
  work we're doing in the corporate, it's to 10 hours per
• 51:20
  day, right? Except for someone that we
• 51:22
  accountant or people in other field that probably they have
• 51:26
  what they call busy season, right, busy season.
• 51:30
  However. We have more businesses, not
• 51:33
  every day, it's not every week, it's not every month, right.
• 51:35
  So let us let us know that you spend an average of nine hours
• 51:39
  everyday doing your job. I mean your nine to five job,
• 51:43
  Monday to Friday, right. It means you have 15 hours left
• 51:48
  from 24. I didn't know.
• 51:51
  I don't know right? No reasonable person is going to
• 51:54
  be sleeping for 12 hours every day.
• 51:57
  It is almost impossible one of those people.
• 52:00
  That's right. It is not possible right.
• 52:03
  So let everyone say ohh, I love sleeping.
• 52:07
  I sleep for eight hours every day.
• 52:09
  There is 7 hours, right? So you must be able to account
• 52:15
  for that 7 hours. What are you using the seven
• 52:17
  hours for, right? If you spend an hour or two
• 52:20
  every day to read, the number of books that you're gonna read in
• 52:24
  a year is not going to be less than 2030.
• 52:27
  If you can dedicate to ours every day, you can dedicate one
• 52:30
  hour every day learning about his skill on YouTube, on Google,
• 52:35
  reading material. Yeah, gotta be more above
• 52:39
  average, right? So it is about time management.
• 52:43
  How do you manage your time right?
• 52:45
  You should be able to manage the distractions like I try to
• 52:49
  manage my distractions. I have time limits for Facebook,
• 52:51
  I have time limit for Twitter. I have time limits for time
• 52:54
  limit for all my social media. Right.
• 52:58
  Sometimes in a day, 15 minutes, 20 minutes, thirty minutes, I
• 53:01
  don't see them. Right.
• 53:03
  Also maybe see movies of course, once in a while.
• 53:05
  But you know what I'm just trying to say?
• 53:07
  It is about discipline. It is about prioritising the
• 53:11
  right thing first, right? If there are things that are
• 53:14
  important to you change that can help you to improve the quality
• 53:16
  of your life, those things you comfort before any form of
• 53:19
  distraction, right? So if you are going to be able
• 53:22
  to, you're able to manage your time, which is what has really
• 53:24
  helped me in managing business with my corporate job, which
• 53:28
  I've always been doing right. That time management skills has
• 53:33
  played a very critical factor. And there has never been a time
• 53:37
  in my life that probably because I'm running a business with my
• 53:39
  95 job that I'm below average, right?
• 53:43
  I tried to compete and even despite the fact I'm combining
• 53:46
  something my job most time I end up being among the best, right?
• 53:50
  So be be deliberate about your time.
• 53:54
  Prioritise things that can improve the quality of your life
• 53:58
  in the long run. Let them come before the
• 54:00
  distraction, right? And if you can do that
• 54:03
  consistently. Identify area of strength that
• 54:07
  you need to consolidate on the strength.
• 54:09
  Identify areas of weaknesses that you also need to improve
• 54:11
  on. Ask yourself, what can I do to
• 54:14
  improve on these areas, right, And be consistently be
• 54:20
  consciously, you know, be deliberately focused on this
• 54:24
  thing, even if it's going to be like on our 30 minutes every
• 54:27
  day. But just make sure you do them.
• 54:29
  And if you can do that, you're going to have a balanced
• 54:31
  lifestyle. You are going to be able to
• 54:33
  combine your job with business or even combine with any other
• 54:35
  things. Might not be business maybe.
• 54:36
  Maybe skill or something that you have and that you also want
• 54:39
  to monetize. Interested.
• 54:42
  Fantastic. One time management is very
• 54:44
  essential and I think I'm going to add to that right Delegation
• 54:48
  as well. I, I I do realise that you know
• 54:50
  delegation actually works a lot for a person like myself.
• 54:53
  Like I'd like to coach people to do like certain things like you
• 54:56
  know, I would have spent, you know quite a lot of time as
• 54:59
  that's the keys to you know, your time management Nuggets,
• 55:03
  right. So there are a lot of things
• 55:05
  that you could have been doing yourself right with your time,
• 55:08
  but then when you coach people and delegate them to do those
• 55:11
  things, it's more like plug and play and then you have your
• 55:15
  media organisation working at that.
• 55:17
  You still like have your job up running as well.
• 55:19
  So fantastic one kudos to you. So can you talk about the highs
• 55:26
  and lows of your career? Like what are those, you know,
• 55:29
  peak points that you're so happy, you're proud of?
• 55:32
  And what were those low points where you felt like, ohh, it's
• 55:35
  like the world is collapsing or everything is coming crashing
• 55:40
  and you were able to find, you know, hope and you know, move
• 55:45
  on. Yeah.
• 55:47
  So I think today it's the heart of my career.
• 55:50
  Will. Be.
• 55:52
  When I got my offer from PwC New York, right?
• 55:56
  Because of course, talk about my story.
• 55:59
  I've shared my story how I started as a child.
• 56:03
  Never in my life I ever dream of working in the USA.
• 56:09
  Of course, I had a lot of dream when I was young, but he was
• 56:13
  never part of the tree, right? So when this happened, I I I
• 56:19
  cry. I cry because looking at my
• 56:23
  background, looking at where I came from and likes how it is
• 56:29
  possible, right? But again, I'm great.
• 56:33
  I'm grateful to God for making it possible and I'm also
• 56:36
  grateful to people who have played important role in my
• 56:41
  career. I've talked about my uncle and
• 56:44
  my sister and the other play in making me who I am today.
• 56:48
  But when they come to my career the biggest influence has been
• 56:52
  that widely also happens. So be my mentor that will shape
• 56:58
  me when it's come to my career because I never had a dream of
• 57:02
  working in a corporate organisation.
• 57:04
  After I graduated from the university, all I wanted to do
• 57:08
  was to just focus on business. It was styled that sought me
• 57:11
  than saving saying I know you are passionate about business
• 57:15
  but it is always good for you to have some years of corporate
• 57:18
  experience before you transition fully into entrepreneurship.
• 57:22
  And I think that religion is one of the best decisions, decisions
• 57:25
  I ever made. I went to jointly Lucy, Nigeria.
• 57:29
  I was able to build important connections, I improved the
• 57:36
  people in my network, and the experience was just out of this
• 57:39
  world, right? And you know, working with such
• 57:44
  amazing and smart people every day, it really inspired me,
• 57:48
  right? There's no way I would have been
• 57:50
  able to join PW C New York if I never had any prior experience
• 57:53
  from FROM. PwC.
• 57:56
  Nature. Or any of the other consulting
• 57:58
  firm, right. So I know, you know sometimes
• 58:01
  you just look back, you just try to connect the dots, right.
• 58:05
  So when I just look back at those little little decisions
• 58:10
  right and the fact that that you made me to see reason why
• 58:15
  working in the corporate organisation is always very
• 58:17
  important if we want to do business right.
• 58:20
  Advising me to consider it and listen to that advice really
• 58:24
  saved my life. Right today I'm I'm, I'm working
• 58:28
  with PW C New York. It's been a it's been a lifetime
• 58:32
  experience right. And so is the, is the.
• 58:39
  The. Height of my career.
• 58:40
  So in terms of maybe low point, to be honest I don't think I
• 58:45
  really have one to point finger to.
• 58:47
  Of course, there have been instances where I was placed on
• 58:51
  some complex engagement right now, and I know you understand
• 58:55
  some of those are what exactly exactly?
• 59:01
  Check time with your PwC Nigeria.
• 59:03
  You collect he was a landmark, right?
• 59:10
  They will graduate from the. University.
• 59:13
  Some of the some of those, but of course they were part of the
• 59:19
  learning experience, right. And so apart from those
• 59:22
  engagement and of course sometimes you work with people
• 59:25
  that are probably you have different work style, right
• 59:30
  maybe yeah unable to kind of make some little compromises to
• 59:35
  be able to kind of you know just align how you.
• 59:38
  Know them. Yeah, and it's my, it's my, it's
• 59:42
  my media engagement. You know not to to ask blank,
• 59:48
  right? Because you relationship is not
• 59:49
  perfect at the end of the day, you know you can the environment
• 59:54
  or the team and I know work together as they are supposed to
• 59:58
  be. So.
• 59:58
  And I think I've had like maybe one or two instances like that,
• 1:00:02
  right? And I don't believe they are
• 1:00:04
  just part of the job, right. Everything is not able to be
• 1:00:07
  easy. Everything is not able to be
• 1:00:09
  perfect. There's going to be one or two
• 1:00:11
  moments of setback or where everything doesn't just work out
• 1:00:15
  as you want, but it's part of the job.
• 1:00:17
  So I kindly pointed into that. The the lowest point in my
• 1:00:21
  career. But.
• 1:00:23
  The height of it, the high point is, you know, joining PwC in New
• 1:00:28
  York, it's been a great. It's just it's just you know for
• 1:00:34
  me, I'm also proud PwC alumni, right?
• 1:00:38
  Being in yeah to to other people's PwC, KPMG, right.
