WHY YOUR BUSINESS HAS REMAINED STAGNANT IN THE PAST FEW YEARS

This one is for all distinguished business owners, entrepreneurs, and hardworking men and women who wake up every day determined to make something out of their hustle. This is to all of you that are making huge efforts, just holding on and wondering why your business has not reflected the efforts you pour into it. I understand this situation because I have built and nurtured many businesses of diverse nature. I have watched some grow and I have seen some stagger and shudder no matter how much I seemed to support them. I have also had to consult with mny organisations and have helped to restabilise them by making a few changes. I have put together some of the recurring reasons why organisations seem to remain stunted for years.

Let me start with a question.

How many of you have said something like this before:

“If not for government policies, my business would have grown by now?”

“If the economy was better, I would be doing much more than this.”

“If dollar was not this high, my profit would be better.”

We have all said it at some point.

And let me be clear — government policies matter. Infrastructure matters. Exchange rates matter. Inflation matters. All these things affect business.

But even in the same environment, working under the same conditions, some entrepreneurs seem to be thriving. This makes me ask the uncomfortable question: Is there something that you are doing wrong?

Because sometimes, the reason for the stagnation isn’t government, it is not the economy. It is not even the strain from competition.

Sometimes, it is the small gaps you have consistently left unattended, the little leakages.

And just like a bucket with tiny holes at the bottom, you may keep pouring water in — through hard work, marketing, and long hours — but the level never rises.

I am referring to the “Busy But Not Growing” trap

Many African businesses are busy. Customers are showing up, orders are coming in.
Staff works effectively, there is a good turnover but  growth is not happening.

You started five years ago with one shop. Today, you still have one shop. You started with one delivery bike. Today, you still have one delivery bike.

You are working harder — but not moving forward.

Why?

This is because growth does not only depend on how much you earn or turn around. It depends on how much you keep.

Gap One: You Don’t Really Know Your Numbers

Let’s be honest. Some of us run businesses where:

• Sales are written in notebooks
• Expenses are in our heads
• Staff salaries are paid from the same account we use for family upkeep
• Business money and personal money are mixed together. (I dealt with the subject of separating personal expenses from the business funds in the previous publication).

At the end of the month, we just “feel” like we made profit.

But feeling is not financial management. You may be selling more than ever before — but also spending more than ever before without knowing it. Growth cannot happen in a business that is financially blind.

Gap Two: Pricing Without Calculating Real Costs

Many entrepreneurs price their goods and services like this:

“How much are others selling it?”

Then you go slightly lower to attract more customers.

But have you included:

• Transportation cost?
• Generator fuel?
• Staff time?
• Packaging?
• Equipment wear and tear?

You may be busy every day but still be losing money on every sale. So business is moving.
But growth is standing still.

Gap Three: Inventory That Is Quietly Eating Your Profit

Stock is money sitting on shelves.

In many businesses:

• Items expire
• Products get damaged
• Goods get stolen
• Or slow-moving items gather dust for months

You keep restocking because sales seem good but some of that stock is not converting back to cash. I learnt a personal lesson on this through my magazine publishing businesses where the unsold copies are just as valuable as the sold. In fact, you put in almost as much money into production as you put into collecting, safeguarding and managing the unsold copies.

Growth becomes impossible when your money is trapped in inventory that is not moving or tracked.

Gap Four: Credit Given Without Control

In our environment, relationships matter. So we sell on credit to:

• Friends
• Loyal customers
• Long-time partners

But without clear terms, follow-up, or limits, it would not be long before your profit is in people’s pockets.

Undefined credit is just you financing other people’s businesses. Cash flow suffers because creditors always demand more time extension. When cash flow suffers, growth stops.

Gap Five: Operational Waste You Have Normalized

Some losses have become so common that we now see them as “part of business.”

For example:

• Generator running when it is not needed
• Multiple unnecessary subscriptions
• Emergency repairs because maintenance was ignored
• Delivery routes that waste fuel
• Duplicate purchases because no one checked existing stock

Each one may look small by itself but together, they silently drain your profit month after month.

Gap Six: Losing Customers and Chasing New Ones

Many businesses focus on getting new customers.

You offer discounts, fund promotions, run adverts. All these cost more money than would have been used to track old customers and adjust service delivery to include their expectations. The truth is some loyal customers go when they feel that the quality of service/product has dropped, or that there are delays or inconsistencies. While it is good to get new customers, it is cheaper and more profitable to keep the existing loyal ones.

