LEADERSHIP IN ENTREPRENEURSHIP: PASTOR (MRS) IBUKUN AWOSIKA, DAY 1 RCCG 68th ANNUAL CONVENTION 2020

RCCG 68th ANNUAL CONVENTION 2020

THEME: WONDERFUL

MINISTERING: PASTOR (MRS) IBUKUN AWOSIKA (PASTOR AT FOUNTAIN OF LIFE CHURCH, LAGOS AND CHAIRMAN, FIRST BANK OF NIGERIA)

DAY 1 MORNING SESSION TOPIC PSF HOUR: LEADERSHIP IN ENTREPRENEURSHIP

DATE: 3RD AUGUST, 2020.

INTRODUCTION OF SPEAKER

On the Talk Show today we will be discussing a very interesting topic: Leadership in Entrepreneurship.

In Nigeria, West Africa, and the entire world, Young People are daily asking questions as to what they need to know about getting into Business.

Every Young Man, every Young Woman wants to be a Chief Executive Officer (CEO) – How do they start? When do they start? Should they start?

Our Guest Speaker today is going to give answers to all of these questions in her talk.

And just before I let you know who she is, I will have her Profile play for us.

Listen!

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Ibukunoluwa Abiodun Awosika (born Bilkisu Abiodun Motunrayo Omobolanle Adekola on December 24, 1962) is a Nigerian Business Woman, an Entrepreneur, Motivational Speaker, Author, Mother and a Pastor.

She is a Survivor and has set Standards for young women in Africa!

Ibukun has shown that What a man can do, a woman can do even better by succeeding in the Furniture Industry – An Industry dominated by the male folks.

Ibukun Awosika has a few 1sts, one of which is that she is the first female Chairman Board of Directors of First Bank of Nigeria – Nigeria’s Premier and Most Valuable Banking Brand. She is also the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of “The Chair Centre Group”.

Ibukun Awosika is a Multiple Award-Winning Entrepreneur and the First Nigerian recipient of the Prestigious International Women Entrepreneurial Challenge Award (IWEC) as a Nominee of the US Department of State in 2008.

Beyond her Career Successes and being a Pastor at the Fountain of Life Church; She established the “Christian Missionary Fund” which is dedicated to raising Supports for Christian Missionaries across the Country.

Among other various hobbies; she loves to watch Investigative and Legal Series in her leisure time.

THE MAIN SPEAKER’S TALK

Good afternoon, wherever you are.

And we trust God to have an interesting encounter together.

It’s always a Pleasure for me to have a chance to share whatever I have learnt over the years.

I had the Privilege of starting business early, building my first business just before my 26th Birthday.

And for the last thirty one (31) years now – It will be thirty two (32) years next January; I have had the Pleasure of building a Manufacturing Group in diverse fields. But centering essentially on Furniture, and Security Systems.

And in the midst of that, I have had the Privilege of working on various Corporate Boards across diverse Industries, which has really enhanced my knowledge base in terms of what businesses should be looking like.

So the Topic we are discussing today is about: “Leading in Entrepreneurship”.

Because you know that the word Entrepreneurship has been so explained in multiple ways and different People have a different understanding of what it represents.

But really for me it’s a simple word – It sounds like a big English word, but it just means that it’s a word for me.

AN ENTREPRENEUR IS A DREAMER!

But some People Dream and do nothing about it – They just having dream.

But an Entrepreneur is a Dreamer that is a doer.

Someone who has a dream about something or see something that needs to be done but has the courage to take it on to actually try to bring it to life.

… That is the difference.

It is an element of risk in the life of every Entrepreneur because every business idea you have is subject to two (2) Possibilities – Either that something comes of it, or that you fail woefully and nothing comes of it.

But if you are smart enough, you will know that even the ones that don’t work, they have something that they teach you and what you learn from them is something major, to maybe some of the things that you will do in future.

Now, if you want to lead as an Entrepreneur, it starts from your Mindset:

1. It starts from how you view things.
2. It starts from the Level or the extent to which you are bold enough to step out of the crowd.
3. It starts from your ability to test the waters.
4. It talks about the Level of Adventurism that is in you.

Because as far as I’m concerned, as an Entrepreneur, you are an Adventurer – You like to explore.

And because in most cases, you know, for you to redefine an area, you take a chance on something.

That is: Sometimes you have some Believers – People who believe along with you but there are many times as well, that you are really just the only one that believes in what you want to do and nobody shares your Faith.

And you have to take the risk of Proving it out so that People can see that there is Value in it.

So what are the things?

