Street Smart Lessons From A Homegrown Billionaire
IF you thought Dr. Cosmas Maduka was coming to the May edition of SADC Wealth Empowerment Summit to gloss over how he made his money, you had less than five minutes to realize you were totally wrong.
The President of Coscharis Group was like no other Nigerian billionaire I’ve had the privilege of listening to talk about how to make it in Nigeria. Admittedly, they have been very few. Even then, Dr. Maduka was exceptional.
For almost three hours, the homegrown billionaire, who started his life as an apprentice motor spare parts seller, stood on his feet, looking the audience straight in the eye, dishing out names, addresses, places and events, as if it to say, “Eh, folks, you can go and check these things out … it all happened in this country.”
Down-to-earth, forthright, no holds barred. His keynote lecture was at the same time inspirational and challenging.
His biography, From Trials to Triumph: The Coscharis Story, is a masterpiece. But hearing him tell his own story himself, in his own words, with his voice rising and falling as the occasion demanded, and with emotion and passion packed into each word, brought all the experiences he had journeying from obscurity to prominence to come alive.
There were dozens of lessons that one could learn from this consummate entrepreneur. Here are just a few of them:
l Trust in GOD
l High self esteem
l Boldness
l Vision
l Calculated risk-taking
lAttracting and working with smarter employees
lImportance of having a system
l Keeping promises
l Frugality
l Loving, trusting and respecting your spouse.
When Dr. Maduka stopped talking, it was as if he should continue.There was something about his story that was so real, so convincing. Not a few of his hearers left the venue believing that if this man could do it, they could do it too.
That was to be expected. Dr. Maduka’s lecture was geared towards moving his audience to that conclusion. “If only one person in this audience picks up my message and acts on it and comes back with results,” he told me afterwards, “I’ll be more than happy.”
Watch out Dr. Maduka: The seed you sowed on Wednesday, May 20, 2009, will produce a greater harvest than that!
Dr. Sunny Ojeagbase is the Co-Founder (with His Wife Esther Ojeagbase) of Success Attitude Development Centre, Publisher of Complete Sport Newspaper, the second highest Circulated newspaper in Nigeria.
He is the Publisher of Success Digest Extra and President of Success Attitude Development Center.
A Colossus and Mentor of many part has been very instrumental to the success of a large number of youth entrepreneurs in Nigeria.
He is well respected in the media, particularlly in Entrepreneiship and Sports jounalism.
A Husband, father , mentor and business coach turned 59 years on the 31st of December, 2009.
moses Says:
Its amazing that all the books i have read written by really successful people about how they became successful, this list features. Its like the written code of conduct among the rich and guidelines for those who aspire to be rich. But the thing is that they are hard to master and you need to work at them all the time
Posted on June 13th, 2009 at 12:55 pm
Matthew C. Kriner Says:
Great comment about success
Posted on March 4th, 2010 at 7:04 am