POISED CORP MAGAZINE INTERVIEWS MRS NWAMAKA ONYEMELUKWE, THE PUBLIC AFFAIRS AND COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER, COCA-COLA NIGERIA ON GLOBAL MANAGEMENT CHALLENGE PROGRAM SPONSORED BY COCA-COLA
Poised Corp: Tell us about the Global Management Challenge program.
Nwamaka: The Global Management challenge is the largest strategy and management competition in the world based on business simulation where more than 700,000 participants from over 40 countries have participated since 1980. It’s a global initiative to encourage youths explore their entrepreneurial capabilities.
This year’s edition of the competition which was sponsored by Coca-Cola is the maiden edition of the challenge in Nigeria and featured a total of 80 students from the University of Lagos competing for the first place at the National level. The emerged winners benefitted from an all-expense-paid trip to Dubai courtesy of The Coca-Cola Company, to represent Nigeria at the International finale in April 2018.
Poised Corp: How were the participants selected?
Nwamaka: This is a pilot, we started with the University of Lagos. The school authorities really welcomed it especially because right now we have a lot of youths who after passing through the walls of the University needs to get exposed to business in terms of practical aspect but it was not targeted at any department and we focused on getting students with high GPA so we worked with the school authorities on getting selections but our benchmark was GPA of 4.5 and above.
Poised Corp: Why is Coca-Cola sponsoring?
Nwamaka: The Coca-Cola Company is passionate about youth empowerment. That’s why we are always looking out for opportunities that can help empower the youth. For us, one of the surest ways of reducing unemployment levels is youth entrepreneurship, people building their entrepreneurial skills, lots of youths leave schools and saying there are no jobs, want to create entrepreneurial skills in our young ones so that apart from looking for jobs they can as well become employers of labour.
Despite academia being the foundation for successful professional practice, practical hands-on knowledge of the trade is the ingredient that unlocks success. The human resource required for businesses to remain relevant and competitive requires more than a four or six-year education in a tertiary institution. This must be followed by constant training and retraining of oneself to stay relevant in a constantly evolving world.
We also try in building the gaps between academy and business knowledge so by exposing them to what happens in the business world they can be able to compete in the global space in terms of the work environment. To further enhance the ability of these students to keep up with the evolving technology for the business sector, Coca-Cola Nigeria sponsored the Global Management Challenge (GMC) competition.
Poised Corp: What are other youth projects that Coca-Cola has been involved in?
Nwamaka: As I said earlier, youth empowerment is part of the key pillars we stand for as an organization, you are aware of our participation in the area of sports, empowerment and job creation.
Globally, The Coca-Cola Company uses football as a tool to inculcate the virtues of discipline, self-confidence, team bonding, optimism and diligence into the youths. You would have noticed that we recently brought the FIFA World Cup trophy to Nigeria and the passion that greeted the FIFA World Cup Trophy in Nigeria. This was made possible because The Coca-Cola Company is an official partner to FIFA. Many people are now hoping that the Super Eagles will reward the passion and support of the fans with a commendable performance at the FIFA World Cup proper in Russia.
Another football property that has the Coca-Cola name on it is the Copa Coca-Cola. This like the GMC is a global competition but is focused on football for teenagers. In Nigeria we have done it for over 10 years, last year we had over 5000 participants from the 36 states of the federation. While the GMC focuses on budding entrepreneurs at undergraduate levels the COPA has the objective of unearthing football talents at secondary school levels and inculcating into them virtues that can help them become great in the game as well as expose them internationally.
Some of the products of this initiative are already doing Nigeria proud at club and national team levels. A ready example is Wilfred Ndidi of Leicester City and the Super Eagles, we discovered him during the COPA Coca-Cola event and today he has moved on to International and National football.
Also we have a program called ENGINE (Educating Nigerian Girls in New Enterprise) it’s the Coca-Cola system initiative focused on improving the learning outcomes and economic status of marginalized adolescent girls in Nigeria aged 16-19. Today about 18,000 marginalized young girls have benefitted from the programme.
The ENGINE program improved the education of marginalized girls already enrolled in schools referred to as in-school girls (ISG) by providing selling skills training , Coca-Cola trade assets as well as seed products to , start a small scale business. The out-school girl program also provided about 12,600 marginalized Out-of-school girls across 3 major cities in Nigeria with start-up trade assets, access to vocational and support skills curriculum over a 9-month period designed to improve their training on employment readiness skill sets, financial literacy and leadership values.
