The 1st of May of every year for the past few years has been significant in the Nigerian calendar as it is a day when prominent speakers from all around the world come under one roof to share ideas, innovations and insights. It is “The Platform”. The platform is an intellectual fair geared towards helping people to create opportunities and develop their potentials. It is also aimed at developing an accurate mindset and right thinking processes to enable people utilise opportunities available to them in the country today.
This year, the organisers of “The Platform”, Covenant Christian Centre have aptly dubbed this session of the event – Cultural Innovation.
We asked Pastor Poju Oyemade, the head of Covenant Christian Centre, why he chose "Cultural Innovation" as the topic for this Platform and he had this to say - “I chose Cultural innovation because I really believe it is the key to the progress of our nation. Every emerging nation as the term is used today needs to learn the basic principles of advancement from the more advanced nation but its important we do not take their models but learn their principles. Their models have the DNA of their culture in it that makes it impossible to work that well elsewhere without adapting it to fit the environment.”
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| Pastor Poju Oyemade |
He also said that with this “Cultural Innovation”, he intends to build more confidence in people to do it as they see it in their hearts while they learn the fundamental principles of success.
Wikipedia defines Innovation as the creation of better or more effective products, processes, services, technologies or ideas that are accepted by markets, governments and society. Now some people might not think of Nigeria as a country that supports innovation. When asked what he thought were the essentials for innovation to thrive in this Nigeria, Pastor Oyemade opined that “Nigeria in a very funny way supports innovation by default. We are an enterprising people without the necessary infrastructure so we innovate to live, but we must build a viable infrastructure.”
This edition of “The Platform” has speakers from emerging economies – Brazil, China, India, Africa. When asked why, Pastor Poju said he chose speakers from various cultural backgrounds similar to our own environment who might be slightly ahead of Nigeria in global competitiveness. Some of the speakers expected are as follows: Dr. Anil K Gupta, Ms. Haiyan Wang, Luis Alexandre Chicani, Maggate Wade, Michael Strong and many more.
The profiles of some of the speakers are as follows:
Dr Anil K Gupta is widely recognized as one of the world’s leading experts on strategy, globalization, and emerging markets. He is the Michael Dingman Chair in Strategy and Entrepreneurship at the University of Maryland’s Smith School of Business. He is also a visiting professor of strategy at INSEAD where he served as the INSEAD Chaired Professor in Strategy until December 31, 2010. Gupta also serves as chief advisor to the China India Institute, a Washington, DC-based research and consulting organization. He has served as a visiting professor at Stanford University and Dartmouth College. He received a doctorate from the Harvard Business School, an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management at Ahmedabad, and a B.Tech. from the Indian Institute of Technology at Kanpur.
Ms. Haiyan Wang is Managing Partner of the China India Institute, a research consultancy with a focus on creating winning global strategies that leverage the transformational rise of China and India. She is also an Adjunct Professor of Strategy at INSEAD. Ms. Wang serves as a regular columnist for BusinessWeek, a Contributing Editor for the Chief Executive magazine, and a regular blogger for Harvard Business Review. She is the co-author of two highly acclaimed books: Getting China and India Right (which received the 2009 Axiom Book Awards’’ Silver Prize as one of the world’’s two best books on globalization/international business) and The Quest for Global Dominance.
Luis Alexandre Chicani, a Brazilian, is the Founder and CEO of DentalCorp Brazil and DentalCorp Chile. He established the # 4 Dental Insurance company (DentalCorp) in Brazil , from just US$ 600 start up and sold it for around US$ 15 MI to OdontoPrev, who went for an IPO of US$ 250 MI (2007).
Magatte Wade was born in Senegal and educated in France. Her first company, Adina World Beverages, was founded in her home kitchen and was originally based on indigenous Senegalese beverage recipes using organic ingredients. The company is now the most widely distributed U.S. consumer brand founded by an African entrepreneur. The World Economic Forum named her one of their Young Global Leaders for 2011, and she is currently launching her second company, Tiossano, producing luxury organic skin-care products based on indigenous Senegalese skin care recipes.
This edition of “The Platform” will hold simultaneously at two locations in Lagos, Nigeria - The Harborpoint, Victoria Island and 10 Degrees, Billingsway, Ikeja - and will be telecast on TV and broadcast live on the Internet. You can't afford to miss it. Check the website for more information.
Wikipedia defines Innovation as the creation of better or more effective products, processes, services, technologies or ideas that are accepted by markets, governments and society. Now some people might not think of Nigeria as a country that supports innovation. When asked what he thought were the essentials for innovation to thrive in this Nigeria, Pastor Oyemade opined that “Nigeria in a very funny way supports innovation by default. We are an enterprising people without the necessary infrastructure so we innovate to live, but we must build a viable infrastructure.”
This edition of “The Platform” has speakers from emerging economies – Brazil, China, India, Africa. When asked why, Pastor Poju said he chose speakers from various cultural backgrounds similar to our own environment who might be slightly ahead of Nigeria in global competitiveness. Some of the speakers expected are as follows: Dr. Anil K Gupta, Ms. Haiyan Wang, Luis Alexandre Chicani, Maggate Wade, Michael Strong and many more.
The profiles of some of the speakers are as follows:
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| Dr Anil Gupta |
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| Ms Haiyan Wang |
Luis Alexandre Chicani, a Brazilian, is the Founder and CEO of DentalCorp Brazil and DentalCorp Chile. He established the # 4 Dental Insurance company (DentalCorp) in Brazil , from just US$ 600 start up and sold it for around US$ 15 MI to OdontoPrev, who went for an IPO of US$ 250 MI (2007).
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| Magatte Wade |
This edition of “The Platform” will hold simultaneously at two locations in Lagos, Nigeria - The Harborpoint, Victoria Island and 10 Degrees, Billingsway, Ikeja - and will be telecast on TV and broadcast live on the Internet. You can't afford to miss it. Check the website for more information.
