‘Pay Raise Shouldn’t Stop You Starting An Own Business’

Chief Razak Okoya, Chairman of Eleganza Group

By Dcn. Davis Ezechinedu

I think it reasonable, before discussing the topic for today to share a little with you on how I joined this ‘journey of faith and adventure’ called entrepreneurship.

I was working in a finance house and for some inexplicable reasons I started nursing the idea of setting up my own company but I had no money nor knew exactly what I wanted to do. So, I prayed about it for one full year and started making small savings from my modest monthly salary of about N10, 000. However, at the end of the year, I just could not summon the courage to leave.

To complicate matters, my employers promoted me, increased my salary, and gave me a brand new car (Jetta Executive) with a fat driver too. When I saw all these things, I changed my prayer into more promotions and more salary increases. I started hearing and reading books about how people who started businesses failed and the associated shame such failures brought to them.

Nevertheless, about 6 months later, for reasons I couldn’t understand, my employers who liked me before didn’t like me again. As much as I tried and prayed to keep the job, I saw it slipping away.

I had even thought I was very important to the company until one day when they asked me to resign- just like that! While sacking me, my employer put one leg on my table and in a humiliating tone demanded for the keys to the official car. I went to the office in an official car, but went home by taxi!

With the regular salary, the official car, and the fat driver gone, I was now alone.  I then made a decision: No man on earth will ever ask me for my car key again.

The little money I saved finished and all those things I read, heard, and feared about being self-employed came upon me. Instead of weakening me, I grew tough and hardened. It is now over 17 years and my only regret today is that they did not sack me earlier.

My story is not too far from that shop owner, boutique owner, trader, importer, or consultant.  It is the same story for that woman that fries ‘akara’ by the roadside in spite of threats by the local government. It is also the story of the owner of that conglomerate you see.

It is our story- the story told by Entrepreneurs: a story of adventures, failures, experiences and the triumphs and glory that follow.

Now to my topic:

Please permit me to make a case study out of an abridged biography of one of the few barely established Nigerian Entrepreneurs.

• This man was born in Lagos and barely educated. He worked with his father who had a tailoring business, who also sold tailoring accessories. After working with his father for a while, he began to do a few things on the side, like amending shirts and trousers for a fee, for instance, turning long sleeves to short sleeves or trousers to shorts.

He saved every penny he made and when he had saved about twenty pounds, he wanted to go into trading. Back then, ordering for goods directly from manufacturers was not popular. Then, he got hold of the catalogue of a manufacturing business in Japan. He liked the goods but he needed seventy pounds to be able to order and ship to Lagos. He approached his mother who gave him the needed balance of 50 pounds.

By the time his goods arrived, they were not only of better quality; they were also cheaper than what was available in the market. He sold out quickly and ordered more. That was how it all began. The rest they say is history. This is the story of Razak Okoya, Chairman Eleganza Group

Today, Razak Okoya’s Eleganza group is one of the biggest homegrown conglomerates in Nigeria and practically produces all manner of household goods directly employing over five thousand Nigerians and non-Nigerians.

From the above story we can pick some vital factors that can assist in building and sustaining entrepreneurial businesses:

1: Create A Competitive Advantage

A business must have a clearly defined unique selling proposition. Ask, “Why will people choose to do business with you or purchase your product or service?” In other words, what one aspect or combination of aspects is going to separate your business from your competition? Will it be of better quality, lower price, faster delivery, better/more flexible payment options, personalized service, better customer service, or a combination of several of these?

I must advise very strongly that you should be extremely very careful of starting or owning only one business, which is in a government-regulated sector. It takes only one government policy to shatter all your entrepreneurial dreams.

2:  Remember It’s All About The Customer

Your business is not about the products or services that you sell. Your home business is not about the prices that you charge for your goods and services. Your business is not about beating the competitions. Your business is all about your customers, or clients, period. Everything you do in business must be customer focused. You must know who your customers are inside out and upside down.

It’s a researched fact that most businesses (80 percent) will come from repeat customers rather than new customers.