• 1:00:42
  And I know, I know it from for for real that being at the peak
• 1:00:48
  four has actually like equipped me with a lot of high level
• 1:00:52
  skills sets that have also transitioned into like my
• 1:00:56
  personal and endeavours. So for you like what are those
• 1:00:59
  skills you know you have picked on the PS4 as well like you
• 1:01:04
  would see have actually transitioned into more into into
• 1:01:08
  a refined entrepreneur and business person.
• 1:01:13
  Or I I think the number one for me will be people management,
• 1:01:17
  right? So when I join PwC, I had the
• 1:01:22
  opportunity to work for the 1st 18 months as that we really
• 1:01:27
  executive assistant, right. And I was really inspired with
• 1:01:31
  Taiwan style of leadership especially how he manages
• 1:01:36
  people, right. That will be down to earth
• 1:01:38
  leader on intelligent professional.
• 1:01:44
  I think that was one of the most Italian people I've ever met in
• 1:01:47
  my life, right. So I picked some fundamental
• 1:01:51
  leadership, people management skills which is the number one
• 1:01:55
  for me. The number two is time
• 1:01:57
  management. Of course, you know before
• 1:02:00
  consulting there's always timeline right here.
• 1:02:03
  We need to sign this account. We need to find it out without
• 1:02:07
  pressures. Yeah, you know, and it's a lot
• 1:02:10
  of pressure, right? But that's what happened.
• 1:02:12
  Get a job done right. So I learnt a lot on time
• 1:02:17
  management and I think you know, the entire environment episode,
• 1:02:21
  so develop resilience, right, Because it's a very fast-paced
• 1:02:27
  environment. You know, sometimes you're on
• 1:02:29
  234 engagements and you know it's just like what's happening
• 1:02:33
  here. I'm not really moving along or
• 1:02:35
  you know we're not getting things done as planned, right?
• 1:02:40
  But you still have to get the job done.
• 1:02:43
  If you require, you stand back in the office till midnight to
• 1:02:45
  get it down right. If you require you, you know,
• 1:02:48
  going extra mile working weekend and just to get the job done
• 1:02:51
  right. And to be honest, you need to be
• 1:02:53
  disciplined and be resilient for you to be able to manage that.
• 1:02:56
  If not, you know you're just going to train the trial like,
• 1:02:58
  hey, I don't think I can. It is around that was this fancy
• 1:03:04
  where people, you know, go and got fed up with it and they just
• 1:03:08
  throwing the towel. But for me, I saw the positive
• 1:03:11
  side of it, right? And that will be honest, right?
• 1:03:14
  I don't think I've ever come across any successful person,
• 1:03:17
  any great, great person that life was easy for, right?
• 1:03:23
  You know, those moments, those challenging moments are great
• 1:03:27
  men are modded, right? So you know that environment,
• 1:03:32
  the fast-paced environment and the resilience that that
• 1:03:37
  development that people develop is also one of the biggest thing
• 1:03:41
  that I took away from PW in Nigeria and and that I'm back
• 1:03:45
  here now. Of course almost the same
• 1:03:48
  experience, of course different environment and and different
• 1:03:52
  gaming. But I think the principles, the
• 1:03:54
  skills are are basically the same everywhere.
• 1:03:56
  And those skills, I believe these kids are going to be very
• 1:03:59
  useful by the time I'm ready to transition fully into, you know,
• 1:04:03
  sheep or running my own business, right.
• 1:04:05
  And the experience, the people, the network, they are always
• 1:04:09
  going to be very, very important.
• 1:04:11
  And which is why I always encourage young people,
• 1:04:13
  especially my mentors and people that have opportunity to mentor
• 1:04:17
  or talk, to reach out to trade platform like this.
• 1:04:20
  Even though you're passionate about business, there are so
• 1:04:22
  many things that you will never learn about business by reading
• 1:04:25
  a book written by by Bill Gates or or by reading a book written
• 1:04:32
  by Elon Musk, Right. There's the practical part of
• 1:04:35
  it, right? For you to really get a
• 1:04:38
  practical, it's either you go for an apprenticeship like the
• 1:04:41
  eco apprenticeship system, which is one of the best in the world,
• 1:04:45
  or you get into a corporate or company like the Peter visit the
• 1:04:51
  consulting, the manufacturing or depending on your own area of
• 1:04:53
  interest, right and work for a couple of years for a practical
• 1:05:00
  experience, you know the difference between you reading
• 1:05:02
  something in a book and you being able to see someone you
• 1:05:06
  know doing it and you're able to learn, right.
• 1:05:08
  So it is always important and if you look at some of the most
• 1:05:11
  successful businesses in the world today, some of the found
• 1:05:15
  out those business that people with corporate experience and
• 1:05:17
  don't get me wrong I'm not saying there are no there are
• 1:05:20
  there are no businesses. The found out that was
• 1:05:23
  successful businesses that the founder never worked in a
• 1:05:27
  corporate organisation called their businesses like that you
• 1:05:30
  should know there will always be an outlier right.
• 1:05:32
  But if you look at the numbers. Right.
• 1:05:36
  Majority of those numbers of those people in that space, they
• 1:05:40
  were people that they're working on vacation before the corporate
• 1:05:43
  framework. So if you want to run your
• 1:05:45
  business like I was in a TWC Nigeria, focus on your job and
• 1:05:48
  the little extra time you have used it to continue to manage
• 1:05:51
  that business on a small scale, but you are ready to transition
• 1:05:55
  fully into entrepreneurship or business, then you know you can
• 1:05:59
  focus on each 100%. Interested.
• 1:06:02
  Interested. You know, I honestly pull up my
• 1:06:06
  time at PwC with very fun memories looking at the
• 1:06:10
  professional framework that they have back there, right?
• 1:06:14
  I sort of like internalised it for my own self.
• 1:06:17
  And you know, it's as always helped to push my drive for self
• 1:06:23
  development looking. I remember the framework quite
• 1:06:26
  well. Whole leadership?
• 1:06:29
  Business acumen, global acumen. You have a what else?
• 1:06:35
  Technical competence, right. And holy the sheep.
• 1:06:40
  Yeah, we, we, we, we can't set up right.
• 1:06:42
  So for you and also looking at the values, right.
• 1:06:45
  Care, working together, you know reimagining the the, the, the
• 1:06:49
  possible. So would you say these things?
• 1:06:52
  Like did you consciously or unconsciously internalise them
• 1:06:57
  and they have helped shape the quality of your life.
• 1:07:02
  Yeah, I would say that the, excuse me, I would say, for the
• 1:07:08
  internalisation of the values, right.
• 1:07:10
  Some of them were conscious, some of them were unconscious,
• 1:07:13
  right? Because when you do the same to
• 1:07:16
  almost everyday, right, unconsciously pick some
• 1:07:20
  learnings, right, that you might even know that you're actually
• 1:07:23
  picking by the fact that you are doing it on a daily basis.
• 1:07:25
  You know are you pick them and of course some of them were were
• 1:07:29
  conscious, right? Because you see people doing
• 1:07:30
  things and you just want to emulate them, right?
• 1:07:34
  You want to be able to deliver quality deliverables to the
• 1:07:37
  clients, right? You want to be one of the best
• 1:07:41
  writer. You see the way or other
• 1:07:42
  colleagues are analysing tax policies you know are.
• 1:07:47
  You discover that it's because they dedicated some time to read
• 1:07:50
  and so do some research, right? And because of that too, you
• 1:07:53
  just want to. I'll show you that, right?
• 1:07:56
  So some of the values, of course those are very important, like
• 1:08:01
  the Compass for the organisation and even myself as an
• 1:08:04
  individual, I have some core values that they're like Compass
• 1:08:08
  for my life. They they helped me to make the
• 1:08:11
  right decision on at different time.
• 1:08:15
  They determine what I will do at a different point in time,
• 1:08:18
  right. So on those values they really
• 1:08:20
  helped me, right and like the one you mentioned and Even so
• 1:08:25
  that not just the value alone, right, not different value alone
• 1:08:28
  even when you see people too like I said that will always be
• 1:08:33
  a big influence in my life. And so because as a close range
• 1:08:37
  I had opportunity to see the way I manage people at TWC and the
• 1:08:42
  way we manage client, you know his own style of leadership
• 1:08:45
  because that is not that is not in the company called value but
• 1:08:49
  you know those those characters, those attitude, I was able to
• 1:08:54
  pick them from me, those were deliberate and you know those
• 1:08:59
  values too, right they they they've been able to also shape
• 1:09:02
  my life as well. Interesting.
• 1:09:06
  I think those of us who are privileged to have a tab in the
• 1:09:11
  big four, we it's a it's a very, very valuable experience because
• 1:09:16
  aside from you know, just gaining those organisational
• 1:09:19
  skills, we are also opportunity to consult for numerous
• 1:09:25
  businesses and that that gives us exposure to not just one
• 1:09:31
  organisation right, but then to multiple organisations and it
• 1:09:35
  helps sharpen our business acumen and that translates into
• 1:09:40
  like creating very smart business savvy individuals.
