*The Rousing Drift Of His Good Graces
* His Peerless Path To Glory, Humane Enterprise
By Lanre Alfred
If legacies are truly footprints of legends traversing among men, the best among them must flaunt a prodigious aura. Consider the trllionaire extraordinaire, for instance; a glimpse at his routine may inflame a sense of discernment, suspense and even intrigue. Sustained appreciation may inspire a yearning to idolise him and walk in his shoes. Not all billionaires, though, inspire such passion and a cult following, except Mike Adenuga Jnr. Yes, the GCON. CSG. Cdr L.H
Some call him the Big Kahuna. But Adenuga’s enigma surpasses one catchy sobriquet. He is puzzling and endearing, a colossus and a figure so strong, exalted and heroic that the blood of the gods must flow through him; because how else could a being so rounded and fine exist in this world, in Nigeria to be precise?
The Chairman of Globacom commands the reins of the enterprise even as he strokes its secrets. It is almost magical; his capacity to fondle desire from a subtle nudge into a wild grope. A grope against the elements. Against reality. But few men are gifted at such enterprise, like Adenuga.
His capacity for humane leadership is inspiring. Adenuga is not particularly interested in making more money to splurge on himself. At 70 years old, he has amassed a staggering fortune, no doubt. Instead, what has consumed him recently is how to commit his fortune impactfully to the lives of society’s impoverished.
While it may be tempting to view his effort as a simple philanthropic exercise in transactional leadership, Adenuga’s charitable gestures show how a careful and humane use of affluence can transform something straightforward into a higher cause through servant leadership.
Over the years, Adenuga came to believe that his vast fortune could be put to use solving some of the world’s most challenging problems. Yet, while a leader’s total devotion to a cause greater than themselves lies at the heart of the concept of servant leadership, it is not always enough to persuade others to take action.
Effective servant leadership often employs fundamental negotiation skills to convince others – internal and external publics of his organisation – to come on board. This noble trait of Adenuga has established him as one of the most successful and respected entrepreneurs of all time. Yes, of all time! He is known for his long-term investment strategy that focuses on growing his companies with strong fundamentals and a knack for profitability.
Adenuga is also well known for his frugality and dedication to giving back to society through philanthropy. Additionally, Adenuga has a reputation for being honest and transparent in his business dealings, which has helped to earn him the respect of both investors and the general public.
There is an encouraging irony in the fact that the most successful capitalist of our times is not a ruthless raider or a flashy speculator but a patient long-term investor and patriot, who commits his genius and enterprise to fostering local industry and a sound, sustainable business empire.
Adenuga’s enterprise was spurred by an overriding ambition to make money but also by an overwhelming need to help the needy and remain positively rooted in his community.
Far from becoming a corporate cut-throat, Adenuga is kindly compulsive, obsessed with his work but always returning to his native roots, remaining devoted to his family, holding on to his friends, sticking with his investments, and hating to lay off workers.
His business culture establishes him as a genius of character, patience, discipline, and rationality. Inspired by his keen sense of enterprise and patriotism, not a few Nigerians have elevated him to heroic stature.
His prestige reflects a longing for older Nigerian virtues of social responsibility and enduring integrity since he has built his success by standing apart from the trends of his times, from the conformist, cutthroat, and greedy commercial arena.
More than those who glorify greed, Adenuga offers an appealing entrepreneurial philosophy: he is intolerant of sleaze and intolerance, thus his relentless crusade to improve staff benefits even as he commits his vast fortune to charity.
The founder and chairman of Globacom created his universe from a conversation. An internal one. Every golem in the history of his business empire was summoned into existence through desire, toil and pragmatic manoeuvring. Adenuga aka The Bull, literally mauled into life his secret fantasies.
Through his struggle, he kept telling himself the truth when it mattered most; he submitted his dreams and his will to an internal censor long before the odds or any traducer could lay their wiles on it. In the end, his efforts earned him vast tracts of a voluptuous empire and the reputation of an African gem.
Even with extraordinary influence and power, Adenuga’s servant leadership is characterized by service to an effort above and beyond himself. The billionaire magnate also understands that success only comes from articulating goals to others who can support him.
With his goal in mind, Adenuga doggedly plotted his path to entrepreneurial success; looking at where he wanted to end up and connecting it to where he was starting helped reveal the issues that mattered most to others and indicated the sequence of actions he would need to take to get them on board.
On Adenuga’s watch, Globacom thrives on peculiar strengths. And as they say: the strength of an enterprise subsists in its capacity to traverse unimaginable tracts in pursuit of phenomenal and unlikely payoffs. Globacom does this with unrivalled finesse. Thus its phenomenal growth over the years.
Now in its 20th year, the telecommunication giant is defined by its matchless pace and incomparable milestones. All thanks to the ingenuity and foresight of Adenuga. For Adenuga, forging his path through Africa and Nigeria’s challenging telecoms sector was certainly no walk in the park. But he achieved this with unrivalled finesse and commitment to ethical engagement with all local and international stakeholders.
One thing Adenuga understood quite early was the dynamics of the African public and social spheres. For instance, he painstaking built a telecoms giant that asserted his genius and carved his niche in the public sphere by typically engaging consumers both in their active moments and during moments of downtime, when there is a lull in their affairs – that is, when they are moving between one point or activity and the next, and their attention is free for new inputs.
Such engagement tactic has a long history, of course, that dates as far back as the 1920s, for example, when a famous franchise discovered the power of sequential signs to deliver rhyming messages in its bid to connect with active and prospective customers.
In the virtual realm, Adenuga’s Globacom engaged in real-time connections and dynamic execution while serving up any one of hundreds or thousands of variations of impactful messaging tailored to the consumer’s profile and, increasingly, location—within milliseconds.
As its targeting of its customers improved in the public sphere, it became less intrusive of it, in their estimation. More importantly, the telecom giant created content, projects and initiatives that targeted the growth of its business public and subscribers. It made sure, for instance, that all of its messaging and corporate social responsibility projects align with the consumers’ experience at the moment they encounter the ad.
Adenuga created and sustained initiatives that helped people reach personal objectives. It integrated its business interests with a range of solutions for customers in every stratum of society.
Globacom, his brainchild’s performance in the social sphere helps people forge new connections and enrich existing ones. Its many clients enjoy the exclusive privileges to profit from social interactions themselves while serving as partners of Globacom as a provider of business solutions.
Whereas the social sphere emphasizes broad, diverse networks, the telecoms giant also ventured into a communal sphere that is the domain of more focused social engagement; here it endeavoured to use or help create consumers’ identification with groups and business solutions.
It also created and sustained a business ethic that leverages social affiliation as a tool that suits the character and values of those involved; Adenuga built Globacom addressed and nourished desires for identity, self-expression, and growth; it provided and still furnishes an enduring social signal or status marker; ultimately it empowers the individuals, societies and groups.
Adenuga embraces servant leadership as part of his humanitarian endeavours and this has proved persuasive to others. He made the strategic decision that his charity would be devoted to how to give money away and who the money would be given to. He carefully picks and chooses his causes – be they personal or corporate – based on their understanding of the needs of others.
By making an effort to get at the core issues and respond accordingly, Adenuga ultimately created a more appealing philanthropic culture tailored to the needs of his teeming beneficiaries in his remote and immediate societies.