Retention is cheaper than acquisition and when customers leave regularly, growth becomes very expensive.

Gap Seven: Resistance to Simple Technology

Some business owners avoid technology because:

• “It is complicated.”
• “It is expensive.”
• “We have always done it this way.”

So records are manual.

Inventory is guessed.

Sales tracking is inconsistent.

Meanwhile, competitors using simple digital tools are reducing errors, saving time, and improving efficiency. Growth loves efficiency.

The Truth About Business Growth

Business growth is not always only about getting more customers, opening more branches or selling more products.

Sometimes, it is also about managing what you already have more efficiently, protecting the profit you already make and closing the gaps that exist in your operations. Every money saved through efficiency is equal to money earned without stress so if you truly want growth in the next five years, close up the gaps that we have reviewed.

Growth does not come from effort alone. It comes from discipline and consistent right decisions.

Government may improve policies tomorrow, insecurity may become an old tale and the economy may stabilize next year, but the gaps in your business will remain unless you close them.

Play your own part, starting now.

Cheers

Fatherhood with Ibe

DID I LOVE THEM INTO MEDIOCRITY?
Reflections of a Father Who Built an Empire but Isn’t Sure He Built His Children

I think I started off a sort of personal reflection amongst fathers when I published the story of Chike, a father that was full of regrets about his journey of sacrifice with his children. Since I published that story, I have received several with similar lamentations and some with very harsh reactions. Two weeks ago, I published the story of Nano who had a different angle. He had dedicated all he had to his brilliant daughter and he said raising her was worth every sacrifice. He said fatherhood is a calling that is far above any other. This publication is another reflection by a father. He is a well-known business man who has sat rightfully on the boards of many corporations. His own angle is one that I think may resonate with many financially successful parents especially those anxious to give their children a lifestyle far better than what they endured in their time.

Below is Otunba’s reflection. I hope you pick relevant lessons for yourself.

At 72, success sits around me like well-arranged furniture in a quiet living room. The houses are built. The companies are running. The boardrooms still take my calls. My name still opens doors that used to intimidate me forty years ago.

My children are comfortable — very comfortable. They each run businesses I helped set up. They live in homes I could only dream of at their ages. Their children attend the kind of schools whose fees would have sent me into visible panic back in the days. Yet, sometimes, I sit in the stillness of my study and wonder: Did I love them too softly?

I was not born into comfort. My father was a proud man, but pride did not pay school fees. My mother stretched stew the way some people stretch the truth; expertly and without apology. Growing up, we did not talk about dreams. We talked about survival. We did not speak about passion. We spoke about opportunity. By the time I got my first job in a large corporation in my late twenties, I had already made a promise to myself:

“My children will never know this kind of hardship.”

It was a noble promise. Or so I thought.

When my first son was born, I opened an investment account before I even opened a savings account in his name. By the time he was ten, I had bought land “for his future.” By the time he was sixteen, I had mapped out the industries that would still be profitable twenty years from then. When he graduated from university, I did not ask him what he wanted to do. I showed him what I had already done.

“This company,” I told him, sliding documents across a glass table, “is yours to run.”

I remember the gratitude in his eyes. I did not notice the uncertainty.

I did the same for all of them.

My daughter wanted to start a small fashion line after NYSC. I insisted she take over the logistics arm of one of my companies first.

“Fashion is risky,” I told her. “Let’s build something stable.”

When my second daughter spoke about tech, I brought her into an existing IT services firm rather than allowing her to experiment with the startup she and her friends were building from a cramped apartment.

“Why start from zero,” I said, “when I can give you leverage?”

At the time, it felt like wisdom. Now, I am not so sure.

On paper, my children are successful. They employ people. They sign contracts. They attend conferences. Their businesses are ‘profitable.’ But there is something missing.

It is difficult to explain to people who have never built anything from nothing.

There is a kind of fire that comes from hunger — not the hunger of the stomach, of course, but the hunger of desire mixed with uncertainty and determination to get it right or die trying. The kind of hunger that keeps you awake at night because if you fail, there is no soft place to land. The kind of hunger that forces you to innovate because your survival depends on it. That hunger births fire.

I see competence in my children but I do not see fire.

I see them manage. I do not see them build.

I see them maintain what I gave them. I do not see them multiply it. And sometimes, when they bring reports to me; safe predictable reports with easy end results, I hear myself saying things I swore I would never say to my own children.

