Reversing Nigeria’s Economic Migration By The Youthful Population. Zenith Bank Opens Up It’s Business Faculty To Train And Scale SMEs

September 27, 2024 Greg Abolo

The Oasis Reporters

September 27, 2024

It is axiomatic that banks should worry over an economy because they thrive when businesses are doing well for that is when they source for deposits and lend to productive sectors in order to make profit.

When multinational corporations like
PZ Cussons, GSK, Procter & Gamble, Sanofi, Equinor, Binance, Microsoft and Bolt for instance started their exodus out of Nigeria, without saying it out, people knew instinctively that Nigerian banks worried.

Besides, the exodus or migration (called Japa in local slangs) of many Nigerian citizens for economic factors was also noticeable.

As many more remain, leading Nigerian multiple awards winning Tier-1 bank, Zenith Bank Plc decided to do something positive as a contribution to express how the situation can be remedied and turned around in what is termed Reverse Japa.

In it’s Zenith Bank’s SME Learning Series (September 2024 Edition) titled ELEVATING YOUR TEAM FOR WORLD CLASS PERFORMANCE with Nwamaka Onyuike as resource person in Zoom on September 26, 2024, it was obvious that the bank is focused on enhancing the capacity of Nigerians to grow the SMEs already in the country to scale up their operations and turn the businesses into conglomerates that can take the position the departing multinationals previously held in the country.

That smart option not only reinvigorates the economy but equally enhances the business of banking. A win-win situation for all.

The resource person, Nwamaka Onyiuke has had over 3 decades of helping organizations build robust structures and improve the quality of their workforce through strategic business consultations/interventions as well as mentoring and coaching, thus impacting over 10,000 businesses.

There are 39,645, 385 MSMEs as at 2020 according to SMEDAN data and these organizations contribute about 48% to Nigeria’s GDP, accounting for 96.9% of businesses that guarantee 80% of employment.

Just imagine what the impact would be if the SME’s are scaled up since most multinationals are leaving and they take over. They should be assisted to develop better products or services and with pricing lower than competition, this making Nigeria have more home grown multinationals that can compete on the international arena. Robotic technology for instance can be integrated to assist in automation and help.

Nwamaka Onyuike listed 6 steps that can assist in elevating a team to world class performance:

Create a culture of excellence.

Building a strong team foundation.

Fostering communication and collaboration.

Empowering and investing in an SME’s team.

Adapting to change by encouraging innovation and problem solving.
Finally, there must be measures to monitor performance.

Any company at all has to start from somewhere, no matter how humble. Even Jeff Bezos did . But see what Amazon has become today.

Vision is critical. Let SMEs have it. Multinationals leaving the country becomes an opportunity for SMEs to rise up and shine. From humble beginnings in what people see as uncle and auntie business or one man business can become something else tomorrow, with the right mindset, attitude and discipline.

Greg Abolo