Some of the questions you need to ask yourself in terms of wanting to be an Entrepreneur?

Some of the questions I get asked a lot of time: So can everybody be an Entrepreneur?

Well, I think that if everybody is an Entrepreneur, we will have a Major Problem, because I served as the Chairman of First Bank and there are over twenty thousand (20,000) People that work for First Bank.

They can be Entrepreneur within the Organization which makes them Entrepreneurs.

But they are not the Founders or the Builders of the business but they are People with Talents and Skills, helping to build an *Idea Forward” – An “Institutionalized Idea Forward”.

You can also listen to the audio here: Leadership In Entrepreneurship – Pastor Ibukun Awosika

So, we are not all that risk taking courageous Entrepreneur and you owe it to yourself to first determine what kind of Person you are.

Do you have a Natural disposition to take on New Challenges?

Do you have a Natural disposition to challenge the Status Quo?

Do you have a level of risk?

The ability to take some level of risk and put your resources at risk, your time, sometimes you need to leave your job in order to be able to try out what you believe, as an Entrepreneur.

… So those are different Parts of what it is.

Everybody is not an Entrepreneur. But those who feel that they have the Personality, have the Temperament and the Mindset to take on the world on their own terms – Those are the People that have a Good fit to be an Entrepreneur.

… And if you want to do that, you need to ask yourself some questions.

For the idea that you have:

1. You need to do your Due Diligence.
2. You need to check that the Idea that you are Pushing that it is viable.

Sometimes, an Idea looks so Good to us because we are looking at it from a Narrow View in terms of our circle of friends, our own immediate community, and People around us.

And the People that love you will always try to encourage you.

So sometimes also; they don’t give you the full story.

And you and your friends might get something but it doesn’t mean it is Valuable as a business because what will make it Valuable as a business is that: It must be sustainable beyond your friends; it must be something that if you continue to Produce or you continue to offer the Service on a consistent basis, that you will always be able to generate the right Market at the right Price in other to Pay all your bills, break even and make Profits from it – That is really important.

Anything that you are doing that you are not making Profits out of it; is either your hobby or your Pass Time, or you are doing Charity.

So, you need to determine if you are in business or if you want to change the world as an NGO (Non-Governmental Organization) or as a Charity.

There are different things – So let us be clear.

Building an Enterprise to do Good is not necessarily building an Enterprise to do well.

But you could do business doing Good and doing well.

The doing Good Part of it is that the business that you build will change lives, will add Value to the lives of People, would solve certain Problems for People, will create Jobs and all of that.

But it will do well because in doing well it will generate Profit and in generating Profit, it allows you to contribute to the Economy because you are Paying Taxes on it. But also it is sustainable because it means that business can continue to exist and continue to create Value over time.

Now, if you want to lead in business, it is important that from the onset, you ensure that you have a “Unique Selling Point” to your idea.

If the idea you have is worth ten thousand Naira (#10,000); People around you have and you do it the same way that they do it.

Now it is Possible to take a General Idea and do it differently and in handling that same Idea, you deliver Value.

Let us say for example, what does Amazon do? What do they do?

It’s like a Global Online Supermarket.

Supermarkets and Stores have existed forever but they decided to redefine the way that Service or those Products are delivered. They also decided to have the audacity to look at themselves as a Global Supermarket – As a Supermarket to the entire world as their Market.

Mostly Supermarkets and Stores are Local – They can have a Global concept for their locality, then in your Neighbourhood, then your City.

They are around you but it took someone imagining or re-imagining the same business or businesses that have existed for generations bringing them together into one business but delivering them as a Service for the whole world by creating a Technological Platform and the Infrastructural Support to deliver whatever you are buying.

You could sit in your Sitting Room in Lagos and order whatever; the thinnest most thing on Amazon and have it delivered to you in the corner of your living room as if you went to a store around you to buy.

If you want to lead in Entrepreneurship; you need to think about what you do – But think about what you do and how you do it differently.

That allows you to aggregate the opportunities that you are already sharing with your Competitors.

You need to think about how you deliver your Service in a way that every time the Customer needs to choose who to receive that Service from; you are miles ahead of your competition.

You need to think about how you deliver your Service or your Product to the Customer in a way that the Value that you deliver, whether in Price, or the in the Quality of your Product, makes you the obvious Choice every time for your own target market because that is a different game.

You must also identify what your Target Market is.

Why? – Everybody cannot be your Target Market because for some People, their disposable income takes them out of your Market, even though they have the same lead.

