A non-governmental organisation (NGO), Junior Chamber International Nigeria (JCI), in collaboration with CreditPRO, has empowered three female business owners with N1.5 million, while urging entrepreneurs to devote more time to work on their businesses. Speaking at the maiden edition of Women Entrepreneurship Day, tagged, ‘Defining The Future: Women in Entrepreneurship, Sustainable Businesses and Strong Institutions,’ Chief Executive Officer of CreditPRO Business Support Services Ltd, Sola Adeyiga, said it was important for incoming business owners to understand that success doesn’t come overnight.
“It takes time to achieve business success, but you must remain focused and consistently improve it. You also need to devote time to work on your business as opposed to working in your business. “Many entrepreneurs don’t work on their businesses; they only do daily operations, marketing, and financing. To scale up your business, you must work on it, improve the process, obtain investment, and develop new strategies, among other things, ” Adeyiga said. In his keynote address, Adeyiga, who was represented by the company lawyer and secretary, Judith Salami-Eyo, said that CreditPRO was set up in 2019 to support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with customised working capital. JCI Nigeria National President, Olawale Bakare, said the initiative aimed to celebrate, motivate, and support ‘Women in Business and Entrepreneurship.’ “This project is in commemoration of Women’s Entrepreneurship Day, which is celebrated globally on November 19, every year. In partnership with CreditPro Business Support Services, we are very optimistic that the programme will no doubt impact, empower and support ‘Women in Business and Entrepreneurship’ intellectually through our lineup of seasoned successful entrepreneurs,” Bakare said. He added that the reality of the moment is that the entry barriers for female entrepreneurs are unbelievably high. “From traditional views on women’s role, access to network in corporate and management leadership to limited knowledge and training in business and Information Technology (IT) skills and probably most defining; low funding and limited access to capital for female-owned business. It is reported that women have access to only one-third of the starting capital that men do, irrespective of sector. “Through the Women’s Entrepreneurship Day Programme, we desire to help more women start and run sustainable businesses while empowering female entrepreneurs with skills and knowledge to enable them to build and grow a global business. To achieve this, we found an incredible partner in CreditPRO, with whom we share the noble objective of supporting small enterprises and invariably, rebuilding the economy in the advancement of our JCI RISE initiative,” Bakare said. With 113 business proposals and nine pitches, three winners finally emerged. Imam Aishat of Triple A Spices, Oghenetejiri Ogodo of La Tejcreations and Joy Olusile of 9japhonographer all emerged winners and each went home with N500,000. Source: Guardian
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