• 1:09:47
  So Speaking of being being business savvy, like what what
• 1:09:51
  would you what would you say is a simple would you advise in
• 1:09:57
  terms of developing strategic fundraising plan for early
• 1:10:01
  startups? Yeah.
• 1:10:04
  So I think the first thing on just need to really focus on is
• 1:10:12
  that they need to build their network, right?
• 1:10:18
  Because today, if I need to raise money today there are some
• 1:10:24
  investments that I do not have direct link to, right?
• 1:10:28
  But if you have somebody in my network that probably has raised
• 1:10:30
  money from that time accelerator or from that VC or from that
• 1:10:36
  Angel investors, and that person is able to help with an intro,
• 1:10:41
  that introduction alone, right? Improve your chances of being
• 1:10:46
  able to probably raise money from that investor, right?
• 1:10:51
  So people need to be more deliberate on building their
• 1:10:54
  network, right. People should be able to watch
• 1:10:58
  for you in terms of all I know they said I know somebody who is
• 1:11:04
  honest. I know he's someone that values
• 1:11:06
  integrity, right? Because characters are value
• 1:11:09
  comes first, right. If somebody if an investment to
• 1:11:13
  invest into your company today and then type your name in on
• 1:11:16
  Google and what these search results, they're saying
• 1:11:22
  something positive. Of course, that might be the
• 1:11:27
  reason why I didn't say, you know, I don't think this
• 1:11:30
  individual is investing. I don't think we should be able
• 1:11:33
  to invest in Amhara, right? So beauty and network building,
• 1:11:38
  the right character, they are very, very important.
• 1:11:41
  Ohh. Sort of find out the jump start
• 1:11:44
  of finance should also be able to join communities, right
• 1:11:48
  community where they share information, community where
• 1:11:51
  people collaborate and I manage one of those community.
• 1:11:54
  We call it our Ubuntu Founder network and we have like a
• 1:11:59
  overrun and 60 startup founders from I think like 10 countries
• 1:12:04
  right where we come together, we deliberate idea, we share our
• 1:12:08
  opportunities right. So beyond the idea, you need to
• 1:12:12
  join your community, you need to build your network.
• 1:12:15
  I know a lot of, I know a few startup founders in Nigeria that
• 1:12:21
  were able to get to some of the accelerator programmes, like Why
• 1:12:24
  Combinator and Text That because somebody introduced them, right,
• 1:12:28
  and the codependent introduced them.
• 1:12:30
  Or someone that had a very good relationship with the with the
• 1:12:34
  accelerator programme, they were able to get it right, which is
• 1:12:38
  why people were losing their most valuable assets, right.
• 1:12:43
  There are some people today they want to see president to know
• 1:12:45
  who they don't need to private appointments.
• 1:12:48
  So we just walked to his office, right?
• 1:12:50
  And if you don't know him, he might be going to Ashura for one
• 1:12:54
  year and you never had the chance to even to see him,
• 1:12:57
  right. So people always your biggest
• 1:13:00
  assets, right? Invest in people and this is
• 1:13:03
  beyond even just out of people. Your career and Rachel restory
• 1:13:08
  where people were able to get job in a very big organisation
• 1:13:11
  because somebody refer them right?
• 1:13:13
  Somebody say, OK, bring your CV, I'm going to help you to submit
• 1:13:16
  your CV and they put in some words for them and I I work with
• 1:13:20
  this guy for is one of the smartest person I've.
• 1:13:21
  Worked with right? And those people were able to
• 1:13:24
  get a job without even probably interview, right?
• 1:13:27
  So invest in people. Be deliberate about the people
• 1:13:32
  you have in your inner cycle, right?
• 1:13:34
  And apart from that, right then your idea too.
• 1:13:39
  Transmission projects to validate your idea, right?
• 1:13:45
  Do your research, do your SWOT analysis, identify what are the
• 1:13:50
  risk and the threats so that to that business right now.
• 1:13:54
  Have it in mind that the chances that your business is going to
• 1:13:58
  fail is 80% and 20% of the on 20%.
• 1:14:05
  You always have that right at the beginning.
• 1:14:08
  The reality that a lot of people do not like to do, not like to
• 1:14:12
  face the truth, is better. Yeah, it's 80%.
• 1:14:18
  You just have to remind the chances that your business is
• 1:14:20
  going to fail is 80%. The changes that go to survive
• 1:14:23
  also see or build into the next Unicorn is just 20% right?
• 1:14:28
  Which is why only one out of every five business, you know,
• 1:14:32
  I'll survive beyond, just beyond five years, right?
• 1:14:35
  Most businesses are run out of money and they run out of gas,
• 1:14:40
  you know, in less than five years, right?
• 1:14:43
  So those are the advice that I would give to young people.
• 1:14:47
  Build relationships, they will help you in any career and start
• 1:14:51
  talking business in anything you want to do, people really do,
• 1:14:54
  your Mozambique said. Then you can do your research,
• 1:14:57
  look for some of these much later, programme yourself.
• 1:15:00
  There are many information on Google, just put on Google.
• 1:15:03
  There are many of them, and the fact that some of them they.
• 1:15:06
  Are. Processes that are merit based,
• 1:15:08
  you don't need to know anyone sometime, but like I said, and
• 1:15:11
  Nitro can help you, but the fact that you don't have anybody to
• 1:15:13
  introduce it doesn't mean that you will not be able to probably
• 1:15:16
  access funding from them or that you won't be able to join their
• 1:15:20
  accelerator programme. So just go on Google, do your
• 1:15:23
  research to pay off, pitch the tram, prepare the best responses
• 1:15:27
  to the questions and if you do all those things and they see
• 1:15:31
  that your idea is something that that they believe is going to be
• 1:15:34
  the next Nigeria, that is going to be much speed.
• 1:15:37
  So that's gonna solve some basic problems from people and they
• 1:15:41
  look out of business your your business model and they see that
• 1:15:44
  something that is sustainable. Of course they are going to
• 1:15:47
  invest in you and but you also need to have it in mind.
• 1:15:50
  People don't invest in business idea, they invest in people. 222
• 1:15:57
  you actually touched the beats. I've spoke about the Onto
• 1:16:01
  Funders network. Can you shed some light on it
• 1:16:04
  And you know what you guys do with the with that platform?
• 1:16:08
  Yeah. So it's just a community where
• 1:16:11
  I'll start off and that in Africa where we come together to
• 1:16:14
  share ideas right now we also share knowledge and information.
• 1:16:20
  We have sessions where we invite more experienced startup
• 1:16:25
  founders to share their story, right and to help people on that
• 1:16:31
  platform to kind of assess their business model, right and see or
• 1:16:37
  identify what they believe they can do differently, right.
• 1:16:40
  So expedite and their growth right.
• 1:16:44
  And at the same time we also hip our members to access some of
• 1:16:51
  these accelerator programmes right through probably
• 1:16:54
  introduction and not just accelerator programme alone.
• 1:16:57
  Also Angel investors and VC's that some of us have been able
• 1:17:01
  to connect with or that we have a very good relationship with or
• 1:17:04
  we can help them with Intro even sometimes down to building like
• 1:17:08
  them to review their pitch deck especially you know promo to
• 1:17:11
  raise fund or they are talking to an investor.
• 1:17:13
  We can. We do have them look at their
• 1:17:15
  their we tell them, OK, maybe you can improve on this, you can
• 1:17:18
  improve on this. So it's just a community that
• 1:17:21
  we'll start off and find us in Africa.
• 1:17:24
  They come together and they help one another to succeed.
• 1:17:29
  So how? How can people join the
• 1:17:30
  community? I yeah, I think for people that
• 1:17:33
  are interested in joining the community, I will advise that
• 1:17:37
  you connect with me on LinkedIn. My name is Vicenta Devon
• 1:17:40
  LinkedIn connect with me on LinkedIn.
• 1:17:42
  Reach out to me. Then I will send you the link
• 1:17:45
  where you will be able to sign up.
• 1:17:47
  Then when you sign up, we review your responses to the form that
• 1:17:51
  we are going to share with you. And if you believe that you meet
• 1:17:55
  all our criteria, then who Extending Membership of the
• 1:17:59
  Community to you? OK, interesting.
• 1:18:03
  Earlier on you you was talking about one of your role models
• 1:18:06
  that you really appreciate. You really, you know, admire.
• 1:18:10
  And you're really grateful for his contribution to your career
• 1:18:14
  interview with daily. So who are your other bro models
• 1:18:17
  and, you know, mentors? And what have been their
• 1:18:20
  contributions, you know, to your career and your life generally?
• 1:18:25
  Yeah. So apart from Taiwan that
• 1:18:27
  happens to be role model and also a mentor simultaneously.
• 1:18:31
  I I have a lot of people that have played important role in my
• 1:18:34
  life. Some of them have not met them
• 1:18:36
  before. And I think one of my role model
• 1:18:39
  when it comes to business is Warren Buffett, right.
• 1:18:44
  I I follow Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger actively.
• 1:18:49
  I I tried to because I'm really inspired with what both of them,
• 1:18:53
  what they've done with Berkshire Hathaway, right?
• 1:18:56
  What they've built that company into.