Let me give a Simple Example:

In Nigeria for a long time, the Option in terms of milk – if you wanted to drink tea, or any of the things that we use milk for; cereal and all of that.

Our oldest, most trusted brand option was always Peak Milk.

Later they had the Powdered Milk and they had the liquid.

But for their Products or other Products like them, you have to buy in a certain volume because of the way they Package their Products.

If you were buying the Powdered Milk, the tin was always like five hundred grams (500g).

The liquid one was, I don’t know how many mills it is but its in a can.

And you have to have enough money to buy that volume in one go.

Even if all you needed out of the five hundred grams (500g) of the Powdered one was five grams (5g); you could not buy the five grams (5g) – You have to find the money to buy the five hundred grams (500g) and store the value and continue to use your five grams every time hundred (100) times until you consumed the five hundred grams (500g).

Then a player came into the Market, so that when you look at the Population, there is a large Population at the bottom of the Pyramid.

And you have to have understanding of the demography of the Population of the Markets where you want to do your business.

You must also understand the Economic Power of that demography, so that you can identify within the Pyramids of Society where is your own Market – At the Bottom, in the Middle, at the Top.

Now, what you must understand is that at the Top; the People can afford a lot but they are very few. As you go down the bottom of the Pyramid, the affordability level reduces, but the Volume, the numbers of People increases. And right at the bottom of the Pyramid, the buying Power is low, but the numbers are huge.

Now, one does not have an advantage over the other. It is about what kind of Products you want sell, to which Market which affects the quality of the Product that you deliver, the Packaging of it, the Pricing of it and it affects whether you are in “Margin Business” or “Volume Business”.

If “Volume Businesses” take very little margin but multiplied over numbers, makes huge Profit.

A “Margin Business” takes huge Profit margin or sell to smaller numbers, but still makes huge Profit for their own Business Model.

Your Structures are different, your required Needs are different, your Target Market is different and your Strategy for delivering is different.

There are different factors at Play and they are different depending on what Part of that Pyramid you decide to Play with.

So, in this case, a company came to the Market, saw the huge numbers of People at the bottom of the Pyramid, realized that they want milk but they cant afford the way the Peaks of this world were Packaged. They didnt have enough disposable income to buy the five hundred grams (500g) in one go and store it.

But if you repackage the same milk in a smaller form, in a form that they can afford in the five gram (5g) that they need everytime.

Which means that they only need the money to buy 5g and not money to buy 500g.

That you will sell to larger volume of People, will “Take a Product” that was in the middle to the upper range – It ran to the bottom of the Pyramid because now affordability challenge has been resolved by selling in small Pockets.

Because Micro units of milk and many Products was created based on that company’s intervention in the market. Knowing that there is a demand, there is a desire, there is a Need for this Product, but the Need and the desire is in a different format from the way it is being delivered right now.

So, they weren’t selling anything other than milk.

And milk has always been in the market, but it changed the way that milk was delivered.

And they changed the Narket and they cleaned out at the base.

Now, the only challenge with their Model is that the People at the bottom of the Pyramid have always aspired for the top brands but they couldn’t afford it in the format it was delivered. And in the small pocket format that they introduced; definitely without a doubt it was not going to take too long for the big brand companies to realized that they missed an opportunity all along and to them copy that Model.

Which is what happened amongst all the Major brands in the Milk sector decided to also do their small packages.

That is Complete loss disadvantage, because there is Aspirational buying.

People will always wanted to be able to buy the peak milk, but they couldn’t afford in the fomat it was sold. Once it was now packaged and more affordable for them, they switch brand and went back to the Aspirational brand.

So, these are factors that come in to Play when you are thinking about how do you take Leadership in Entrepreneurship?

Whatever business you want to play in, you might be the first at the beginning but other Players will always come in. As long as its a successful model, there will be Copycats Players; People that will come into the Market.

Now, it is easy for you to sit on the walls and think: Oh, I’m already doing these, People already like my brand.

No, No, No, No – When you are actually at the front of the Park, everybody can see your Strength, they can also see your Weaknesses. And if you are not continuously reinventing yourself, and challenging your own Model, if you are not looking at your business as if you are an Outsider, every two (2) years or so, to continuously innovate and challenge yourself; if you are not thinking of New Ways to deliver your Service; if you are not thinking of New Ways to improve your Products; if you are not thinking of New Ways to engage and to embrace Market Opportunities, then somebody is going to come from behind and jump to the front and you will find that you will lose ground in some areas.

So, it is important that you must have a “Mindset of Innovation” when you are in business.

And especially as a Christian, you know that the Spirit of God within you is the “Creative Spirit”.

