Risk and Return: A journey of entrepreneurship and self-discovery in Africa

by Yomi Jemibewon

We aren’t taught to see our future through the lens of our past. But fguring out where you are going forces you to answer the question of where you came from. It’s funny because those of us who don’t come from places where there is a lot of time to sit around pondering the meaning of life aren’t really taught to contemplate our personal histories.

Being told in subtle ways to change my vocabulary, to alter my accent and to suppress my Nigerian-ness, was not feedback I felt like getting.

I wanted to work in a world where I wasn’t constrained by the structure of consulting; where I wouldn’t start something and have to move on to another client before I could see my plans implemented and know whether they had really worked out; before I could build something tangible that I could point to and be proud of. I wanted to see things through to the end.

I didn’t need to speak with my American accent or smile when I wasn’t feeling like smiling. I didn’t need to use words I didn’t feel comfortable using. I could switch to Yoruba, then pidgin, then back to English.

But for every patient person, there was a not-so-patient person with a… bendable moral compass.

Risk and return was the foundation of my business training and I had always made the best business decisions, but now I intended to turn those nouns into verbs.

My old mentor, Les Strauss, taught me this principle that suddenly seemed so relevant. It was that every stool needed at least three legs to be able to balance steadily. And the key to success was to take your career goals/objectives as your stool and ask yourself what the three legs that are essential for your stool to be sturdy are.

It is easy to think events are easily forgotten, and all slates are wiped clean after a while, but this isn’t the case. If you leave a positive mark, the people around you will equate you with positivity, and continue to associate you with that trait long after you last see them.

“Try your best to make all strategic decisions by consensus voting only. Avoid doing them by majority voting. If one partner just can’t seem to align, go back and try your best to see how you can make the case to convince him until he does. If you don’t succeed, consider stepping down the decision until a future date.”

as part of chasing whatever business objectives may be in front of us, we, frst and foremost, must become builders and groomers of women and men.

Things got much worse when the naira depreciated from N193/$1 to N520/$1 between January 2015 and February 2017, before eventually settling at N365/$1 in December 2017.

Defne a personal vision for yourself or your career and be honest with yourself about the areas you need to work on.

When we the partners could only aford to pay ourselves meagre salaries, I was not too proud to have my wife be the breadwinner. I was not too proud to tell people about it. If you hold on too tightly to your identity as a man, a provider or a successful person who doesn’t need anyone’s help, your entrepreneurial or life journey might fail because you are not utilising every resource available to you.

When you are searching for partners seek out people who share similar values but bring complementing competencies and strengths to the table.

Find someone to be accountable to.

donating your time, money or expertise to driving change.