• 1:18:59
  Honestly, these are just ordinary people rather than also
• 1:19:03
  read ordinary. Things.
• 1:19:07
  So you know and I also have people like Martin Luther King
• 1:19:11
  Junior is my when it comes to politics right and civil rights
• 1:19:16
  right. I think is a role model.
• 1:19:19
  Also I I love my Malcolm X right.
• 1:19:22
  I read a couple of his books like you know Nelson Mandela,
• 1:19:26
  Madman Gandhi. Depending on the area of my life
• 1:19:30
  that you want me to just focus on, I I have role model in
• 1:19:33
  different area of my life, right?
• 1:19:37
  And depending on what I want to achieve, I always try to
• 1:19:40
  research about those people and say hey, what would these people
• 1:19:42
  have done if they were to be in my position?
• 1:19:45
  Would they made this decision because nobody is looking at
• 1:19:48
  them or they will do the right thing.
• 1:19:50
  Even though they know that nobody's going to know if
• 1:19:52
  they've done the right thing down to Barack Obama, right.
• 1:19:55
  I was really inspired with his story and you know what he
• 1:19:59
  achieved in the United States. I remember there in 2008 I was
• 1:20:03
  in secondary school and every after every closure of school.
• 1:20:07
  I'll go to our library to pick up the newspaper because I
• 1:20:10
  wanted to know what his campaign team were doing at every point
• 1:20:15
  in time. And I remember that day in 2009
• 1:20:18
  when he was 20, right on his motorbike.
• 1:20:21
  Yes, yes, we can. Right.
• 1:20:24
  It lets a a positive impression on me that there is nothing we
• 1:20:29
  cannot achieve once we and we are determining, like you said
• 1:20:32
  earlier, once we are ready to put in the hard work because it
• 1:20:36
  was just unbelievable. Many people thought it was never
• 1:20:39
  going to happen, that there was never going to be a time in the
• 1:20:42
  history of the United States of America where a black man was
• 1:20:45
  sitting White House for four years, not to even talk of eight
• 1:20:48
  years, right, But Barack Obama came.
• 1:20:51
  He said yes we can. And because of his that vision,
• 1:20:55
  because of that dream, because of the hard work, his commitment
• 1:20:58
  and is his belief that the people will always do the right
• 1:21:01
  thing when they see someone that has the competence and they have
• 1:21:08
  the ability to move the country forward.
• 1:21:09
  And of course Iran and Iran and Iran twice.
• 1:21:13
  And he won. And I'm always inspired by that
• 1:21:16
  story. And I'm only inspired by even
• 1:21:18
  the world that has been doing, you know, Post is president.
• 1:21:25
  It's time after Billy president, right.
• 1:21:27
  So these are people that are role models.
• 1:21:30
  These are people that are one way or the other window we've
• 1:21:32
  never met before. They've shaped my life.
• 1:21:35
  And also there's some family members to some friends that
• 1:21:38
  they also like Rome with us for me because of the support
• 1:21:42
  they've been able to extend to me.
• 1:21:44
  Right. So a lot of people, right.
• 1:21:46
  I cannot just point to one thing and say you know, many people
• 1:21:49
  are different role at different times in my life, in different
• 1:21:52
  areas of my life And even of those people are watching and
• 1:21:55
  might not be able to mention anyone else named maybe
• 1:21:58
  including my wife too, right. She's, she's been a very, very
• 1:22:01
  supportive partner, right. And she she has played a very
• 1:22:05
  important role in my journey. So to all these people, I'm
• 1:22:07
  extending my gratefulness to you all, and I want you all to know
• 1:22:11
  that I'm eternally grateful for all the role and that you played
• 1:22:14
  in my life and that I will continue to put in the hard work
• 1:22:17
  to to make all of you proud. Wow, fantastic fantastic.
• 1:22:22
  I I saw a post of yours on LinkedIn was I think maybe
• 1:22:27
  sometime earlier this year you you took a picture with popular
• 1:22:30
  Nigerian people in there and businessman familiar to dollar,
• 1:22:35
  right? And.
• 1:22:36
  You. You.
• 1:22:37
  You. You.
• 1:22:37
  Made an excessive post about, you know, appreciating people
• 1:22:42
  and the art of gift giving. And for me, I really, really
• 1:22:47
  appreciated that that that post because I'm very big on
• 1:22:51
  gratitude. I'm also very big on given the
• 1:22:55
  growing up my mom used to tell us, you know, the hand that
• 1:22:58
  gives you know, he's always blessed and it is essential to
• 1:23:03
  offer value to people. A lot of people that we come
• 1:23:06
  from in our part of the world just believe in an entitlement
• 1:23:09
  mentality. They believe they are meant to
• 1:23:11
  take, take, take. But then for those of us who are
• 1:23:15
  able to write at both the statistic, we understand the the
• 1:23:20
  principle of being valuable and being valuable involves given
• 1:23:26
  value. You have to give value in order
• 1:23:29
  to even receive a value. And that's the concept that he
• 1:23:32
  says is even based on right business is about giving value
• 1:23:36
  to people in order to get their store of value, which is our
• 1:23:40
  money. So like what have you learned
• 1:23:42
  from him and how was that you know interaction that you you
• 1:23:46
  had from the first day and has the relationship been after as
• 1:23:50
  well? Some of.
• 1:23:52
  Value right, of course. As a young.
• 1:23:55
  Person I've always known she fermented Allah.
• 1:23:58
  I think he's one of the, I don't know, the active investor in in
• 1:24:04
  Nigeria right now. You can see footprint in almost
• 1:24:09
  in every sector of the of the economy right now.
• 1:24:12
  Of course, I had opportunity to meet him that day based on the
• 1:24:16
  way I was brought up, right? Some of the early stage value
• 1:24:19
  that I picked from my sisters and from the people I live with,
• 1:24:23
  right, is giving right on everybody.
• 1:24:28
  Everybody appreciates gifts right when I met him that they
• 1:24:32
  of course I'm aware that. The.
• 1:24:34
  Billionaire in. Dollar, right.
• 1:24:35
  And yeah, they were like open 1% of his.
• 1:24:40
  All right, but. That was not an.
• 1:24:43
  Excuse I just like, hey, I'm meeting this guy for the first
• 1:24:46
  time and I wanted to leave a impression, which is why I just
• 1:24:51
  went to a nearby store to get some kiss for him and I was
• 1:24:55
  really surprised. He appreciated the gifts, right
• 1:24:59
  is on that. Yeah, I don't think the.
• 1:25:02
  Dental can I can buy for him right all that I would have
• 1:25:05
  bought for him that he cannot afford right and.
• 1:25:09
  You. Know I I saw that humility.
• 1:25:12
  I saw that also that out of gratitude from him, from the way
• 1:25:16
  I appreciated the gift, right. Of course.
• 1:25:20
  After that our meeting we were able to exchange contact and I
• 1:25:24
  received a call from him the following day.
• 1:25:26
  After, you know, I give you that gift.
• 1:25:29
  So, so say thank you, say thank you boss.
• 1:25:32
  And then I've not been able to establish their relationship for
• 1:25:39
  that. Right.
• 1:25:40
  And we need to understand. That she felt methodology is a
• 1:25:42
  very busy person, right. And these are people that they
• 1:25:46
  they did not hit with President of national.
• 1:25:48
  He has a lot of businesses that is managing right.
• 1:25:52
  But again, I know that the next time he's in New York, I'm, I'm
• 1:25:57
  hoping that it's going to be able to reach out to me because
• 1:25:59
  I, I believe is somebody that I will be able to learn a lot from
• 1:26:03
  considering what they have done within a business space across
• 1:26:06
  Africa right now, the relationship that I believe can
• 1:26:09
  also, you know, transform my life positively.
• 1:26:13
  But. Again to.
• 1:26:15
  I'm not somebody that loves to kind of, you know, stalk people
• 1:26:19
  or put on intensive pressure on people, right?
• 1:26:21
  So once in a while I just dropped message for him just to
• 1:26:24
  say hello to him and I don't really care if he replies or
• 1:26:26
  not, but I know at the right time we'll be able to connect
• 1:26:30
  again and. You know, he's a great man.
• 1:26:33
  Its contribution to Africa and Nigeria especially if I move to
• 1:26:37
  achieve 50% of that, I think. You made my.
• 1:26:45
  Mother. The bike's high.
• 1:26:52
  Again. Interested.
• 1:26:54
  Fantastic, you know. So such an.
• 1:26:56
  Experiences with people, right? Go a long way in influencing a
• 1:27:02
  person in life and it's for me as a person.
• 1:27:06
  I'm really grateful to experience, you know, people
• 1:27:08
  that are great. Yeah, at at some point in life,
• 1:27:12
  you know, because. It saves us.
• 1:27:13
  Fuel that's positive and inspiration to to go for that,
• 1:27:17
  you know to greater things in life even if you do not lead to
• 1:27:21
  connect them back in life or it it goes, it goes a long way into
• 1:27:26
  you and you also have to pay pay that forward.
• 1:27:29
  So it's it's Speaking of, you know, paying that forward,
• 1:27:32
  right. You have benefited a lot from
• 1:27:36
  bro models and you know, mentors in your life.