The Holy Spirit within you is a “Creative Spirit” – When God was going to create the world, you know, the Bible says that the Spirit of God was hovering across this multiplicity of confusion.

And when the Lord spoke into the situation, Order came and Creation was made over time.

It is that same Holy Spirit that you have as a child of God – And once you identify the areas of your Calling as an Entrepreneur, you must then learn to use your Gifts of the Spirit to enhance your ability to dominate, and to take control in those areas.

You must be Steps Ahead of the Market, and how can you be steps ahead of the Market?

The Bible says that the Holy Spirit – You know the Spirit of God is all knowing. God is all Knowing. He will always lead you as to things that are ahead of you.

God is a Proactive God.

Sometimes, He is going to tell you to do something that nobody else understands. He will not make sense to you, even you, but you must learn to trust the voice of God and step forward.

And as you step forward and take opportunities, you will see that the Spirit of God will always lead you in the way to go.

You know: 1 Peter 4:10 says: Each of you should use whatever Gift you have received, to serve others, as Faithful Stewards of God’s Grace in his various forms.

In trying to build a successful business, you are trying to use the Spirit of God and the Gift of God within you to create a Product or a Service that will serve others; but you are doing it as onto the Lord.

And if you have a sense of understanding that in the business that you are in, God is in that business with you and God is All seeing, He is All knowing, He knows the Beginning, He knows the End – You can always be confident that God will give you what, you know Nigerian students call kronje. He will give you an insight into the future, He will sometimes tell you to take a Position in an area that you would wonder why. Sometimes it will not make sense to you at that Point in time, but you are going to learn to walk with the Holy Spirit to be discerning of the Times and the Seasons, to be discerning into where Opportunities are concerned, to lay your Plans before God every time; to understand that you put yourself at a disadvantage If you are a child of God that is in business and you do not seek to use that ability to see the future through the Holy Spirit as Part of your business Plan.

As in, you Pray about whatever you want to do, and you ask the Lord to lead you in the way to go.

The Bible says you hear a voice telling us which way to go. Whether to turn to the left or to turn to the right that you walk in it; because in business we are always faced with Options.

We are making “Critical Decisions” as to which way to go, there is always an “Opportunity Costs” for what we choose to do. And in deciding; left might look great, right might look great, but there is only one of them that is really great for you and for your own business.

And sometimes all the facts you can see may not necessarily give you the full answer. You might get to a Place where it’s really a difficult decision.

That is where you need God to help you to make the “Right Decision” as to where to go.

So, if you want to lead as an Entrepreneur, you cannot drop your “God Factor” – It is a Non Negotiable Asset that will put you at an advantage in the Marketplace.

He would give you insight into things; He will guide you in terms of Projects or Ideas that represent the future when the future has not come.

You know, as it is, The Bible says, Faith is what?

Believing those things that are not as if they are.

In having the ability to believe what the Lord says; what you sense in your Spirit is what the Lord is leading you, even though all the facts on ground don’t necessarily support it.

But let me put a Caveat!

1. Having said that, you must make ensure that everything that is Humanly Possible you will do even concerning that which you discern.
2. You will check out all the facts – You would do all your Due Diligence, you will do the best you can to try to verify, to confirm, to analyze the situation.
3. And when you have all of those facts, you can still go before God and get to a Point where despite what you have, if you have a “Strong Conviction” that you need to go in a certain way, then you will know that at that Point, you are at the moment of having done all, Stand Still and see the Salvation of the Lord.

If you want to lead in any area of Enterprise you want to play in, you cannot do it anyhow:

1. You must become a Master of your Trade.
2. You must seek knowledge.

The Bible says we must seek knowledge. In seeking Knowledge the Bible says that we must seek Understanding.

3. You must learn to be Approved – You must learn everything that is Possible to learnt concerning that Industry.
4. You must be one that goes to the Fairs or goes to Trade Shows, and all of that.

Every information, every knowledge you can learn.

5. You must build for yourself a “Circle of Influences” or Voices who are Skillful in that area so that you can gain knowledge from them.
6. You must be humble enough to know what you know, to know what you do not know.

And when you know what you do not know, to seek that knowledge from wherever it is.

If you have to sit at the feet of a man to learn, learn! If you have to go to school to learn, go!

I don’t care what your age is, it is irrelevant because it is an attitude of the Mind – It has nothing to do with age; it also has nothing to do with your certificate and it has nothing to do with the fact that you have First (1st) Class, you have Third (3rd) Class or have a Pass.

