There’s so much happening economically in Nigeria recently that can potentially depress even the most thick-skinned business leader. It’s great we celebrated the improvement in our “ease of doing business” global ranking from 169th to 145thof 190 economies ranked about a year ago.
Despite this and the fact we became the largest economy in Africa and 26th in the world by the GDP rebasing of 2014, our economy is still inchoate – and that isn’t going to change overnight.
There is much work to be done in transforming the enabling business environment to cause the attainment of a top 20 economy in a few years. Business leaders speak of the issues of high cost of capital employed for business, punitive regulation (that some refer to as over-regulation), multiple taxation, loose borders enabling an influx of cheap, inferior products competing with local offerings, the madness at the ports to clear key raw materials (which creates capacity utilisation issues for manufacturers) etc, as keeping them awake at night.
I haven’t even mentioned the persistent twin issues of power and roads, over which we now sound like broken records. I can go on and on. Many of these issues have become entrenched in our economic environment. The balance, though, is that the fundamentals of the Nigerian economy remain strong from my perspective – the population (and its youthfulness), the dynamism of the workforce, size of our oil reserve and untapped arable land with its inherent natural resources, etc. But this isn’t a script on the economy, and haven’t we said these for donkey years with little changing?
This is about the leadership required to successfully navigate the challenges in the economy. Business leaders can choose to sit at their desks and cry all day or lift their heads to exploit economic opportunities by focusing on the positives. The impact of positive thinking (the ‘yes I can’ attitude) in driving life achievements is unquantifiable.
At Coca-Cola a couple of decades ago, we had a supplier who never thought anything was impossible. Give him a brief at midnight for delivery of a commercially time-sensitive service in the morning, before you finished your sentence, he would say “consider it done” He would then bend backwards to honour his word and deliver. Before long, he started enjoying the trust of key stakeholders in the company with the result that he got his fair share of contracts. The biggest obstacle to staying positive is that we are largely wired to focus on threats and challenges. Our auto mode is to see what’s wrong in everything, but regrettably we have no clue what we lose not embodying the principle of positive thinking, not just in business but, in everyday living. I would expect a business leader who complements his positive thinking spirit with the following leadership behaviour to stand a good chance of winning.
(1) Strong competitive orientation: You must have an insatiable appetite for beating the competition. When I was in school, I would cry harder if I got 85 per cent in a subject and came 3rd or 4th in that subject than if I got only 50 per cent and topped the class. The point is, in a tough economy, shareholders would judge you not only by your absolute numbers, but by your comparable results versus competition. I have seen companies excel in very tough economic climes by sourcing business value from other industry players. Eating your competitor’s lunch in a depressed economy is not a bad performance metric to tick
(2) Be visible, inspirational: It’s in tough times your team needs you most. You can’t afford to go into any shell. You must be in the trenches with the team. When the going gets tough, the tough must get going. That is “leadership 101”. Every employee is looking up to you as their source of inspiration. I remember at certain times in my CEO roles, even when things were tough performance-wise, I could stay at my desk for a couple of hours doing some sober reflection, and feeling sorry for myself, the team and the organisation on account of overwhelming headwinds.
However, the moment I stepped out of my office, even the very first person I met would have no clue I had been a bit down. My role was/is always to inspire people, and you don’t succeed doing that by looking low in confidence yourself. Let me say for the umpteenth time in this column, your team/followers don’t just listen to what you say, they listen for what you are not saying. You are their ambassador for belief and inspiration.
(3) Creating possibilities: Whether it is by breaking barriers or championing innovation, you must create the conditions for your team to succeed. You must have the ability to lead a conversation for business performance. This is not the time for frivolous or trivial matters. You must not sweat the small stuff, but focus on orchestrating performance by emphasis on elements of significant strategic/commercial value. It goes without saying that in these times, you must have a strong external radar, networking with colleagues in the industry to explore possibilities for collaboration. I believe no matter how different you are from a competitor in the same industry, there must be some commonalities to explore for collaboration. Leverage those.
(4) Learn to run slowly: Most times when things are tough, the tendency is that we become so desperate to turn it around quickly we rush decisions. Even when it’s not about tough times, part of being positive about life is taking the pain to look before we leap. While we castigate people that procrastinate, not running ahead of ourselves provides the necessary balance. I felt hugely sorry for a Spanish football manager, one Julen Lopetegui who was sacked as Real Madrid (RM) FC coach last week.
Only last Summer he was sacked by the Spanish Football Federation (SFF) for “jumping ship” by signing as coach of RM while still in their employment of as Spain national team coach, just as he was about to lead them to the World Cup in Russia. Now the same RM has fired him. Did he rush the decision to sign for RM? Should he have done enough diligence before signing – even to as detailed a level as knowing the team could not be the same without top player Cristiano Ronaldo? Surely this can happen to anyone, but the point is in business, timing is everything. As Germany Kent said “it is (at times) more important to go slowly and gain the lessons you need along the journey than to rush the process and arrive at your destination empty”.
Happy New Month!
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