• 1:27:39
  So what would you say about the importance of having mentors
• 1:27:45
  for, you know, the young up and coming and individuals in
• 1:27:49
  society I think? That this popular coach of.
• 1:27:56
  As the new team that says. You guys.
• 1:28:02
  See further in life. It is by standing on the
• 1:28:06
  shoulders of those who have gone ahead of me, right?
• 1:28:10
  That's just the simplest definition of mentorship, right?
• 1:28:17
  Because your mentor is somebody that has experienced in life
• 1:28:19
  that you want to experience, right?
• 1:28:22
  Your mentor is probably someone that has achieved what you want
• 1:28:27
  to achieve, right? And they have a lot of
• 1:28:30
  experience because they've been there, right?
• 1:28:33
  So they are more like a guide or a compass, right?
• 1:28:39
  They can help you to avoid some mistake that they made.
• 1:28:44
  So let's just assume today that somebody wanted to start a
• 1:28:46
  business within the transportation space in Lagos
• 1:28:49
  State, right. And someone approached me based
• 1:28:52
  on the fact that of course I was in that space for a year or more
• 1:28:56
  where we invested and we manage operation.
• 1:29:00
  I'm able to extend some advice to that person and say, hey,
• 1:29:03
  this is where you should go about it, this is where you
• 1:29:04
  should go about it. So that's just the simplest
• 1:29:08
  definition and the idea of having a mentor.
• 1:29:12
  Just imagine if I never had that widely as a mentor and you are
• 1:29:17
  never good idea that recent try and work at PwC Nigeria for some
• 1:29:21
  years before transitioning to entrepreneurship.
• 1:29:25
  Just that simple and that simple advice.
• 1:29:28
  Look at the impact it has made in my life, right?
• 1:29:31
  So it is always good. I'm not saying it is 100%
• 1:29:37
  necessary. No, there are many successful
• 1:29:40
  aside there that they never had a mentor, right?
• 1:29:42
  OK, maybe one or two people might be would have been an
• 1:29:45
  influence on them, but and it depends because.
• 1:29:50
  I'm also aware that there are. Some mentor, protege
• 1:29:53
  relationship that you know, people also try to exploit and
• 1:29:57
  they also probably try to manipulate people, right?
• 1:29:59
  But if you're able to find a genuine mentor like that, we are
• 1:30:04
  dealing, I think. It's going to.
• 1:30:07
  Help you to go very very far in life, right the advice.
• 1:30:12
  The. Experience.
• 1:30:14
  It's going to be a long way, I remember.
• 1:30:17
  When I launched. My, my, my last book, the last
• 1:30:21
  book that I wrote. I think I lost it in 2020,
• 1:30:26
  2020-2021 and I wanted to invite.
• 1:30:31
  She. Was one of the.
• 1:30:33
  Guests to that. Event writer and I've been
• 1:30:36
  trying to reach a daily memory on social media.
• 1:30:38
  I didn't get any response, but luckily for me in the oral.
• 1:30:47
  Global Killara Gun. Also happened to be a mentor to
• 1:30:50
  me and he's a friend so she really my model.
• 1:30:53
  So I just told you that I want to invite chief during my module
• 1:30:58
  to my book launch and that was it.
• 1:31:02
  Shivil Malhotra attended and that was something that I've
• 1:31:06
  been on social media for months, you know, try to get his
• 1:31:10
  attention and reach out to. Yeah, to reach out to right.
• 1:31:14
  As simple as that. So there are some.
• 1:31:17
  Doubts that you. Yourself might not be able to
• 1:31:21
  but the relationship with. Your mentor.
• 1:31:23
  The relationship. Your mentor, probably.
• 1:31:24
  Have with that person, like I said the other time, there are
• 1:31:27
  some people today they want to see President Muhammadu.
• 1:31:30
  They will not book any appointments, They will see him,
• 1:31:33
  right? So look for someone that has
• 1:31:35
  done what you want to do, someone that has achieved what
• 1:31:39
  you want to achieve, someone that inspires you, right?
• 1:31:42
  And try and establish relationship with them.
• 1:31:46
  The conscious deliberate and a win win relationship because
• 1:31:49
  sometimes people also kind of abuse mentor mentee relationship
• 1:31:53
  and and me from the mentee perspective now what you
• 1:31:57
  literally think that your mentor is not your father is not your
• 1:32:01
  mother and that all your life body should be transferred to
• 1:32:03
  them. Right now, Amanda, your mentor
• 1:32:05
  is not your. Father is not your.
• 1:32:06
  Mother it must be when we relationship.
• 1:32:09
  If your mentor is adding value to you, you must also find a way
• 1:32:12
  of giving value back. That is what is going to make
• 1:32:15
  the relationship of sustainable, right?
• 1:32:18
  And it's going to help your journey.
• 1:32:20
  Even if it's for. You to ask somebody.
• 1:32:22
  Mostly accountable on an annoying What have you achieved
• 1:32:28
  this year? What did you achieve last year?
• 1:32:29
  What can you do this year? What do you want to do this
• 1:32:31
  year? What are the resources you will
• 1:32:33
  need? What do you need to do better
• 1:32:34
  with your life? Where do you want to be in the
• 1:32:36
  next five years, In the next 10 years?
• 1:32:37
  What are you doing right now? I cannot help you.
• 1:32:40
  That alone is something that can change your life.
• 1:32:45
  Positively and for. Me.
• 1:32:46
  That is the importance that I see in mentor, mentor
• 1:32:51
  relationship and which is why I try to, you know, get along or
• 1:32:58
  establish a positive relationship with some of these
• 1:33:01
  people that their success story are inspired me as continuing to
• 1:33:06
  inspire. Me.
• 1:33:08
  Interesting. So what, what would you say has
• 1:33:11
  been the driving? Force behind you being a
• 1:33:14
  prolific writer, motivational speaker, a corporate
• 1:33:17
  professional and a business. But what has been the driving
• 1:33:21
  force and that was that inspiration behind the
• 1:33:25
  consistency because you have been consistent I I would say
• 1:33:30
  maybe that motivational. Speaker Tattoo I think is out of
• 1:33:33
  the title now. Why?
• 1:33:38
  My. Brother.
• 1:33:40
  I. I took a step back.
• 1:33:44
  Right. Because little.
• 1:33:46
  Bit careful with your life. You don't want to go outside
• 1:33:49
  there every day, every year. Telling the same.
• 1:33:51
  Story that you've been sharing 5-6 years ago.
• 1:33:55
  You need to do more. You need to do more.
• 1:33:59
  You need. To.
• 1:34:02
  The next thing is, I want to have most also said that we
• 1:34:06
  spare people because at the end of the day, if you're not
• 1:34:10
  careful, you go around motivational speaking today,
• 1:34:13
  motivational speaking today, we, without also assessing your
• 1:34:19
  life, you discover that some of those people you are mentoring
• 1:34:22
  will become your mentor, right? Because they will be able to
• 1:34:25
  take your words, your encouragement, you know to go
• 1:34:29
  ahead and you just sit down there you think and inspiring
• 1:34:32
  people you know without challenging yourself to have to
• 1:34:34
  do myself, for some time now, I've not really been actively
• 1:34:37
  involved in, in the motivational speaking part of it, right?
• 1:34:42
  But again, I still look for the opportunities to kind of add
• 1:34:46
  value to young people, improve mentorships, right, and which I
• 1:34:49
  believe it is more deliberate and it's more result oriented
• 1:34:53
  than just public. Speaking because let's be.
• 1:34:55
  Honest, right? The fact that somebody just give
• 1:34:58
  you a speech of 45 minutes doesn't mean your life is going
• 1:35:01
  to change, right? It needs somebody to be
• 1:35:04
  consistently knocking on your door like, hey, how far are you
• 1:35:07
  going with your life? What are you doing?
• 1:35:09
  Where are you? What are we?
• 1:35:10
  Are she? What are we doing?
• 1:35:11
  That is how their relationship is going to have a positive
• 1:35:14
  impact. I'm not saying motivational
• 1:35:16
  speaking doesn't have his own positive impact, but just
• 1:35:19
  believe there is need for more consistency beyond the
• 1:35:22
  motivational speaking if you really want to help people to to
• 1:35:26
  succeed, right? Because I also just want to
• 1:35:28
  visit. I don't want to be there, but
• 1:35:30
  just one story, there are many success stories, right?
• 1:35:34
  So I took a step back. Right now I'm trying to focus
• 1:35:37
  more on myself to achieve 1. So that when I'm half again like
• 1:35:40
  hey guys, see this was where I was five years ago when I was
• 1:35:43
  talking to you and five years today since it's what I have
• 1:35:45
  achieved. So that I'm also a drawer of my
• 1:35:48
  own words, right. Because it is easy to be a
• 1:35:51
  preacher, encourage people and at the end of the day you don't
• 1:35:54
  even put those those words and everything into into practise
• 1:35:58
  yourself, right? So that that on the emotional
• 1:36:01
  speaking part of it, on the business part of it, of course,
• 1:36:03
  like I said, I don't think there's any year for the last 15
• 1:36:08
  years that have not been involved in business.
