Dr. Uzo Anozie, an academic in Bournemouth University,United Kingdom, doesn’t only encourage students to become entrepreneurs, but to also figure out what they are passionate about, what they can to achieve success with their lives. She spoke with Blessing Olisa of the Online desk.
How many entrepreneurs have you mentored so far?
I have trained students who own businesses and those who have the ambition to start something on their own.
I mentor them and look at what they are doing.I advise them, follow up to see how they developing their ideas.
Outside the university , I have one or two small business owners that I mentor just like those on campus.
We meet frequently to discuss their business models, suggest what they can do to reinvent the business if need be, grow it ,identify what they might be doing wrong, commend what they might be doing right. I am always offering tips on what they can do to improve the performance of their businesses. There is one in London, who is into into IT, hardware and software business.
Though the business has grown, I have suggested diversification. At the moment, he’s looking to get involved in satellite installation and maintenance.
The computer aspect of his business, is getting saturated with many people running into it. It is becoming very challenging even for those who are competent in it. He needs to add something to what he is doing and go that extra step forward.
At the moment he’s thinking about satellite installations. He is also planning to go into the phone business as well. So these are the types of entrepreneurs that I’m involved with. As a mentor, I keep up with the progress of such businesses.
How would you access the entrepreneurial landscape in Nigeria having been in the United Kingdom?
There are things that don’t need comparing. I don’t really know the basis of comparison when it comes to issues of different environment. I am proudly Nigerian but sorry to say, nothing actually works. Nothing actually works it’s quite a difficult one so if I can start with in the very first place, government policies, government regulations, government plans for entrepreneurship in Nigeria are supposed to be the same thing elsewhere in the developed countries or in UK, you see the difference. Here it’s like government policies and plans are on paper. It doesn’t get implemented, it’s just something that is written, people hear about it but nothing happens.
At a point, I think there was a time government partnered with banks to fund small businesses, certain percentage must go to the small businesses but that was just on paper, I don’t think that has been implemented. While in the UK, whatever policy it is, is followed up with implementation. You can’t just have a desire to help without actually helping, it doesn’t make sense. So the basic difference first of all is the type of policies that are put in place in these two different places and is it implemented at the end of the day? Secondly, we look at the environment we are in. I think by now you must have heard so much about inadequate infrastructure but it cannot be overemphasised. Without infrastructure, entrepreneurship cannot survive, businesses cannot work. There are some basic things that are not existing in this country while in the UK it is being taken for granted that there is electricity, that you open your tap and there is water running. It’s being taken for granted that someone comes to take out your bin as a business person and you don’t have your bin all over the compound. Our environment is not conducive for entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurs have to go the extra mile, they have to suffer in order to sustain their business, not to talk of developing or improving the business further. While in the UK there are basic things that are already on ground and it is left for the entrepreneur to work with those things, those other resources and things that are available for them to progress. Let’s leave entrepreneurship aside, as individuals, like I said I’m proudly Nigerian but I live in the UK. I wake up in the morning and I’m not thinking about the basic necessities of life, I’m thinking about my work. So my brain and energy is reserved to think about my work. And if I have got such resources to think about my work, I’ll be more productive than the person that wakes up in the morning and there is no light to get ready for work, so they are thinking about how to get electricity to iron clothes or see where they are going. There is no water so they are thinking about where to buy water from. So even when you wake up, you have exhausted your energy thinking about the basic necessities of life. So you have nothing left to input into your work, so the work suffers. That is how it is for business. If the entrepreneur starts thinking about the unnecessary basics, there is nothing left to input in the business. There is nothing left to motivate the person to really make sure that their business thrives or is sustained. These are two landscapes that shouldn’t really be compared. We should compare like for like. For me, there is just no need comparing Nigeria and UK.
What business opportunities would you recommend for young school leavers considering the current unemployment situation Nigeria faces?
