Meet Fife Banks: Entrepreneur helping families build transgenerational wealth

From having a diploma in Electrical Electronics Engineering to a first degree was in Computer Science, Fife Banks didn’t relent on his pursuit and love for developing capacity in helping business people, executives and professionals make the most of their career and ventures. As the Managing Partner/CEO at BraveICONS Global, an emerging, global professional services firm [Management Consulting, Advisory & Optimization] Fife BANKS invests in, and collaborates with brave clients to develop shared and sustainable prosperity in their ecosystems through the optimization of Transactions and Talents. He is also the Managing Partner at BRAVE® by BraveICONS Global Multi-Family Office LLP, a boutique firm of Subject Matter Experts helping high-net-worth African families build transgenerational wealth. In this interesting with Ifeoma Okeke-Korieocha, he speaks on how he leverages partnerships to build wealth for families and individuals.

What inspired you to go into this really exceptional business ? Did you have any experience growing up or you just feel it’s a vision you have always had ? Kindly share with us.

I started out in the sciences. In fact, I have a diploma in Electrical Electronics Engineering and my first degree was in Computer Science although from as young as age four, my late father ensured i started reading encyclopeadias which resulted not only in my virile and resourceful mind but also in my capacity and affinity for learning. However, while I was a sophomore in the University, I gradually discovered that I was the go-to-person by a lot of folks who were venturing into business and a lot of people were also reaching out to me for career advice and everyone seems to be getting some value. So, I doubled down on developing capacity to help business people, executives and professionals make the most of their career and ventures. Over the years, my career journey had always come to the intersection of adding value to people, policies, transactions and investments.

Can you take us through the journey of founding BraveICONS Global. How long has the company existed and how has operations been for you in Nigeria?

BraveICONS Global was registered in 2014 as a Management Consulting firm and we started operations a few years later in Lagos although I had earlier been inspired to leave Lagos which I eventually did in 2016, to Abuja, FCT and during that period, the business went through a Phoenix experience in the sense that nothing was happening for a few years and then in 2018, we started reconsolidating and refocusing the firm as a premium professional services firm with our current focal areas of practice which are Transactions and Talents Advisory.

Running an indigenous professional services firm with a global outlook in a nation like Nigeria comes with diverse challenges not just because of the millieu in which we operate but also because of the mindset of the average client who sometimes would rather hire the likes of KPMG, Accenture, PWC or EY but what you will find out is that although these big brands have their strategic advantages but we also have ours and in certain instances, indigenous firms like BraveICONS Global have a distinct edge brought about by contextual, local intelligence not to mention that at BraveICONS Global, our team of consultants and advisors are also very well grounded, experienced and accomplished A-list professionals who have demonstrated over time better value for money for clients.

How do you help high-net-worth African families build transgenerational wealth?

Sometimes ago, circa 2008/2009, I was working in Port Harcourt and living in a friend’s family house and literally speaking, the family came into sudden wealth because the patriarch was promoted to a very juicy position in this nation. Unfortunately, I saw how with bad advice coming from so-called loyalists and many wrong business and investment decisions thereafter, the family went from wealthy to average. So, during COVID-19, while I was reflecting on that experience, I got inspired to start a Family Office which is something that has always been in my consciousness and after some deep reflections, I realized that the story of my friend’s family fortune to belt-tightening is not unique and there are many more stories like that in Nigeria and across Africa. So, I decided to instead of starting a personal family office for Fife Banks, to rather partner with some very well accomplished subject matter experts in providing Multi-Family Office services and solutions to high net worth families who desire to lead a prosperity lifestyle and leave a prosperity legacy. I have been extremely favored to have the kind of partners I have in the Multi-Family Office business and we are gradually building that aspect of our business. It’s called: BRAVE by BraveICONS Global.

How do you collaborate with clients to develop shared and sustainable prosperity in their ecosystems ?

For us, collaboration doesn’t begin with the client, it runs deep into how we do business as a professional service firm. Internally, we do two different types of hiring -engagement of consultants, advisors and subject matter experts as well as employment of in-house shared services and support staff who run our day-to-day operations. So, to run such a dynamic, multi generation structure requires strategic collaboration, an intentional cooperation to create and optimize value for the client. We bring this same orientation into client scenarios and work with them to not only diagnose root causes but also to design, develop and deliver unique interventions that optimizes their transactions and talents. We have found out that when you involve the client in the solution and value creation process, ownership of the solution becomes easier than if you just impose your views. So, rather than just copy and paste, we will rather bring our expertise and experience to help clients create and adapt cost-effective solutions that guarantees remarkable returns on investment whether we are advising on transactions or we are helping with the optimization of their most important assets -their talents.

What you do seems different and totally uncommon. How has patronage and acceptance been from people ?

Well, what we do is that we do things differently even though we are essentially a Management Consulting and Advisory firm. However, we are guided by an unusual ‘thoughtware’ which I often describe as the Prosperity Paradigm and we also have an uncommon set of metrics by which we measure the ‘prosperity’ of the firm. I shed more light on this ‘prosperity’ principle in public speaking engagements and in my upcoming book. So, patronage has been great and keeps getting better because even though we are pitching similar solutions as you see with top management consulting firms who play in our field and are referred to as the big four or big five, our ‘Davidic’ advantage is that instead of relying on well-oiled but outdated strategies, we are learning to throw stones better, focusing on blue ocean strategies and strategic execution while paying attention to details and providing real value to clients and not just a pile of documents that often end up gathering dust on shelves.

Sometimes, we have prospects that are still influenced by primordial loyalties to the big names but through strategic promotions and sponsorship as well as doing our job well, we are positioning our brand to engage with our ideal clientele.

You have almost two decades commercial experience; working with multifunctional teams in multicultural contexts at the intersection of people, policy, business, international trade, investments and sustainable development. How has these work experiences helped shape what you currently do ?

