People often underestimate how addictive the entrepreneurial process can be. There is a particular thrill to starting up and growing a business that has the person with an entrepreneurial bent coming back for more. This has been the experience of Nigerian entrepreneur Boye Balogun.
Growing up in London, Balogun had a thriving career the corporate world before he decided to take the plunge and start his own business in Nigeria. Being too early to market, the first venture did not succeed. But the bug had bitten, and his interest lay with emerging markets.
In the latest media inspired episode of CNBC Africa’s Entrepreneurial Edge, the Founder and CEO of FutureTech Media spoke to Tania Habimana, about his journey. FutureTech Media is one of several of his businesses, and it currently has operations in Africa, Dubai and Singapore.
“What I didn’t realize was the confidence you get from running your own business was just so attractive to recruiters and I landed a job within a week and that trajectory has really helped me in terms of confidence but also in terms of looking back at the continent and thinking to myself something is here,” he told Tania.
In this energetic interview, Balogun emphasised the importance of building future leaders and encouraging them to become entrepreneurs. As part of his recruitment strategy, he tells people when they get to a point where this company is not the direction for them anymore, and they would like to start their own business, he may be the first to invest. He is driven to prepare the next generation to be ready when business prospects come around the corner.
Amongst a wide range of topics brought up in this discussion, Balogun spoke passionately about how scaling up a business is not his first concern when it comes to his investment strategy. “What we are really looking for is businesses based on sustainable business practices and by that I mean not get rich quick schemes. I want sustainable businesses that care about their people and sustainable businesses that are building their product that actually elevates and empower lives.”
The resource richness of the African content was also brought to the table, and Balogun emphasised the human resource capabilities of the continent, and how young Africans are at the forefront of innovation in the ICT sector.
Balogun makes a conscious effort to “feed the creative mind.” He does this in a multitude of ways. One of them is reading. While non-fiction business related books are important, he dedicates a greater portion of his reading time on fiction to inspire and retain the creative aspects of life. The most important thing Balogun does to keep his mind fresh and in a constant state of creative thinking is to do something new all the time.