Therefore, along with trying to draw newcomers, the more you can do to woo your regular customers, the better off you will be in the long run and personalized attention is very much appreciated and remembered in the modern high tech world.

No matter how great your idea or your products are; your goods or services, if there are no customers to which they can profitably serve the business will collapse.

3: Manage Your Money Wisely

The lifeblood of any business enterprise is cash flow. Cash is the King in business. You need it to buy inventory, pay for services, promote and market your business, repair and replace tools and equipment, and pay yourself so that you can continue to work.

Therefore, all home business owners must become wise money managers to ensure that the cash keeps flowing and the bills are paid. There are two financial gates in any business that requires wise money management.

Entrance Gate: The money you receive from clients in exchange for your goods and services you provide (income) come through this gate. You must open it as wide as you can.

This is because it is the Lack of customers and orders that ultimately lead to business failures and NOT Lack of access to bank loans and other external finance.

Exit Gate: The money you spend on inventories, supplies, salaries, wages, bills, admin expenses, and other items required to keep your business operating. Keep this gate narrow as much as possible.

Place yourself on a fixed and documented Salary and Allowances. You must however also strike a balance not to stifle the company; although, entrepreneurs all over the world are known to be good money managers, very shrewd and hard negotiators.

4: Invest In Yourself

The greatest, most powerful, effective and best business and marketing tool in your business is you- the Entrepreneur, the chief executive officer, the alter ego and the no 1 decision maker of the company.

The company can only be as good as you are.

Top entrepreneurs buy and read business and marketing books, biographies, magazines, reports, journals, newsletters, websites, and industry publications. They network with other skilled business people to learn their secrets of success and help define their own goals and objectives.

Top entrepreneurs attend business seminars, trade fairs and exhibitions, workshops and training courses. They do these because they know that education is an ongoing process. There are usually different ways to do things better, in less time, with less effort.

5:  Build A Rock-Solid Reputation

A good reputation is unquestionably one of the home business owner’s most tangible and marketable assets. You can’t simply buy a good reputation; it’s something that you earn by honouring your promises.

If you promise to have the merchandise in the customer’s hands by Wednesday, you have no excuse not to have it there. If you offer to repair something, you need to make good on your offer. Consistency in what you offer is the other key factor.

If you cannot come through with the same level of service (and products) for clients on a regular basis, they have no reason to trust you. Moreover, without trust, you will not have a good reputation.

6. Have Faith In God

People with greater faith in God are more willing to take risks!

In spite of the wide range of theories, trainings, mentoring and sometimes-unhelpful advices on how to attain business success the reality, is there are plenty of people who applied all these and more, but still have fallen flat on their faces after starting up their own business.

Why? You may ask. There is still no known reliable and certain handbook/formula for business success

However, research works have established that there is a strong link between faith and entrepreneurial activity. Entrepreneurs need faith because starting a business is like stepping into the dark. You have to believe that you can and will succeed before you even start.

All Entrepreneurs derive their drive from their faith in something- external or internal. Those termed atheists put their faith in themselves and their instincts to the extent of thinking, believing and acting themselves as to be a kind of god to themselves.

A further research revealed that successful Buddhist entrepreneurs, Hindu entrepreneurs, Jewish entrepreneurs, Muslim entrepreneurs, and even African/Traditional entrepreneurs are strong devotees in their faiths and support the cause of their faiths with sacrificial giving.

Those who are not in any faith (Atheists), resort to charitable giving, donating to the orphanages, the less privileged, and victims of natural disasters.

As entrepreneurs and business people, we have to lay the foundation in our spirit, soul and mind that both riches and honour and the power to prosper indeed and only come from Him in whom we believe in.

Conclusion:

If you are here unemployed, lost your job, or are dissatisfied with your current job, I challenge you to join us; defy the fear, and our story could be your story too!

I strongly believe that as a faith based and entrepreneurial ministry, God will surely, in not too distance time raise out of us many Entrepreneurs whose testimonies would be global. It could be you, it could be me or it could be both or all of us!

Courtesy, Dunamis Publications, TREM and originally published with the title: Sustaining Your Business