I am grateful for all the opportunities I have had in my career and all the people I have been privileged to work with across the private, public and development sectors, either in employment, on consulting projects and even on volunteering assignments as all these had contributed immensely to my professional and business outlook. I have been described by clients and colleagues as the Al-Kazneh (the treasury) for what they term exceptional charisma, competence and contextual intelligence but I must say that first, I am grateful to GOD and to my late father while I also genuinely appreciate the amazing people I have worked for, and worked with over the course of my career. Now either as a consultant, an executive coach or a transaction advisor or even as Managing Partner/CEO at BraveICONS Global and other businesses and organizations I am associated with, I am still working for, and working with people I learn from on a daily basis. For me, learning is lifestyle and this helps me to be able to bring value into any client scenario.

What are the major challenges you face in this business ?

The major challenges I have faced in business are what I can describe as growth challenges and we are overcoming them gradually. For example, in the beginning, regulatory compliance was not fully in place as we tried to consolidate but now, we are fully compliant and can do business with, and provide services to government and multilateral organizations. To overcome that challenge in the past, we have had to synergize and worked with partner firms as a consortium to deliver on some of our interventions and we still do collaborate with partner firms who share our vision and values. We have also had the challenge of moving the business from Lagos to Abuja leading to a short-term shutdown of business activities and loss of clients but now we are grateful that we have staff members and associates in Lagos and other parts of the world.

In helping families build transgenerational wealth, can you share a few success stories you have had in this regard?

In helping families build transgenerational wealth, one of the primary understanding we now have is that no two high net worth families are ever the same even when the dynamics appear extremely similar. Talking about success story, we recently advised a family client on their international business expansion and had since helped them with US registration even as we are helping them secure US residency through investment, a route that more wealthy families are now recognizing as a new asset class in wealth management because it is essentially modern-day life insurance policy for the family, especially at uncertain times and alsoa bequeathable asset that can be passed on to family generations. There is another family we are helping to rebrand and restructure their family business to ensure the next generation are invested and interested in taking the business into the future.

Do you leverage on partnerships to excel in what you do? If you do, kindly explain the kind of partnerships and how they help you accelerate your services.

Absolutely, we leverage our strategic partnerships locally and internationally. For instance, when our family office clients began to ask us about second citizenship and particularly about the EB5, the Unites States Citizenship By Investment program, we are lucky to be the official partners of the Invest In the USA (IIUSA) which is a US government-recognized association of approved regional centers who offer EB5 investment opportunities and we often bring our partners (IIUSA and other reguonal centres) to Nigeria to engage with investors and provide reliable information while we help them through the process. In addition, we have some of the best US immigration attorneys like SummitLaw USA as our partners who work together with us to help clients through the EB5 journey and one of the reasons we partner with Summit Law USA for example is that one of the partners, Attorney Ademola Akande went through the EB5 program himself. So, it’s not just about expertise and experience helping other people, it is also about personal experience for him and his family.

Locally also, we have a retinue of partner organizations and firms as well as associates and affiliates we work with. The truth is that, the business landscape has shifted significantly from the days of cutthroat competition to the days of co-opetition when you need the leverage of strategic partnerships to deliver long-standing value in the marketplace. So, we are big on collaborations but are mindful of who we partner with.

Your services seem to be for the high-net-worth. Was it deliberate to leave out the average Nigerian and the poor from these services ? If so, why ?

Not actually. Our corporate strategy adopts the Pareito 80-20 principle meaning that 20 percent of our activities are targeted at SMEs besides the fact that I personally have a lot of engagement with young people startups and small businesses through my office as the Chairman, Young CEOs at the Abuja Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI), as FCT Coordinator, NACCIMA Youth Entrepreneurs (NYE), as Special Adviser to NACCIMA National President to NYE and also as Abuja Team Lead for Covenant Capital, a social impact arm of the Covenant Nation helping professionals and entrepreneurs maximize their careers.

So, the average Nigerian benefits from our services and expertise either directly or indirectly even as many of our clients serve majority of the populace in their own businesses that we provide strategic support for.

Did you have any humble beginnings you would like to share as a motivation for entrepreneurs looking to emulate what you are doing ?

Of course! I wasn’t born with a silver spoon but I would love to give my children a golden spoon. I am however grateful for my parents who made education and learning a major priority while we were growing up. My late father was the youngest professor of analytical chemistry in his time and he worked in the academia and some government-funded research institutes like NCRI, Badegi, IITA in Ibadan etc and my mum retired as a headmistress. Losing my father at an early age; I was barely eight when he passed at the age of 44. This was a major blow to our family finance and it was tough for my mum to raise my brother and I but we thank God for His faithfulness over the years. My charge to entrepreneurs would be to never have a short-term thinking in a long-term world and for them to also invest in, and appreciate relationships.

Nigeria is facing some economic downturn at the moment, including the free fall of the naira. How has this affected your operations and patronage?

Nigeria’s current situation is an outcome of long-term mismanagement and rudderless leadership but we have a chance in our lifetime to turn things around. Personally, I love challenges and in terms of the economic condition affecting business, the cost of services has increased significantly and rapidly. All I would say is that GOD is helping us to navigate the murky waters as we prepare to set sail on high and deep waters. However, as Bravehearts, we are not of them that turn back due to bad weather and since we have been learning to ride the tide, we can only thrive.

How many African countries do you extend your services to ?

Currently, we are operating in Nigeria and have an outpost in the United States with my Partner, Temitope Paulson running the Chicago office but we are looking at extending our businesses to other African countries in the nearest future and this vision has also been empowered by the African Continental Free Trade Agreement covering services like ours. We are currently raising friends in places like Rwanda, Cameroun and Ghana.