Some participated in the lady mechanic scheme where they were trained on how to repair cars and when they passed out the Edo State Government supported them by ensuring the state vehicles where repaired by them, some were introduced to the business of Coca-Cola where they had assets such as products, coolers, umbrellas to start a small-scale business
Poised Corp: Is the program just once or continuous?
Nwamaka: We are in this for a long haul. The target is to expand it to other universities, where we can have inter -university competitions.
Poised Corp: How will the winners emerge and what are the rewards?
Nwamaka: At national levels we had 80 students and divided into groups, each team where given a virtual company, initially identical to every other company in the competition. They were then asked to develop their own company by making a series of decisions relating to every aspect of the business. The challenge ran for six weeks during which the teams met twice a week to take managerial decisions on their virtually owned business.
These decisions were fed weekly onto the GMC database program and the effects of such actions on the businesses outcome were in turn populated after a few days. At the end, the team with the most innovative business solutions with good return on investment to shareholders funds came tops in the competition. Like a real-life business with effect of things that happen in the boardroom.
The winners represented Nigeria for the first time at the international finale in Dubai along with other 20 participating countries on an all-expense paid trip. They also received cash rewards of N500, 000, N300, 000 and N200, 000 respectively. Each participant received a minimum of N10, 000 rewards upwards depending on the stage they were evicted from the competition, and they also got a good reward of Coca-Cola products.
For me, the knowledge and experience are invaluable rewards that should last each participant a lifetime.
Poised Corp: Tell us about yourself
Nwamaka: As you know I manage the Public Affairs and Communication function for Coca-Cola in Nigeria. I am a Public Affairs, Regulatory and Communication professional, an expert in helping companies manage their corporate reputation, growing company profitability and mitigating extreme regulatory policies. I have worked in this space for over ten years.
I started my career in the pharmaceutical sector before venturing into the FMCG space;My passion in engaging people and stakeholder management saw me in the corporate affairs space.
I have acquired vast experience in the Pharmaceutical & FMCG sector, working very closely with key Regulatory Authorities and Government Agencies within the English-speaking West African Region. This has enabled me to develop strong understanding of the African Pharmaceutical and FMCG industry.
On my private life, I am married and a mother of four kids.
Poised Corp: Advice to youths seeking career growth
Nwamaka: My advice is that they should have an open mind, aim for the sky and acquire more skills and capabilities. The four to six years in the higher institution is really not enough. A lot can become entrepreneurs by acquiring skill-sets not just the white-collar space. They should be more entrepreneurial.
During holidays they should not just sit at home but acquire skills, because being in the private sector, there is so much that can be done by those with adequate skill sets and capabilities. Your course of study should not limit you. I studied Pharmacy as first degree and today I am in the Public Affairs Space. Passion, dedication and hard work is key to success.
Poised Corp: What skills do you need as a Corporate Communications person?
Nwamaka: To be in the Corporate Affairs space, you must be a very good stakeholder’s manager, communications skills as well as people’s management etc. versatility is key in this space.
Poised Corp: Coca Cola Nigeria performance as compared with other countries.
Nwamaka: At the Coca-Cola Company, competition is seen in terms of the economy not a single operating unit, so we look for ways to help one another succeed not reasons to applaud an individual business unit and deride the others.
Poised Corp: Apart from the youth development tell us some other Corporate Social Responsibility projects that Coca Cola is involve in.
Nwamaka: There are lots of initiatives we are involved; women empowerment, Community water access, Youth empowerment, Health and wellbeing initiatives etc. Just to give details on a few initiatives. We have 5 by 20, an initiative targeted at enabling the economic empowerment of 5 million women through its global value chain by the year 2020., Coca-Cola Nigeria is one of the largest corporate sponsor of the Lady Mechanic Initiative focused on economically empowering vulnerable young women with vocational, entrepreneurial and life skills, equipping them to become certified professional automobile mechanics.
Most recently, Coca-Cola Nigeria embarked on an initiative termed “Safe Birth Initiative” targeted at improving the infant and maternal mortality in Nigeria. I will simply say watch the space on how this campaign of #keepMumsAlive will evolve and improve the maternal health system in Nigeria,
