Mentoring Matters — How mentorship builds wealth and creates richer life experiences

I was nominated and selected out of 1000s of women to attend a group mentoring session with @TonyElumelu in celebration of #internationalwomensday 2022. The mentoring session began with a brief overview about himself and how he got started in business. The highlight of the evening was when the women were given the floor to ask questions and share their stories. We have some truly phenomenal women doing great things in Nigeria. The mix of ages, personalities, for profit businesses, social enterprises demonstrated the importance of embracing and celebrating diversity and inclusivity especially in mentorship. Some key takeaways I learnt from TOE and also my fellow mentees were;

1. It is important to have a very good level of self-awareness. Understanding who you are, your capabilities, your skills, your strengths, can give you a good idea about the type of work you can excel in and passion projects best suited to you.
2. Whatever you do, have a vision for your life. One of my favourite scriptures verses is from the book of Habakuk - 'write the vision on plain tables so that the reader can run with it'. Write down your goals, vision board, etc.
3. Building a long term business for the future is not child’s play but make sure you have fun building. If you don’t love what you do , you will eventually grow to hate it and get tired of it.
4. Invest in yourself. Read widely. Become an eternal student. I noted that throughout the mentoring session he made reference to business leaders that he looked up to. Steve Jobs featured a lot. He also referenced Malcolm Gladwell a few times. The old adage readers are leaders rings true.
5. Set milestones for yourself. These could be personal milestones or career milestones. There is nothing worse than waking up everyday without a sense of direction. Having milestones gives you a sense of direction and a target to work towards. He mentioned that when he acquired Standard Trust which at the time had just one branch, he worked towards growing the bank to becoming a Pan African bank. A rather ambitious goal considering where he started from. Then when that milestone was achieved in 8 years he set new goals to become a global bank — he explained to us that he wanted to “take Africa to the world’. To be considered a global bank, you need to establish a presence in key international capitals, Paris, London, New York etc. And he set about working towards this and achieved it. In 2022 , the latest international branch of UBA in the UAE is set to launch. Impossible is nothing.
6. The power of having a social cause — one amazing lady amongst the mentees shared her story about how she started her cerebral palsy centre inspired by her daughter who has advanced stage cerebral palsy. Having no decent care options available, she quit her role and focused on caring for her daughter full time. She was inspired to set up a care centre to help other parents as well because she knew that the support was little to non existent. She started fundraising, soliciting support from the general public, asking the general public to give less than $1 or 1000 Naira each. Incredibly, she has raised more than N300m over the years singlehandedly through 1000 Naira donations and has built a centre where she has carers who care for children living with cerebral palsy totally free of charge. She challenged TOE and all other corporates to do more to support NGOs that focus on disabilities. That was totally inspiring to me. We can all be social activists in one form or the other. Having a cause bigger than yourself can motivate you to do far beyond what you can imagine.
7. TOE exhibits many of the traits of High Performance Individuals. HPIs are results driven, high octane, passionate extroverts that derive their energy from being around similar people unlike introverts. They thrive on personal and group interactions which help them become master networkers. He stood up to address the cohort for nothing less than 2 and half hours without even a toilet break. High performance individuals surround themselves with people similar to them. It was evident during the session that many of the things he achieves is down to building strong teams around him made up of smart men and women that work hard and execute harder. Good delegation is key. No one builds great things alone. It usually takes a great team.
8. I had the opportunity to make a presentation during the mentoring session, to be honest I was not actually sure what to ask but with some quick thinking, I found the right words and it was ultimately my expertise that helped me deliver an impactful short presentation that caught the attention of TOE as well as other people in the audience. Which brings me to the point that you can’t short-cut or bullshit your way to long term success without being good at what you do. Mastery of your industry or your craft is really important and this message was reiterated through that experience and also in his address.
9. Dr Awele Elumelu, the wife of TOE, an elegant, soft spoken lady addressed the mentees and she had some words of wisdom to share. She reminded us all that we should never underestimate our capabilities and our impact on others. Finally she rounded up by reminding us about the importance of having a supportive partner and when asked if TOE supports her she replied “of course, 190%”. The ladies in the house enthusiastically cheered her on and clapped.
10. The mentoring session ended with a cocktail evening. Another opportunity to consolidate contacts, mingle and mix. Admittedly it can be daunting being in a new environment and having to mix with so many other women most of whom you have never met. It can seem a bit like networking on steroids, but the best thing is to keep an open mind and go with the flow. As mentioned previously, I not only met people I knew, including graduates from my AWEC cohort but also women from the legal industry , ladies I met on twitter and even ladies from my agribusiness days. People who listened attentively to my presentation on the value of the sports industry, my work as a legal advisor in sports and now as a personal development mentor approached me to find out more about what I do. I even got an offer of investment into my business by a senior business woman in attendance.It was a really powerful and impactful experience for me. Overall, there were many lessons shared but the most important things I took away; take an interest in the people around you and work on building powerful, positive connections, you have to keep shooting our shots daily and develop tenacity, think long term and have a vision for your life and your business.