I’m going to speak to you today about three things that I find important to me when I speak to entrepreneurs. First is, entrepreneurship itself and what it means. Second is, dignity and love. Third is failure, and I’ll wrap up with what I believe your mandate should be.
So, let’s talk about entrepreneurship. When you read my profile, you probably think that I’m just successful and yet, I’m the biggest failure I know. For every positive outcome, I’ve probably failed one hundred times. Entrepreneurship is tough. I like to say entrepreneurship is doing God’s work – you can’t be paid enough for it. Getting a job is easier. When you’re an entrepreneur, people go home and sleep because you are awake. The month ends are the worst, right? When those salaries are due along with other payments in addition to various frustrations like supplier etc. One is often frustrated as all the bills come in at the same time.
I am yet to meet an entrepreneur that will tell you that every day is not a new lifetime. The curveballs just come at you and you are dodging them every day. You are doing God’s work. You are feeding families. People are going to school because of you. People are having dreams, planning because of you.
I incubate almost a thousand entrepreneurs every year, and they all have different stories. I’m lucky enough to be at the table when I see them thinking about their dreams, lives, and ambitions. Entrepreneurship is for those that God has called. So, congratulations on being called by God. There are over 35 million MSMEs (Micro, small and medium enterprises) in Nigeria.
As an entrepreneur, the first thing you must do is to play to your own advantage, your uniqueness is very important. Do not try and copy other people’s ideas.
Over 350 Million MSMEs on the continent, that’s a ratio of one to four. One in four Africans is an entrepreneur and one in five Nigerian is an entrepreneur. The thing about entrepreneurship in Africa that I like the most is that most entrepreneurs are women. It is also represented here today in the graduation ceremony. Our women are our best thing on the continent. They have been ruling this world for over 10,000 years, and not just in business or family. Yet for some reason, we don’t celebrate and appreciate them enough.
As an entrepreneur, the first thing you must do is to play to your own advantage, your uniqueness is very important. Do not try and copy other people’s ideas. Be unique, be authentic and be yourself. Authenticity is important because your dream is yours alone. Leave other people’s goals alone. Leave other people’s lives alone. Your own life is set for you.
Other people’s opinions, good or bad, are their opinions. Once you’re a learning and objective person, once you are true to yourself, no matter how bad the valleys get, the mountains will come. And there will be casualties of going through with your vision so don’t worry. Sometimes you will stare bankruptcy in the face, you will be ridiculed and laughed at, and you will make mistakes. Just stay the line. The end is overrated, the journey is more important. The people you bless along the way, the lives you impact, all those small things compound over time to help you achieve greatness.
I’m a firm believer in pivoting, not changing. You have your assumptions, and you test them. Once they are tested and you find out which are working, and which aren’t. You must ask yourself “How do I adapt it to my reality?” You pivot. Every entrepreneur must pivot along the way because the ecosystem will keep changing. The day you write down your business plan is the day that business plan is dead. Because by the following day, things have changed.
Don’t be a slave to your business plan. Be a slave to your goals, your values, and to the reason why you are doing this in the first place.
My third point, which is probably my most important point for entrepreneurs, is love. Love is a beautiful thing. If you are not in love with what you do, get out. Entrepreneurs don’t exist for money. Money is an outcome of the value you are creating. If there is no value for you to create, money will not come. Money is very attracted to value. So, focus on value. To focus on value though, you must love what you do. You must love who you work with. You must love yourself. You must love your vision and your passion. You must be obsessed with making a difference.
To every entrepreneur here, find what you love doing. Stay at it. Because on those dark days when everything looks like it’s not working, what keeps you going is love. You would rather be in love than be miserable collecting money. Because sometimes the thing that life tests you most with is what you want the most. But the universe wants you to demonstrate that you want it that bad. What are you willing to give up for it?
Almost everybody will give anything for love. For as long as you love it and you want it, the universe will compensate you. It is written, do not worry. And it’s not time dependent so don’t bother yourself with whether you get success on day one, or day ten or year ten, focus on enjoying the journey and the value you are creating.
In my career, I have failed over a thousand times. I’m failing right now. Some things are working, and some are not. I flew back yesterday for this graduation ceremony because I love doing this. For me, the love of what I do drives me every day. When people laugh at me and say, “He’s broke”, I laugh and say “He’s rich”. I laugh. I don’t believe when people say good things about me, so when they say bad things, I don’t believe it either. It doesn’t matter. Your opinions are just that. My opinions about myself are the most important thing. You will succeed if you stay at it long enough, if you’re authentic, if you pivot, and finally if you love what you do. Just be open-minded to knowing that the work you’re doing is important and make sure you love it.
And nothing you’ve learnt in class is wasted. Education and knowledge are different though. Now that you have an education, seek knowledge. Education, as important as it is, is only a foundation for knowledge. Knowledge happens on the streets. Don’t just cut and paste case
studies. Take out the learning points from them. Apply it to yourself, unleash and pivot. Don’t think because you went to Lagos Business School and EDC that you’re better than the person who hasn’t. Even your security guard will teach you a few things.
A while ago I had an investment in a company, and I realised for some reason their costs would not go down. So, I took a closer look at their cost lines and their energy costs were sky high. Most of it came from diesel which made sense to me because diesel is expensive. But it just didn’t add up that the diesel consumption as a factor of revenue was that high. So, one day, I decided to go there myself on the day that the diesel was due to be delivered. I got there and sat down with the security guard. He told me the diesel would be arriving soon. When they got there, they weighed in the diesel – you could see how much was coming in.
