Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in leadership development but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Kemi Ogunkoya, Founder of LeaderX, located in Lagos, Nigeria.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

I am a leadership development strategist, coach, and founder of LeaderX. I help business professionals and entrepreneurs develop the right competence for their leadership skills so that they can perform effectively in their current roles and seamlessly transition into higher positions.

Tell us about yourself

I previously had some experience in consultancy, banking, and human resources. When I decided to go into entrepreneurship, I delved into management consultancy. Technically, I was doing great but struggled to achieve the desired results. At some point, we had to temporarily shut down the business.

That period of shutdown was one of my lowest moments I was angry, broke, and frustrated, and I remember one of those evenings as I thought about my next move, some words dropped strongly in my spirit, and it was, “You cannot become better at what you do unless you become better at who you are.” It was the light bulb moment.

I finally found the missing piece – “Self-Leadership.” I began the inside work and activated my self-leadership journey, which was a transformation. Looking at the success I was beginning to achieve in my personal life and business, it became evident that there was a huge leadership gap that ravaged across different stratus of life, and if people become better at who they were, they will become better at what they do. Hence, I dug deeper and immersed myself in leadership development.

Being on this journey of transformation has birthed remarkable results in my life and the lives of my clients, and I am deeply motivated by the tremendous impact that my work brings.

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

Waking up every day to see how my products and services impact hundreds of lives across the world daily. That is a feeling that I will always cherish forever, and no matter how surreal the feeling is today, it comes with newness the next day.

What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?

As a business owner, you'll have to face lots of uncertainty. This means that you won't always know what will happen and may have to make decisions based on assumptions rather than solid information. It can be difficult to deal with this kind of uncertainty. Still, it's a part of being a successful business owner. Every day there are new things to worry about and problems to solve.

Business is unpredictable, no matter how much you plan for it. The truth is, you'll never be perfect, but you can get close if you're able to have the mindset of taking on challenges and finding solutions.

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

  1. Be clear about who you are and what you want to achieve: Anyone who wants to start and grow a successful business must be willing, to begin with a journey of self-discovery. Start by understanding who you are, your personality, strengths, weaknesses, passion, motivations, triggers, goals, ambitions, patterns, and more. It is important to also spend time clearly defining what the business is all about and the vision for the business.
  2. Be Flexible: You may start out believing that you have the picture all figured out and then get stuck on the picture that has been created. To successfully run and grow a business today, you must be willing to fail forward and adapt quickly. If a plan you previously had in mind isn’t working, be open to exploring other ways.
  3. Prepare to make sacrifices: Starting and building a business requires a lot of work. As they say, there are no weekends and no vacations for business owners. The adage sure has some credence. Businesses require a lot of resources, personal, mental, financial, psychological e.t.c and anyone who is committed to building and growing their business must be willing to make sacrifices along these lines sometimes.

Where can people find you and your business?

Website: https://leaderx.app/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/leaderxapp
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/leaderxapp/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/leaderxapp/

If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solo or small business entrepreneur that you'd like to share, then please answer these interview questions. We'd love to feature your journey on these pages.

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