• 1:36:11
  I will always find a way into business, right and we are into
• 1:36:16
  business, right. So that really helped me.
• 1:36:18
  That really shaped my thinking as it made me to become a better
• 1:36:23
  person, right? So as well as writing is
• 1:36:26
  concerned. I would really call myself.
• 1:36:29
  A gifted writer, right? I just started writing because I
• 1:36:32
  don't want to share my story, the couple, or just to make it
• 1:36:34
  part. I just want to put my stories,
• 1:36:38
  the books and that is go across the world to to change people,
• 1:36:42
  right. And I put a lot of work to do
• 1:36:44
  it. Of course I know some people
• 1:36:46
  are, they are gifted and talented writer, but I'm not one
• 1:36:49
  of them, right? I I put a lot of hard work to
• 1:36:52
  write them that that that that I've been able to publish right?
• 1:36:57
  And. I think I have some time now, my
• 1:37:00
  most out of that space, but. I think in.
• 1:37:02
  The near future with the event that has happened in my life the
• 1:37:05
  last couple of years, I think I should be able to put some of
• 1:37:07
  them into a book, right? And I'm grateful for people that
• 1:37:11
  have read some of my books, you know, some of them do.
• 1:37:13
  So they usually reach out. Like you said, your book check
• 1:37:17
  changed my life, impacted my life positively and understand
• 1:37:20
  I'm grateful for you for taking the time to read my book right
• 1:37:23
  on more. Stick on him right now.
• 1:37:26
  Visit is working on his life. I want to become a better
• 1:37:29
  person. Like you guys said that the next
• 1:37:31
  book will give you and shoot you to the moon.
• 1:37:35
  Interesting. So what are some of the great?
• 1:37:37
  Things we should be. Expecting from Vincent idea of a
• 1:37:40
  you know in the next couple of years ohh so many things that
• 1:37:45
  I'm. Working about again.
• 1:37:47
  I'm human like everyone and we should know that no future is
• 1:37:51
  guarantee your only guarantee of the this one minute right in the
• 1:37:54
  next one minute. We don't know what can happen
• 1:37:58
  but. Again.
• 1:38:00
  I'm positive and I'm optimistic that I'm going to be here for
• 1:38:02
  for for some time. One of my biggest goal is to run
• 1:38:09
  for governor in my state and also run for president of
• 1:38:12
  Nigeria at the point in my life. Alright, again, Like I said, I
• 1:38:17
  also want to run an edge fund, which is something that I'm
• 1:38:21
  working on now. And I also want to consolidate
• 1:38:26
  or some of my not-for-profit work that I did some years back,
• 1:38:31
  right? I I want a platform that can
• 1:38:34
  help children from poor homes to access quality education.
• 1:38:39
  Because without education I won't be who and where I am
• 1:38:43
  today. It is almost impossible.
• 1:38:45
  Education changed my life, right?
• 1:38:49
  So unfortunate that some of my friends that will grow.
• 1:38:52
  Up in the market and many of them.
• 1:38:53
  That were unable to afford their education.
• 1:38:55
  Some of them are similar market today, right?
• 1:38:58
  And here I am in here, what's the difference?
• 1:39:00
  Education, right? So education is very important,
• 1:39:04
  your passport to the world, you have education, there's nothing
• 1:39:08
  you cannot become. So I want to really invest in
• 1:39:12
  FP4 kids, elegant kids, kids from a poor community, community
• 1:39:18
  that are educationally marginalised.
• 1:39:20
  I want to be able to help many of these kids to to succeed.
• 1:39:24
  I want to give them a voice, I want to give them a chance to
• 1:39:28
  also see. So it is something that also
• 1:39:31
  look forward to achieving the nearest future.
• 1:39:34
  I'll be doing it on a small scale now, but it is something
• 1:39:37
  that I really want to build into a bigger scale so that we can
• 1:39:40
  also help out many kids with similar story with similar but
• 1:39:43
  not like mine to also succeed. Interesting.
• 1:39:48
  So what would? You say have been the.
• 1:39:50
  Great accomplishments, you know, that stick out for you, that
• 1:39:54
  you're really proud of, you know, in your entire life and
• 1:39:58
  career. So what are these
• 1:40:00
  accomplishments that you know have been, have given you proud
• 1:40:04
  moments, and you are? Continuously.
• 1:40:07
  Proud of as a person. I would have been alive.
• 1:40:12
  Right. Wow.
• 1:40:15
  Yeah. But it takes a lot of.
• 1:40:16
  Discipline to be alive, right? Because of my life today.
• 1:40:20
  That's why I'm still. Dreaming, right, that's.
• 1:40:22
  Why? I'm still planning for the
• 1:40:23
  future and that's my biggest achievement with my background
• 1:40:28
  and everything, I could have resulted into crime, right?
• 1:40:34
  Because ohh do we have grown. Up.
• 1:40:37
  Probably today I could have been been a criminal.
• 1:40:41
  And. There are some of my friends are
• 1:40:42
  right now you know I don't want to talk about talk about some
• 1:40:47
  other thing they they got into right.
• 1:40:49
  Having that grace, you know, to put my head on the ground, still
• 1:40:54
  humble, keep working every day is my biggest achievement,
• 1:40:58
  right? And also having my kids to call
• 1:41:03
  me a mentor and their role model is also an achievement that I'm
• 1:41:07
  proud for. Like my daughter, you know, they
• 1:41:09
  ask her to talk about what she. Loves about.
• 1:41:12
  Her There, I see my dad is a lot.
• 1:41:15
  You know, my dad is hard working, so having to pass those
• 1:41:19
  values to my kids is also something I'm proud of, the fact
• 1:41:23
  that my kids who are describing with those words.
• 1:41:27
  He gave me. A sense of fulfilment.
• 1:41:30
  Right on. I'm proud of it.
• 1:41:32
  Right on the I'm proud of being alive, like I've mentioned and
• 1:41:37
  and I'm proud of everything that I've achieved.
• 1:41:39
  Right? And I'm also proud of my
• 1:41:41
  failure, right? Because the reason those failure
• 1:41:44
  actually happened was because I wanted to succeed, right, The
• 1:41:49
  top one. I couldn't achieve the result I
• 1:41:51
  wanted. But I'm proud of all my failures
• 1:41:54
  as well, because I also pick important lesson from them,
• 1:41:58
  right? And I know those failure, those
• 1:42:00
  experiences are going to play important roles in the success
• 1:42:03
  that I'm going to be achieved, I'm going to achieve in the near
• 1:42:07
  future. So those are the things that.
• 1:42:09
  I'm proud of and. I'm also proud of you right now
• 1:42:11
  because you know, we met. You know you.
• 1:42:15
  We met. You know, you, yeah, yeah.
• 1:42:20
  Lovely back UK. I'm in New York.
• 1:42:23
  And not just that. You're UK, you are making a
• 1:42:26
  positive impact, right? Because you just started the
• 1:42:29
  podcast, you don't really know the extent of what you are
• 1:42:32
  doing, right? You don't know the impact that
• 1:42:35
  this content you are putting outside there you don't know.
• 1:42:38
  The. You have no idea of the impact
• 1:42:40
  that's going to make in the near future, right?
• 1:42:42
  In the next 20 years, 30 years, people are going to come back to
• 1:42:45
  some of these podcasts they're going to listen to.
• 1:42:46
  Some of this. Story and it's going to inspire
• 1:42:48
  them. So I'm also proud of you for
• 1:42:51
  being deliberate, for always wanting to give back to the
• 1:42:54
  community, and it means a lot to me.
• 1:42:58
  Yeah. Thank you.
• 1:42:59
  Thank you very, very much. So what?
• 1:43:02
  What are your? Hobbies and interests.
• 1:43:04
  I read a lot. I know I read a lot.
• 1:43:07
  Because wow. Leaders, so they say.
• 1:43:13
  I read a lot. I read a lot.
• 1:43:15
  I read a lot. And I mean it.
• 1:43:17
  I read a lot. So Speaking of books, right?
• 1:43:20
  Like what books? What?
• 1:43:22
  Let me OK, like, what would be the top five books you would
• 1:43:25
  recommend to the audience you know to succeed in life and
• 1:43:28
  business? These are 7 habits of highly
• 1:43:32
  effective. People by Stephen Gobby.
• 1:43:34
  That book really saved my life. The book on management's richest
• 1:43:38
  man in Babylon is superb Book on personal finance.
• 1:43:42
  Your book is you check out is very small but because the very
• 1:43:46
  small for that book really shaped my life.
• 1:43:50
  I think the third one is Were Born Rich, You Were Buried by
• 1:43:56
  Bob Proctor. It is also an amazing book on On
• 1:44:01
  a personal finance. Then I would say the story of
• 1:44:05
  Malcolm X right at the Autobiography of Malcolm X is
• 1:44:08
  also. A very powerful.
• 1:44:09
  Book. You know, I read that book and I
• 1:44:12
  was really inspired, right? Because my comments also had a
• 1:44:16
  very not too good beginning, but he was able.
