Progress, Process, and Practice of Thankfulness: 2021 in a Nutshell

P.S: This is not a year review post but a highlight of my experience as a part of the founding class of the Nigerian University of Technology and Management Scholars program (NSP)

I began the year 2021 unsure about some aspects of my career. After considerable thought, I can confidently state that 2021 was a year of progress, trusting the process, and practicing thankfulness. I am overwhelmed with appreciation and humility. 2021 has been an incredible year!

I started this year by joining the founding class of Nigerian University of Technology and Management Scholars program (NSP). I was awarded a full scholarship worth $40,000. NUTM is a transformative, rigorous, and highly impactful program to identify and train Africa’s next generation of leaders in technology and management. My knowledge base has grown, and I have learnt a lot in sectors and disciplines I never considered in previous years.

The faculty is made up of a team of a well-read and diverse group of brilliant minds that includes professors from Stanford, Wharton, MIT, Rochester & amazing people from all over the world. The program is an experiential module that enables scholars to work on real-world problems through entrepreneurship and capstone projects.

With my engineering background, I was empowered with knowledge in digital transformation & innovation, design thinking,?market-creating innovation, social entrepreneurship, human-centered design, business strategy, marketing, sustainability, gender diversity & equality, finance management and Africa’s history. I was able to work on real-world challenges and provide workable answers. I now have a greater understanding of team dynamics and self-leadership which has been useful in my present role as a program manager.

A key part of the NSP curriculum is TEDLab [Technology, Entrepreneurship, and Design Lab] facilitated by Femi Longe. I worked with a team of 2 other scholars to address a real-world problem in the logistics industry using design thinking from ideation to final execution. TEDLab was quite exciting as I learnt a lot about tools that can be used to build our MVP without breaking the bank. I got introduced to No-Code tools and other fantastic design thinking tools.

To solidify our TEdLab projects, we also took a course on product management by Ope Bukola. Through the product management course, I learnt about the framework for ideating, evaluating and planning for a new product launch. This course distils lessons learned by Ope Bukola from being a product lead for Google classroom and growing from 1 to 100M users.

Another key part of the curriculum is "Shadow-a-Leader". This is a full-time associate role that involves supporting executives of leading organizations and being mentored by them. I spent the Shadow-a-Leader period at TLcom Capital and worked closely with my mentor, Dr. Omobola Johnson and Adeyemi Adegbayi. During this time, I was given various duties and projects to handle. I was allowed to undertake preliminary assessments of some of the startups in the company’s pipeline and compose the pre-investment report for the global team. I was introduced to deal flow and how deal flow works. I was able to work on over 150 deal flow updates. I gained experience evaluating companies in various industries by assessing their market size, product-market fit, competitive advantages and core team. It was so much fun and intellectually enriching to dive into business models, industries and technologies. I learnt a lot about the Nigerian and African startup ecosystem.

The highlight of my journey is the people I met at NUTM. I was inspired, challenged and driven to grow by the fantastic set of colleagues I had. My colleagues were the brightest minds that Africa has to offer. They showed me how much potential for change the African youth had. I have made amazing friendships and built relationships with some of the brightest people in Africa.

A special thanks to the NUTM team, Oghogho Ayanru, Debo Odunlami, Omoladun Bamgbose and everyone on the team who exemplified authentic leadership and were a source of inspiration and encouragement for all scholars.

To the visionary Dr Okechukwu Enalama,? Our dean- Dr. Omobola Johnson, Adeyemi Bero, Prof Wole Sobeyejo and all members of the governing board, Thank you for investing so much in us and birthing this vision

I can boldly say I am a better person than I was in January 2021. I know have some clarity on what the next phase of my career will look like. I am grateful to be surrounded by God’s goodness, and I am approaching the year 2022 with the mindset -“Plan around things you have control over and have flexibility in your plans.”