Industry leaders in the Nigerian tech ecosystem have outlined ways by which Nigerian and African tech startups can mitigate risk in long-term business investment.
The expert who spoke at the African Techent1:0 held in Lagos noted that many tech startups have shut down due to the inability to plan and adopt various risk management strategies.
Victor Adebayo, founder Diversity Talent Management Limited speaking on the various ways to manage the risks outlined these five measures for Nigerian tech startups
Copying successful business plans
Copying the hard work and success of already established businesses is one of the ways to succeed in long-term businesses.
According to Adebayo, there is a need to copy shamelessly to achieve a target goal and find a good implementation strategy to make it work.
“If somebody has done something very well before, shamelessly copy. If you are able to copy the hard work and success of others, it goes a long way to help in managing risk. In managing risk especially in the tech space, there is a need to emulate what already worked for others. It is also important to understand the society and business environment you are applying what you have already learnt.”
Applying existing policies in Business
This means that tech startups must apply already-made policies to their business to stay on track and updated.
Citing the Nigerian Data Protection Regulation (NDPR), Adebayo said, “NDPR has come up with a lot around data protection, you can bring the whole concept of the data protection down to business protection and apply them.”
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“You can also attribute this to some of the changes happening in the tech space. For instance, ChatGpt came and some education institutions lost about 95 percent of their revenue. For instance, you must be able to ask yourself, how will your business continue to thrive in the phase of changes even in the tech space, how do we reinvent,” he said.
Technology adoption and business environment
This means that businesses must consider the working environment, market and time before adopting new technologies.
“Look at the environment within which you are operating and always ask the questions if the business is mature enough yet to leverage on some of the technologies, so you don’t arrive ahead of time. When you spend a lot of money for adoption and the market is not ready for it, you don’t get your money back and you shut down. When the market is ready, you have lost so much revenue that you are no longer relevant,” Victor added.
Documentation:
Every business must have proper documentation for proper accountability. Every sale or service rendered must be documented to avoid ambiguities within which the business operates.
Laws of the land
We talk about corporate values which are just business belief systems. It does not necessarily mean it is legal. For you to operate as an entity in any nation, the laws of the land are the base point. Your business values must have the laws of the land and from there, you begin to move.
“What are the values of the Organisation so that when people begin to work for you, they will work within the remit of the law to avoid issues, so you don’t work and run in a fraction?
“A case study is what is happening to Facebook now, paying over a billion fines by the European Union (EU) from migrating data from the EU to the U.S. Probably they have thought it is the best way to keep safe not knowing they are breaking the law. If it was just a rising startup, it might just lead to the end of an era,” he said
Meanwhile, the African TechEnt1:0 is a conference organised by the People Capacity Management Business Academy which aims to discuss and proffer solutions to the current business models adopted by tech entrepreneurs.