And then they left. Afterwards I checked the tank, it was the exact amount they were supposed to deliver. So, I figured they weren’t lying to me. I went again the following weekend and sat with the security guard. He asked me what exactly I was looking for and so I told him my confusion about what was going on with the diesel. He started laughing and said, “They bring the tank half full, so what they discharge is only half”. What do you mean? I asked. He said, “What you’re seeing… the diesel isn’t full. Its only half the discharge.” So essentially, a full tank comes in, and a half tank goes out. But the tank itself has been calibrated to read as full. So, I put in the weighing machine to weigh when the tank goes out as well. And that’s what the security guard taught me. I saved 50% of my cost that year because I wasn’t under the assumption that the security guard had nothing to teach me.
Knowledge is not education. There are things that people on the street know that will help your business. Please talk to everybody. Listen to every conversation, whether you agree or not. Be open-minded about it.
Next thing I want to talk about is failure. Failure is an impossible word, it doesn’t exist. Let me assure you; you cannot fail… unless you quit. Sometimes in death you succeed. Van Gogh, one of the greatest artists, had to die to succeed. When he was alive, his paintings could not sell. The only ever painting he sold was to his sister-in-law, for peanuts.
People said he was a failure so much, he killed himself. Imagine how you let other people define your own success goals. A hundred years after he died, his artworks are selling for $40-$50 million or more. In death he was successful. For as long as there is life on earth you can succeed. Entrepreneurs works live after them. So do not judge your work by your current outcomes. Some people will succeed over time because of what you have done. You are all foundation builders in a world that still has millions of years to go.
Galileo Galilee was a successful inventor. He said the world was round, other said it was flat. He was killed for his conviction. Five hundred years later, the Catholic Church apologized for killing him because he was right. The Wright brothers didn’t have any formal education in engineering but believed it was possible to build a plane. People said it was impossible.
Even the biggest inventor at that time, Edison, said it was not possible. They tried eight, nine times, they crashed. Eventually they did it and today you have flight. Magic happens when you don’t give up.
My point to you is that an entrepreneur’s work is not about your lifetime. You are laying a foundation for humanity to benefit over time. You all count. Every single one of you. Failure is an impossibility for as long as you keep trying, you get up every day, you go outside.
Failing, though, means that you are progressing. So, when things don’t work, failing is an unexpected outcome. So, when you try something, it doesn’t go as you want, you have not failed. You have progressed from point A to point B. But it’s not what you want. So, you try again. There can never be any success without failing. Failing is preparing you for succeeding.
And once you succeed at something, don’t assume that you will succeed again at another using the same approach, you’re going to fail. Because each attempt is a new beginning. So, when something works for you, don’t celebrate it and sit on a stool gloating. Go back quickly and say, ‘this new journey is different from that last one’. So, start again from the basics. It may be tight, it may be tough, you may have lost everything and you may have doubted yourself. You only need to give up once to fail. If you don’t give up, I assure you in this lifetime or the next you will succeed.
And there is a reason why you’ve been called. Because the God that called you does not fail. You need to know that you matter. And even if you don’t even believe in God, do you imagine that the universe that was created for the people you are paying and you are blessing is one where there is no reward for good? The universe rewards efforts and sacrifices. Failing can happen. And when you fail, enjoy your failing. Go out, have a drink, have a pity party. You know why? You must trick your brain into going forward. That’s what I do every day when things don’t work. I’ll go and have a nice drink, I’ll watch a movie, I’ll do a pity party. I laugh at myself. So, when you’re laughing at me, it doesn’t matter because I’ve already laughed at myself. People will tell you it will not work.
What if it works? You are doing God’s work.
Life itself, scientifically, was a one-time chance in 4.6 billion attempts and a stone started breathing called a diatom. If life happened after 4.6 billion times, who am I not to try? And somehow you always keep finding a way to go on. So please, do not leave here with failure in mind. Scratch it. You cannot fail.
And the last one for me – your story is beyond you. It is about your ecosystem and universe. Your mandate is to be your brother’s keepers. You see our challenge in Africa today and Nigeria is that all of us are forming silos; “Me and my family alone”. Who is your family? Your kids? They’re not yours. You spend less than a third of their time with them. They go to school, they watch TV. They’re not your kids. You are just a vehicle they came into this world through. Other people spend more time with them and they are more their kids than yours.
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You know who your kids are? The people you work with every day. Other people’s kids that you look after – those are your kids. Look after them well and your kids will also be looked after by those who spend more time with them than you. Until we go back to being our brothers’ keepers in Africa and Nigeria, we will miss the point. Being your brother’s keeper is fundamental to you succeeding because you will not reap where you did not sow, as the universe only compensates you for faith and the sowing you have done to others.
You must give back. You must endow some students. You must think about how we can ensure intergenerational continuity of Nigeria. You must sponsor a child. Our average budget for education in Nigeria today is $18 per child per year. In other places it is over
$40,000. How can we compete? Go to primary schools where there are 200 students sitting in a class. Adopt a school. Give them boards, chairs, ceiling fans, basic things.
We found out in our research that by just buying uniforms and sandals, enrolment went up by 100% in one school. Do you know the indignity of not having uniform or sandals to go to school? They deserve dignity. It’s a fundamental human right. We found that young girls in other areas, intelligent students did not go to school because they didn’t have period materials, some use rags and leaves for their periods. By giving them reusable pads, they went to school.
Do beyond yourself. Leave your kids. Take care of somebody else’s. Give back to the society that gave you this chance. Because when you sow it pays back hundred times. My mandate to all of you as you leave here is to decide that you’ll not just be a human being, you’ll be a change agents and through you other people will bless and glorify His name.
Excerpts of a keynote speech by Dr Akindele, chairman, Platform Capital at the Enterprise Development Centre 2022 graduation ceremony in Lagos.