It irrelevant, to be honest because in the field of Entrepreneurship, there are many skills that are beyond your “Academic Skills” at bay.

And sometimes the best Players were not “The Most Cerebral People”.

So, it is really about you, being humble in accepting that there are things you don’t necessarily know and that knowledge that is necessary for your Enterprise to succeed is a shared knowledge.

That there are many People around you who are as Valuable to your Ventures as you are.

And what that teaches you is that you must learn to Value Human Beings, whether the ones that work for you, the ones that work with you or the ones who are your benefactors around you or the ones who are your Mentors, your influencers and your voices or the ones who have the knowledge that you seek.

7. You must learn to accept that everybody has a Value that they bring to the table and you need all of those Talents brought together for you to be able to lead.

I have a simple Principle that guides the way I approach life where People are concerned – I considered myself to be equal to an equation of Liability and Asset.

And that my Liability and my Assets is who I am – Because Assets are my Strengths, my Weaknesses are my Liabilities.

But for me to succeed, I need to find other People who have Assets in my Liabilities, willing to willingly give up their own Assets for my Service – So, that I can have their Asset plus my Asset to be equal to my ability to succeed.

And the only way People will willingly give you their own Asset; It depends on how you treat them.

It is not even about how you Pay them because it doesn’t matter how much you Pay a man, it is how you make him feel that determines how he willingly give of himself for your benefits.

You can Pay him so much but you make him feel miserable because you treat him badly.

He will give you something of what he has, but you will never get everything from him.

So, it is important that you learn that to be a “Leading Entrepreneur” – You have to have great skills at managing People and then different categories of People along your Path as an Entrepreneur.

You have the People that are your Customers and we tend to say the customer is King.

Yes, but you look at them as King because we want something from them.

And then you tend to look at the People who work for you as nothing because they want something from you. But that is a mistake because in reality, no Great Entrepreneur, no Leading Entrepreneur can run the Enterprise by himself or herself.

As a Great Entrepreneur, you are going to be “Highly People Dependent”.

You see everything you are going to do is going to be about what People do for you, and on your behalf.

QUESTION BY THE ANCHOR (TO CONCLUDE THE TALK)

If you would have any concluding statement on your talk this afternoon, what would it be to the Young Generation, especially those who aspire to lead in Entrepreneurship?

RESPONSE BY THE SPEAKER (TO CONCLUDE)

I think the most important thing is that:

1. There is nothing you cannot do.
2. There is No Limit to the extent that you can build your business.

And that if you want to build for the Long Term, as a Christian, you absolutely have no choice but to build on the “Right Value System”.

Because the time and the world will tell you that there is a way to do something for “Temporary Gain” in business, but I can tell you for thirty one (31) years of being in business, doing the right thing is sustainable for all times.

*And that People will change, governments will change, rules will change but if you have chosen from the onset that you will build your business with the Fear of God, on the Principles that depict who you are as a child of God, that you will always do your business with an Honest Skill, that you will consider Fairness in all that you do, that you will deliver the Right Value that you are Paid for, that you will seek to always understand that even though you are in business, you are a child of God, and you still have the Mandate on you to take the Gospel to the Ends of the Earth. And that the way in which you do your business must leave you in a Position, well, if you need to, you must be able to Preach the Gospel.

Nobody who has done business with you, must say that based on how they did business with you, they can never receive the Gospel from your lips. Then you have wasted your life and everything else that you have done is useless because it doesn’t matter how much money you make – What is your “Biggest Goal” in life is to live well and to die and live in Heaven forever.

So, you really want to live a life that allows you to continuously deposite Value into your account in Heaven.

And the business area is a “Major Test Area” for us as Christians, because the world has it’s Practices and it tells you that it’s okay to cheat, it’s okay to sell the wrong thing as the right thing, it’s ok to take advantage of People because they don’t know, it’s alright not to operate with the Fear of God as long as you are making money off it – Then money becomes your god.

So, we need to remember who we are in the Place of business, we must never forget that.

And once you keep that Part of your life alive, and you stay focused on your Goal, you will soon find that it is as easy to be successful as a Christian business, as it is to fail as a Non Christian business.

And that even though People succeed doing things anyhow, they also fail and fail woefully doing it that way.

Now does that exempt the children of God from troubles in business? – Nope.

The Bible says in the world, we will see troubles.

So, challenges will come even in our businesses. And there will have “Trying Moments”.

Our Faith will be tried, our Practices as Christians in business will be tried and tested but if we hold on to the Gospel, things will work out for us. And at the end of our days, we will be able to say: Father have done the best that I can considering the Market.

Thank you.

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