• 1:44:20
  To move his. Life into something that become
• 1:44:24
  a positive influence to millions of people across the world.
• 1:44:29
  That is All right. I think my #5 is going to be a
• 1:44:34
  tough pick, right? Because I I read a lot of, I
• 1:44:39
  read a lot of great books, right?
• 1:44:42
  I think my #5. My. #5 Alright.
• 1:44:53
  Yeah, talk. Maybe Audacity of Hope by Barack
• 1:44:57
  Obama, right? Ohh, you had you had to pick
• 1:45:00
  your mind. I was also inspired by By
• 1:45:04
  everything. And in that book and you see
• 1:45:07
  those books, you can see that they were like a blend, right.
• 1:45:09
  So I don't just read management or leadership alone.
• 1:45:17
  I tried to kind of have like a diverse kind of knowledge base
• 1:45:22
  when it comes to books. So I read book from personal
• 1:45:25
  finance to leadership to management or even normal
• 1:45:30
  motivational books like you know by Liz Brown, by TD Jakes, by
• 1:45:36
  Miss Muro. And I think some of some books,
• 1:45:40
  some Maduro book actually also shaped my life.
• 1:45:44
  Especially fun fact. Team before Wow.
• 1:45:53
  Wow. Somebody would have.
• 1:45:55
  Loved me because I learned. Very fast I.
• 1:45:59
  Listened to some of his species. And his messages.
• 1:46:03
  And you know, you know, they wake you up.
• 1:46:06
  They wake you up, right. So I I just try to kind of read
• 1:46:11
  our knowledge and if I'm going to pick number six, I know you
• 1:46:14
  asked for five is 1 Nation why initially other honourable
• 1:46:19
  mentions coming in. He's just unbelievable, right?
• 1:46:24
  And I I encourage people to pick up the book You know why Nation
• 1:46:28
  Fail is is a good that will shape your life.
• 1:46:31
  We help you to understand how countries that we see as the
• 1:46:35
  developed country today, how they evolve over time and to
• 1:46:38
  also give you a basic understanding of why we are
• 1:46:42
  stuck in Africa, right and what we can do differently.
• 1:46:45
  Those books, amazing books are that you know we should pick up
• 1:46:49
  and read Interesting. So I think 2 two book.
• 1:46:53
  Recommendations are from me that I, I, and I think you might you
• 1:46:57
  might have come across them. Did you ever read I Think and
• 1:47:00
  Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill? Is.
• 1:47:04
  I have. I think that that that would
• 1:47:07
  kind of shift my life like my. Father gave me a very young age.
• 1:47:12
  The great will prepare then. The the other book you talked.
• 1:47:16
  About you know why? You know about the Pillars of
• 1:47:19
  Africa, right? Reminds me of this other book,
• 1:47:22
  The Jewish Phenomenon. No, I'm not ready yet.
• 1:47:26
  So. Basically, the book is.
• 1:47:28
  About. The Jewish communities and the
• 1:47:31
  principles you know, they apply 7 principles that actually help
• 1:47:33
  them to be successful, especially financially.
• 1:47:37
  Yes, it's, it's, it's a very fantastic read.
• 1:47:41
  At the end of the podcast, I'll send you a soft copy of the
• 1:47:44
  book. Ohh.
• 1:47:45
  Thank you. I appreciate it.
• 1:47:46
  I appreciate it. Yeah.
• 1:47:47
  Yeah, you. You're welcome.
• 1:47:49
  So what's the use of competences or abilities do you think you
• 1:47:53
  have and you're proud of, but people don't really know about.
• 1:47:56
  So let me give you an example. I think for a long time, right,
• 1:48:00
  a lot of people did not know that I I'm a great chef.
• 1:48:04
  Like I can cook, but then, you know, people just don't we
• 1:48:07
  refinance. I know back when when Nigeria, I
• 1:48:09
  used to teach, you know, because professional accounting students
• 1:48:13
  for iCloud, ACC. So a lot of people just know me
• 1:48:17
  as a finance guy and some people know me as the MMA pundits.
• 1:48:22
  You know, I'm one of the top Nigerians in the field of you
• 1:48:25
  know, analysis for mixed martial arts.
• 1:48:29
  But they didn't know that, oh, this guy could cook.
• 1:48:32
  So for you what? What is it?
• 1:48:33
  What is it that you're really me?
• 1:48:39
  For me. I I and I think it's gonna.
• 1:48:41
  Be similar to yours too. Right.
• 1:48:44
  You know, people don't also know that I love to cook, right?
• 1:48:47
  Of course I'm not a professional chef, but I could very well and
• 1:48:52
  I think it was when I was very, very.
• 1:48:57
  Young when I was. Very young, so cooking for me.
• 1:49:00
  Then #2 is a. A lot of people also know that.
• 1:49:06
  I also I. Trade, right.
• 1:49:09
  So I trade stores. I trade it.
• 1:49:12
  Yeah. I'm I'm very, very active.
• 1:49:16
  In. In the stock.
• 1:49:17
  Market, right? I read a lot, I'm able to
• 1:49:20
  analyse companies, you know, look at their trend in the last
• 1:49:23
  couple of years and decide if it is something that once you
• 1:49:27
  consider for investment. And I know how to read some
• 1:49:31
  technicals when they come to Candlestick, like like Rival Up
• 1:49:36
  Train. And.
• 1:49:36
  Some of this stuff, you know, I know how they work.
• 1:49:39
  That's impressive. That's impressive.
• 1:49:41
  Did you ever trade crypto? No, no no.
• 1:49:44
  Because I couldn't answer is highly.
• 1:49:46
  Volatile. Research on crypto I could not
• 1:49:49
  really point finger. To where the value is coming
• 1:49:51
  from, right. So because of that, I did not I
• 1:49:54
  I could not just. I could not just.
• 1:49:56
  See where. What?
• 1:49:57
  What the value is, right? You know, it's just more like
• 1:50:00
  speculation. Obviously.
• 1:50:01
  Is going to do this Is going to do this.
• 1:50:03
  And it was a lot of risk so I I tried to manage my risk but ETF
• 1:50:08
  bonds you know stock I'm. I'm very very active right now
• 1:50:15
  like I said because it aligned with my future plan.
• 1:50:18
  Like I said, I want to manage an edge fund later.
• 1:50:22
  In life, so because of. That I tried to get involved in
• 1:50:25
  the market to understand how different events actually
• 1:50:30
  determine investor response to a particular stock or to a
• 1:50:34
  particular company, and it's been a great experience for me.
• 1:50:37
  A lot of people don't know, people don't even know about
• 1:50:40
  sports. Is something that that I really
• 1:50:43
  find exciting and I I read a lot about it and I do a lot of
• 1:50:47
  research and a lot of. Learning about it.
• 1:50:50
  Interested. So what advice do you have for?
• 1:50:54
  Upcoming businesses and you know, young people are in
• 1:50:57
  general. Yeah, just just just go for your
• 1:51:01
  dreams, right? Go for it.
• 1:51:04
  And I mean it. Go for it.
• 1:51:06
  A lot of people are gonna tell you that it is not possible.
• 1:51:10
  Don't listen to them because the people that go to tell that this
• 1:51:14
  is not possible is people that have never done anything great.
• 1:51:19
  If you meet a landmark today and tell amount that you have.
• 1:51:21
  This idea he's gonna. Tell you it is possible because
• 1:51:23
  Elon Musk has done the impossible on many occasions.
• 1:51:27
  If you meet Mark, look back to that and say you have an idea,
• 1:51:30
  go to tell. Even if it's going to fail, it's
• 1:51:31
  good to tell you to go for it, right?
• 1:51:33
  You know when you started Facebook in 2000 and three 2004,
• 1:51:36
  somebody has told him that you're going to become one of
• 1:51:39
  the richest people on earth Without social media platform.
• 1:51:42
  Probably it wouldn't have believed, right?
• 1:51:45
  Well, it's for people that have never achieved anything great,
• 1:51:48
  and I'm sorry to say it my would be your parents.
• 1:51:51
  They will tell you it is not possible.
• 1:51:53
  Please don't listen to them, right.
• 1:51:55
  Rather go after your dream so that at the end of the day you
• 1:51:58
  can make them proud, right? Please go after your dreams.
• 1:52:03
  There are. Many things I've done in my life
• 1:52:04
  that people told me whenever possible, but I I didn't listen
• 1:52:08
  to them right. I decided to give it a shot and.
• 1:52:13
  On most. Occasions I was able to achieve
• 1:52:16
  those things. In instances where I couldn't
• 1:52:20
  achieve them, the learning experience is something that
• 1:52:23
  will stay with me for the rest of my life and just learning
• 1:52:26
  experience will be important on future.
• 1:52:31
  Projects, Right? So please.
• 1:52:33
  Go after your dream. Many people told Barack Obama
• 1:52:35
  that it is not possible, possible, Not possible.
• 1:52:41
  It's always not possible until you.
• 1:52:43
  Prove that it is possible to Yes we can.
• 1:52:46
  Why people were telling me telling?
• 1:52:47
  Him. It was not possible, he said.
• 1:52:49
  Yes, we can, right. Not possible.