It is so unfortunate that in Nigeria today, the school leaver has the responsibility of creating jobs for themselves. It is someone else’s responsibility to do that, not the young school leavers. So like every other thing, when you are in school and you’re thinking about how to create a job for yourself when you leave because there is the uncertainty of unemployment when they leave school. So you find out that there is a high rate of unemployment in Nigeria. Everyone has become an entrepreneur in Nigeria. For the young school leaver as well, this causes a problem because they are thinking of what exactly to do when they leave school. There is that dilemma of “should I go with my passion?” “Is my degree worth anything in the business world?” “Should I learn a new skill even though I’ve got my accountancy degree?” “Should I do what every other person is doing because it has been tested and trusted?” There is that dilemma facing them, but having said that, Nigeria is full of opportunities. Anything we complain about in this country is an opportunity for someone to start a business on. We’ve got one million and one complaints in Nigeria, that is an opportunity for a young school leaver to start and do something with. So I wouldn’t say there is a laid down set of opportunities for them. People are different in their capabilities, people are different in the resources they have, some might need financial help, some don’t have that problem, people are different in their skill and their knowledge, so there is no one size fits all answer to the question. I think the main thing when it comes to opportunities would be that a young school leaver should try to make themselves different from what is available, no matter what path they choose. Even if you are trying to develop a new product, even if you’re going with the crowd and trying to do something that is already existing, try to be different because it is so competitive, and in Nigeria, things get picked up so easily. You see someone that starts bead making and in six months time, everyone is into bead making. You see someone that goes to Turkey to start buying and selling and in the next six months, Nigerians are all going to Turkey. The only way a young person can manage in this environment is to be different from the crowd, be innovative, be creative, be proactive. Don’t just be complacent. There was a time we never had sachet water in Nigeria, but now, every nook and cranny produces sachet water. For a young school leaver that may think he is tested and trusted for people to drink water, would add a straw to that sachet of water get him that one per cent increase in the customer base. Being different doesn’t mean doing something out of the blues, perhaps going to the moon and coming back, it is just that little addition and that little difference you could make. It could just be your customer service. We are too impatient and “aggressive” in Nigeria. That little pre-customer service and post sales service could draw you that customer base you need. To be different irrespective of what opportunity or what idea you might have is key. Many opportunities exist for young entrepreneurs, but whatever opportunity they decide to go into, they should try and be different because that is the only way they can survive in such a competitive environment and be able to take their business to the next level.
How would you advise a young school leaver with N100,000 to go about entrepreneurship?
People have different capabilities. Whatever you have a passion for, your N100,000 wouldn’t be able to get you that. If you have a passion for medical services because you have seen the state of the hospital in Nigeria and want to add your bit to the health sector, your N100,000 may not be able to get the sort of equipment you need to start that business. That is your passion, but you don’t have the resources to fulfill it. Again you might have the resources, but not the knowledge. So it’s a combination of mix and match. Entrepreneurship is not one sided, you have to think about loads of different things. Now as an entrepreneur, the thing is never giving up. Entrepreneurs work with very limited resources and whatever they can lay their hands on. They can start small, but the essence of being an entrepreneur is to be able to go the next step and be able to develop that business. So it is possible that the N100,000 might not fetch you what you are passion wants, but can you start from somewhere with your N100,000? That is the question. It is not necessarily having that big business, you can start from somewhere. Start first, then grow the business to where you want it to get to.
What kind of small businesses do you think would thrive in Nigeria?
Any small business that does not require electricity. (Laughter). But seriously, there are so many factors that will limit the survival of small businesses in Nigeria. Although I keep saying Nigeria, entrepreneurship anywhere in the world is difficult, but you find out that their environment is not as harsh and unfriendly as ours. There are so many factors that limit small businesses thriving in Nigeria, but if I can at this point make this difference, a small business is different from an entrepreneur. A small business owner is someone that just has a small business and is content with the way it is run. The entrepreneur has got their own business but are never content with where they are, they are always willing to move forward, have targets and goals to achieve, always looking for how to differentiate themselves from all that is happening around, as opposed to a small business owner who thinks “I have a business, I can sustain my family, fair enough”. In the next 10 years, that shop is still as it is, exactly the same thing and the same products, nothing new. The entrepreneur, given the same business and in three years time has gotten another branch somewhere, they are online, they are thinking about “I started with this business model, what do I add to this business model?” That is the difference. Businesses that will thrive in Nigeria are businesses where the owner is neither complacent nor content with where they are, because if you are, competitors will come and take away market share and customer base from you and you are trying to find your feet.
So those businesses that aware of competition are those that would thrive in Nigeria. So I’m not going to pick out any sort of business and say the restaurant business or health business or fashion business will thrive, it all depends on the person who is in charge of that business. That would determine if the business will thrive.
Do you think that there are prospects for the growth of entrepreneurship in Nigeria?
Yes, but under one condition, the government has to come in now and do something. Individual entrepreneurs in Nigeria are die-hard, they struggle to the best of their capabilities and abilities but the environment is not conducive, they’ve tried to make the environment conducive by themselves but that impacts on the cost of doing business, that impacts on their profit so someone needs to come in, someone needs to step in and help. Now think about a business that generates its own electricity. You know and generating electricity, we are talking about you using generators as your main source of power supply, not as a backup, as your main source of power supply. Now you need to maintain that generator with fuel and you know what the situation of fuel is in this country so that taps into their profit, that source away all their profit. Think about a business that has to provide its own water and you’re talking about buying water or digging boreholes which you need to have using electricity, think about there are no good roads to actually transport your goods to wherever or distribute them to your consumers or to your retailers, you know. I’m saying think about these challenges, even though they are real, they are better imagined than really experiencing them because at the end of the day, they leave the entrepreneur with nothing. So the entrepreneur as individuals do their best but it’s so difficult for them. The only way entrepreneurship can thrive in this country is for the government to step in, take the baton and continue the race, yea, so they need to really come in.