“You can do better than this.”

They nod but nothing changes.

Last year, my youngest came to me with a proposal to expand her business into another West African country. It was ambitious, too ambitious, if I am being honest. The projections were bold. The risks were significant. My first instinct was familiar.

“Let’s slow down,” I told her. “Why not consolidate here first?”

She nodded. She always nods. But this time, I noticed something. Disappointment!

She did not argue. She did not push back. She simply withdrew the proposal and returned to running the business exactly as it had been running before.

That night, I could not sleep because I realized something uncomfortable: I seemed to have raised children who were waiting for my permission to be great.

I thought I was helping them by removing obstacles. School fees paid in full; they lived like royalty while in the universities. I provided business capital without interest or any stringent rule about refund. I picked up lapses and covered financial setbacks. I arranged opportunities through my contacts. When my first son’s business failed in the early days, I stepped in quickly to stabilize things.

“No need to struggle,” I said then. “That is why I am here.”

But struggle, I am beginning to understand, is not always an enemy. Sometimes, it is a teacher.

I remember my first failed deal at thirty-three. It nearly broke me.

I had borrowed money from friends and taken a risk that did not pay off. For weeks, I avoided calls because I did not know how to explain what had happened. I had to sell my ‘just get me there’ car to cover part of the losses. But that failure taught me more about risk management than any MBA program ever could.

It taught me to ask better questions, read contracts more carefully, study people more deeply and think three steps ahead. Most importantly, it taught me that I could survive failure.

Have my children learned that? Or have I protected them from the very experiences that would have made them stronger, I asked myself?

Parenting does not come with performance reviews. There are no quarterly assessments to tell you whether you are overcorrecting or underperforming. There is no HR department to advise you when your good intentions are creating long-term consequences. You simply do your best with the information you have.

And for many years, I believed that good parenting meant providing; providing comfort, security and opportunities. I was trying to give them the childhood and beginning that I never had but in doing that, had I robbed them of the very joy of building?

Now, I am wondering if good parenting also means withholding — strategically and lovingly: Withholding rescue, immediate solutions and the safety net that prevents them from ever feeling the full weight of their decisions.

A few months ago, I had lunch with an old colleague whose daughter built a thriving business in an industry neither of us understood. He told me she had started it with money saved from freelance jobs. No family funding. No corporate backing. He could afford to help her but didn’t.

“She struggled in the beginning,” he admitted. “There were months she could barely pay rent.”

I felt a familiar tightening in my chest.

“That must have been difficult to watch,” I said.

He smiled.

“It was. But it forced her to become resourceful. Today, she knows her business inside out because she had to learn everything herself.”

I did not say anything because I was thinking about how quickly I would have stepped in if one of my children were in a similar situation. I was thinking of how uncomfortable I would have been watching them struggle, how anxious I would have been to fix things.

Love, I am learning, is not always expressed through intervention. Sometimes, love is expressed through restraint. Like my friend, it is through allowing your children face challenges you have the power to remove but choose not to. Love can be expressed through trusting that the very difficulties they face are the ones that may shape them into something greater than comfort ever could.

Do I regret helping my children?

No, not really.

I am proud of the stability they enjoy. I am grateful they do not know the kind of desperation that defined my early years. But I wonder if there is a middle ground I never found: A place between abandonment and overprotection, between hardship and ease, between guidance and control. Perhaps I should have given them less certainty and more responsibility – less capital and more curiosity, less direction and more room to discover their own.

These days, I am trying something new.

When they come to me with ideas, I ask questions instead of giving answers.

“What do you think the biggest risk is?”

“How would you handle it if things go wrong?

“What is your backup plan?”

Sometimes, I say nothing at all.

And it is uncomfortable because doing nothing feels like neglect when you have spent decades equating action with love. But I am beginning to see small changes.

They seem to have more initiative, more ownership of their plans and more willingness to defend their decisions.

It is not dramatic but it is a start.

If I could speak to my younger self and that would also be all the fathers that will read this article, the man holding a newborn son and making promises about a hardship-free future, I would tell him this: “Do not make their road as smooth as yours was rough. Let them climb. Let them fall. Let them figure some things out without you. One day, you may build an empire big enough to house them all … and still wonder why none of them learned how to build one of their own.”

At 72, I am still learning that parenting is not about raising children who need you. It is about raising adults who don’t. Sometimes, the greatest gift you can give your children is the chance to struggle without you always stepping in to save them.

Thank you.