• 1:52:54
  That was the response. From people.
• 1:52:55
  Like how would a black man become the president of the
• 1:52:58
  United States of America? But rather than listening to
• 1:53:01
  them, he said yes, we can. A lot of people never believe
• 1:53:06
  that. America was.
• 1:53:08
  Going to be able to put a man on the moon in 1969?
• 1:53:12
  Neil Armstrong right, it was it was not possible how you get to
• 1:53:16
  the. Moon.
• 1:53:17
  But because they have the yes we can spirit, we did it.
• 1:53:21
  They did it. So many of the achievements that
• 1:53:23
  you see in the world today, many of the progress that you've seen
• 1:53:27
  in the world today. There were many pessimists at
• 1:53:30
  every point in that. I said it was not possible,
• 1:53:33
  right? But despite the fact that they.
• 1:53:35
  Said it was not possible. Today we see all those things as
• 1:53:39
  ordinary. Things they are not.
• 1:53:40
  Ordinary. Some people actually heard that
• 1:53:43
  we can do a spirit. Some people just they had that
• 1:53:47
  determination, that resilience they put in the hard work.
• 1:53:50
  And that's why today you see these things as the part of
• 1:53:55
  progress that the world has made.
• 1:53:57
  So please, I want you to know that your dreams are valid,
• 1:54:00
  right? I don't know what your dream is
• 1:54:01
  seen as much and not involved in crime.
• 1:54:03
  I want you to know that your dreams are valid and people
• 1:54:06
  don't need to believe in your dream for you that she reached
• 1:54:09
  in fact when it would be late too much in your dream, then it
• 1:54:11
  means something is wrong. Believe in your dream for you to
• 1:54:19
  achieve. It it is.
• 1:54:20
  Just about. You go after your dream, putting
• 1:54:24
  all the hard work. Be deliberate, be consistent.
• 1:54:29
  You are going to fail. But in that phase of failure
• 1:54:33
  develop resilience, All those things in place.
• 1:54:38
  I want you to know that nobody and not your head will be able
• 1:54:43
  to stop you from achieving your dreams.
• 1:54:46
  So those those are gonna be my advice to anyone, young people
• 1:54:49
  outside there that are listening or they are that are watching
• 1:54:52
  sports cars. And just look at my story, look
• 1:54:55
  at how I started losing my mom, my dad, my grandma before I was
• 1:54:58
  5, right? Not being able to score one of
• 1:55:02
  our ten in my in my English class work at the age of 89 and
• 1:55:10
  see where I am today. That is power dream.
• 1:55:13
  That is power of consistency, that is power of hardware,
• 1:55:16
  right? And I want you to know that.
• 1:55:19
  All your dreams are. Achievable.
• 1:55:20
  So please go for them. Speaking of, great for it.
• 1:55:25
  You know when I. Was about inside the podcast,
• 1:55:31
  right? I had quite a number of people
• 1:55:33
  who were close to me who, you know, discouraged me from
• 1:55:38
  starting it at. He knows he hurts when it's
• 1:55:40
  painful. You know when people do not
• 1:55:42
  believe in a dream, but when you believe in your own dream and
• 1:55:45
  you know that your dream is actually going to make impact
• 1:55:51
  and it's going to succeed, you need to believe in yourself
• 1:55:54
  because you have that responsibility.
• 1:55:58
  The owners of believing in yourself lies on you and you
• 1:56:01
  only. You cannot make another person
• 1:56:04
  believe in your dream. But it's not their dream, it is
• 1:56:07
  your dream. A lot of times people tend to
• 1:56:09
  want to place us in boxes. You know, some people feel like
• 1:56:12
  why would the finance guy be a podcaster, right?
• 1:56:15
  You're already good with finance, like this is your own
• 1:56:18
  thing peace thing, that's finance box.
• 1:56:20
  But then people can actually make impacts and give back to
• 1:56:24
  society in you know different ways in which they are talented,
• 1:56:29
  in which they are gifted, you know and can impact society.
• 1:56:32
  So always go for. It.
• 1:56:35
  Go for it, of course, you know, he said, adding overseas.
• 1:56:38
  So, so we have, you know, a tradition at the end of the
• 1:56:41
  port, so we usually have the current guests.
• 1:56:45
  Leave a question for the next guest and you know the neck.
• 1:56:49
  The current guests answer the question from the previous
• 1:56:52
  guest. So do you want to know the
• 1:56:54
  question that was left for? OK, so this question.
• 1:56:59
  Was actually for you from. Another chartered accountant.
• 1:57:03
  That's actually what you know do so he stays with you.
• 1:57:07
  What are you doing to impact the next generation?
• 1:57:11
  Yeah, thank you. Very important question.
• 1:57:14
  Right there. Yeah, I'm actually trying to
• 1:57:16
  lead to, OK, Like I said, I have an NGO that we support education
• 1:57:23
  of four kids. We just want to give them a
• 1:57:26
  chance to succeed Right on. I also share my story on
• 1:57:31
  LinkedIn. Right.
• 1:57:32
  On lot of people they reach out to me that.
• 1:57:36
  Progression. Of my stories and they were
• 1:57:38
  really inspired, right? Also run the.
• 1:57:43
  Ubuntu founder. Community, which is a community
• 1:57:47
  where founders come together to help one another to succeed,
• 1:57:52
  right? So those are my little ways of
• 1:57:55
  giving back to the community now, to giving back to the
• 1:57:58
  society, and that has made me who I am, right?
• 1:58:02
  And I'm. Hoping that in the near.
• 1:58:06
  Future I'm able. To consolidate on some of these
• 1:58:09
  projects and scale them up into something that will be able to
• 1:58:13
  impact millions of people across the world, Fantastic.
• 1:58:17
  So what question would you? Like to leave for the next
• 1:58:19
  guest? Ohh.
• 1:58:23
  My question is going to. Be.
• 1:58:26
  If you are going to die next week.
• 1:58:28
  What is the most? Important thing that you think
• 1:58:30
  you will do between now and that next week, so you're.
• 1:58:34
  Gonna die next week. What are the?
• 1:58:37
  Most important things you being, you need to do between now and
• 1:58:41
  next week. Well, the next guest has their
• 1:58:45
  work cut out for them right there at this point.
• 1:58:49
  Thank you very much. Thank you very much.
• 1:58:52
  It's been a long, insightful session.
• 1:58:58
  A lot of wisdom has been bestowed upon us in this
• 1:59:02
  session. So I'll give you the opportunity
• 1:59:05
  to give a shout out to anybody you would like to shout out to
• 1:59:10
  before we call it an. Episode.
• 1:59:16
  Today, that's. It's got a bit of my wife,
• 1:59:20
  right? Because behind every successful
• 1:59:25
  man. And I'm not.
• 1:59:25
  Successful yet, right? I'm judging that there's.
• 1:59:30
  Always a woman, right? So I want to say thank you to my
• 1:59:35
  wife. She's she's been an amazing
• 1:59:38
  woman, right? And I appreciate all that
• 1:59:41
  support on the road as she's also played my life.
• 1:59:45
  And in helping. Us to raise our kids in the way
• 1:59:49
  we want to raise them. And I'm also proud of our Of
• 1:59:52
  course she's also an accountant. We both work in in consulting.
• 1:59:57
  I know. Our difficulty is when both
• 2:00:00
  husband and wife are working in the consulting right and they
• 2:00:03
  have kids to raise and and all. So I want to say thank you to
• 2:00:07
  her for all the hard work and I'm proud of everything that she
• 2:00:10
  has achieved. Also to my family members have
• 2:00:14
  mentioned her name, my uncle Mr Henry and his wife, right then,
• 2:00:19
  that we're delighted to have been.
• 2:00:22
  Positive influence in my life and I would say, in that order,
• 2:00:26
  right? And also to my friends, my
• 2:00:29
  colleagues and everyone outside there who?
• 2:00:32
  Has always. Believed in me, Wagholi reached
• 2:00:35
  out to support me one way or the other.
• 2:00:38
  I want to say a very big thank you to all of you.
• 2:00:40
  I do not take your support for granted.
• 2:00:45
  They mean a lot to me and make sure to know that I will always
• 2:00:50
  put in all the necessary work. So continue to make you guys
• 2:00:53
  proud and this is just a. List I'm gonna become.
• 2:00:58
  This is going to be the least. I'm gonna be every day I walk
• 2:01:02
  out and I know that God is going to crown that all my effort and
• 2:01:06
  hard work with success stories that we.
• 2:01:10
  Inspire people. Across the globe.
• 2:01:13
  Wow, what? For.
• 2:01:15
  I want to see if. There be thank you for your
• 2:01:17
  time, brother. I wish you the very, very best
• 2:01:22
  in all of your endeavours. I wish were greatly into proof
• 2:01:25
  of great greater heights for you only.
• 2:01:28
  So thank you very much and God bless you.
• 2:01:31
  Thanks so much. OK.
• 2:01:34
  So how did this? Ladies and gentlemen.
• 2:01:39
  You'll once again welcome to another.
• 2:01:41
  Episode of the King Games Podcast I've got exciting news
• 2:01:44
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