The Apprentice 2010

The youth are tomorrow’s future #thatisall

I get so excited by news of young ladies and guys doing big things in their fields. This week is about that. Musings of a Caramel Latte Addict (MCLA) will be discussing certain young people who have shone in their art. They have excelled in their individual fields and we cannot but celebrate them. How did the thought of this pop into my head?

I have recently been drawn by The Apprentice on BBC (please what is Stuart still doing there?) and also the recently published Nigerian Future Awards nominees’ list. One thing that is common to most of these people is that they are doing what they absolutely LOVE! It gives me great joy when I see young people between the age of 16 and 35 going into what they love and doing well at it too.

You only need to see the way the young people on The Apprentice, for instance, go about business negotiations, pitching, sales, marketing to be absolutely challenged by it all. What is more challenging is when you see ages such as 21, 24 and 27! Let’s talk very briefly about two of them: Joanna and Stuart.

Joanna Riley is 25 and has her own cleaning company which she started at just 22! In The Apprentice, she has been doing so well and with her shrewd business sense, she has led her team to many wins.

Stuart Baggs, 21 is the loud mouth of the show and is The Apprentice’s youngest ever candidate (which he never fails to remind us every single episode, lol). His first venture into business took place in his own school playground when he started selling yo-yos to fellow pupils. He later went on to launch his own telecommunications company at the age of 19. Even though people (including myself) wonder what he is still doing there, he has been a worthwhile candidate.

Proverbs 18: 16 says that a man’s gift maketh room for him, and bringeth him before great men. This means that whatever talent you have will open up doors to you and bring you to places you have never dreamt of being able to get to. What do you love to do? Writing? Talking? Sewing? Designing? Painting? Decorating? What? Hone your skills and become good at your stuff and see how far you will go.

Please don’t go getting me wrong. It is okay to aspire to be a partner in Aluko and Oyebode or even to become a big girl in JPMorgan Chase or Chevron. However, there is a league of extraordinary youth that I admire so much: those who know that the way forward in life is working for no one but yourself. So this week, MCLA will be honouring ladies and gentlemen that have taken this big step including those who are just simply plain hot at what they do. There is such an exciting line up of young people and I’m sure you will be inspired by their stories and learn a lot from them. We will have them discussing the dangers of throwing away the secured paycheck at the end of the month to being your own boss and also the joys of being self-employed.

What exactly does going into your business involve? It is important to come up with a vision or a business idea. Without a vision, any business will fall face flat. You should be able to see and envision where you want your business to be. I once attended a conference where the speaker said it is not absolutely crucial to be able to see this picture CLEARLY. A picture, however vague is a good starting point. With time, it begins to take shape.

“If you want to be rich, you need to develop your vision. You must be standing on the edge of time gazing into the future.” – Rich Dad, Poor Dad, Kiyosaki and Lechter, 2001.

The next is the capital raising bit, attracting your customers, retaining them. Whilst this is not the most professional bit of advice, it does give a rough idea of what doing your own thing entails. The people that will be featured this week on MCLA will shed more light on this process giving us their personal experiences thereby showing different sides to the whole business processes.

Today, however, MCLA discusses Makinde Adeagbo, a nominee for the Future Awards 2011, Young Person of the Year. I must be honest, when I saw the list, I was like, ‘who is this person?’ I had previously heard nothing about him and the little information given about him on The Future Nigeria website got me researching almost immediately. I was intrigued. How could such a young man have achieved so much!

Here is what was said of him:

Makinde Adeagbo, 25 – Innovator


Facebook has changed the world, and 25 year old Adeagbo is one of its frontrunners. A Software Enginner with the company for four years, amongst other things the whiz-kid is famous for being part of a 2-man team responsible for reducing over 1 MB of Javascript to 2 KB, making the site load twice as fast worldwide.

Now, that is something. So who exactly is he?

Born on the 1st of September, 1985 as Olumakinde Adegboyega Adeagbo in Ibadan, the largest city in Nigeria in 1985, his family moved around when he was a child but finally settled in Louisville, KY in the United States. He has a computer science degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is one of the top software engineers at Facebook in Palo Alto, California. He had previously worked for Microsoft and Apple and is now with Facebook where is doing big techie things which I may never understand. I wonder if he is one of the people behind the new Facebook look, lol.

Here is an interview conducted with himself and Tom Occhino, the other part of the innovating duo.

He was featured on the Facebook homepage at some point.

 

We are very proud of you Makinde and we wish you the very best in all you do.

Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Makinde-Adeagbo/22502717552

Website: http://makinde.adeagbo.com

 

 

It is interesting to see young people doing so well for themselves and I hope you are encouraged to find an area you love, study well and become the best in your field. Whatever your hand findeth to do, do it well.

Watch out for this week’s posts on some young people who are in self employment and are thriving.

Have a great week ahead.

On a random note, Matt Cardle, 27 won the X Factor 2010 and I am so happy about that!!!

This has taught me one crucial lesson. Success has many relatives but failure is an orphan…and an only child too. See the way those contestants jumped on him including those who openly rooted for others.

Even a friend of mine who was clearly a Rebecca Ferguson fan changed his BB Display Picture to Matt after he was announced the winner. This just makes me want to succeed in life so much. Nobody was to identify with Number 2 mehn, loool. Anyways, all the best to them all. I loved Rebecca too, such a classy lady.

NB: Please vote for your Young Person of the Year 2011. I have and I voted for Uche Eze of Bella Naija 🙂

That’s all folks (for now)

Temiville.xoxo