You’re a busy lady, but your beauty routine doesn’t have to suffer just because you have a packed schedule. Obviously, there is no shame in being a busy woman – work, family, kids and everything else that goes with it! When in a jiffy, we often look for quick and easy options to help us look presentable for the day. Always be on time whilst looking fabulous with our top beauty tips.

• LEAVE OUT THE LIPSTICK

Lipstick looks great right after application, but keeping that pout looking great throughout the day takes work. Instead of lipstick, try a tinted lip gloss. It gives you just enough color and shine to brighten your smile, but it doesn’t look bad when it starts to wear off. Also, gloss doesn’t have to applied as carefully as lipstick, so it’s great to slap on as you run out the door.

• MOISTURIZE

If you are in your teens and 20s, you can probably get away with moisturizing at least once a day. However, once you stepped in to your gorgeous 30s, maintaining your skin’s moisture is more important than ever. Especially when you’re working in a place where heat and humidity is more than what you’re used to. To keep your skin nourished, apply a rich moisturizer day and night. This is to lock in plenty of moisture before you get exposed to dehydrating effects of daily movement or heat.

• PERK IT UP

Being on the move usually takes a toll on the skin especially your face, so if you don’t want to turn up looking tired or exhausted, perk it up with a soft shimmer powder or cream by stroking it lightly over your cheeks, nose bridge and lips. Alternatively you could switch to cream blush to add a dash of colour and moisture. No matter how tired you feel, once applied, you’ll look fresh and rosy.

• CARD YOUR LASHES FOR MAJOR VOLUME

Before applying mascara, place a business card or index card behind your lashes to cover your lid. Starting at the roots, swipe mascara all the way to the tip. You can really let the wand fly so it lengthens without making a mess—the mascara will just hit the card! Your lashes will go from barely-there to full and thick in seconds.

• SPEED UP THE DRYING PROCESS

Make your nail varnish dry faster by soaking your nails in ice water after painting them. Fill a bowl with ice and water, and soak your nails for a few minutes after painting them. The cold water will set the paint and help your nails dry faster.

Photo Credit: Fashion Allure

This article was published in Maktoub Magazine

“As the women told their stories, I could hear in the back of my head a prosecutor building a case because each of them was adding something that could be material for prosecution,” E.R. Shipp, a journalist and columnist said about the documentary. The journalist-scholar who happens to be the first black woman to receive the Pulitzer in the category of commentary is a firm believer that the media should be a tool for driving truth and justice.

“Our job is to pursue the truth and there’s a long history of media engaging in crusades on a variety of topics, so this is no different from that,” she continued. “We are now in this era we call the #MeToo time. In the back of our head depending on what the story is, we are hoping that this would end up with some justice coming from the story. There’s nothing wrong with pursuing truth and letting the chips fall where they may.”

And the chips are falling in favor of the women who sought justice by sharing their experiences. Not only did the documentary spur a wave of legal actions against the singer, more people have come forward with claims of inappropriate conduct. In February, a Cook County, Illinois judge approved an arrest warrant for Kelly, charging him with ten counts of felony aggravated criminal sex abuse. Singers such as Lady Gaga and Chance the Rapper who have collaborated with him in the past have issued statements apologizing for their involvement with him and pulled their music from streaming platforms. Recently, a video of Kelly allegedly engaging in a sexual act with a minor surfaced. The video was uncovered by attorney Michael Avenatti, whose firm is representing a former associate of Kelly. Multiple reports also say that his longtime record label Sony Music has dissolved the recording contract with the singer.

It’s hard to exaggerate the impact Surviving R. Kelly had in bringing to the fore a case that had been buried for too long. The singer was acquitted of a similar child abuse allegation in 2008. Even though Kelly maintains his innocence and said as much during his interview with Gayle King which aired on CBS March 6, it is obvious now that the media has set in motion a trajectory to this case that cannot be easily stopped.

“I think media helped to put pressure on the prosecutors to do something,” Shipp said. “That documentary was out there saying ‘OK law enforcement, what are you gonna do? We just laid this thing out for you.’ These women are obviously willing to talk now and now the media are helping to build the case by encouraging people to come forward with more stories and more documentation.”

R.Kelly might have survived the child pornography trial over a decade ago, but he just might not survive the impacts of Surviving R.Kelly.

Photo Credit: M. Spencer Green/AP

The moment a problem arises in my business, I address it immediately. This helps me see better results all the time. They say your business is like your baby and seeing it fail is the one thing every entrepreneur tries to avoid. With my business, I’m constantly looking for ways to improve, make more money, be more efficient, and grow.

But when it comes to my body, I’m not quite so proactive. I push to the sidelines issues concerning my health like keeping fit, eating healthy, counting my calories, going for my regular check-ups and more. You’ve probably heard it before: that little voice in the back of your mind saying, “yes, I know the right thing but there just isn’t enough time.”

If your business operations are structured incorrectly or inefficiently, there could be dire consequences. Your profits will be reduced because you’re paying for inefficiencies and you run the risk of your business failing. The same thing goes for your body. It requires hard work and dedication; there are no shortcuts or overnight results. Relying on willpower alone is the wrong way of achieving the desired results. Instead of relying on willpower, seek to change the structure of your environment to support your choices.

So, if your health and fitness goals are teetering on the brink of collapse, I want you to consider a new strategy: Treat your body like your business.  

There are two strategies that work well. First, you can harness the competitive nature that has helped you in the professional world. Second, you find a way to hold yourself accountable.

Personally, I love the competitive nature of the business world. And with my own fitness, I think I’ve always been competitive with either someone else or myself. Setting fitness goals, getting a workout partner and rewarding yourself for achieving your set goals help a lot. Entrepreneurs and business owners rarely succeed on their own, having business partners and connections are just as important as having gym partners. This person needs to be able to be firm and feel confident pushing you outside of your comfort zone.

If you really want to make significant improvements in your business you have to get serious about going after it. You can’t make it a part-time business plan, it has to be consistent. The same goes for your health. If you’re successful in your business you can easily be successful with your health and fitness goals.  You just need to apply the same level of commitment and consistency in doing the things you know you need to do when you need to do them, even when you don’t want to.

As an entrepreneur, you can always work more and always achieve more. There’s no ceiling to how much you can achieve, and it feels great to constantly achieve more. It’s not surprising that many entrepreneurs work as much as they can and still feel they should work more. Unfortunately, this addiction to achievement comes with negative side effects. You start neglecting your health, family, friends, and self-care. At one point, a simple desire to work more turns into workaholism, an addiction to work for the sake of working.

The solution to this problem is similar to the solution regarding the love of work. Find something that will challenge you and make you feel productive. It doesn’t have to generate tangible results directly; as long as it gives you a similar feeling of achievement you get thanks to your business, it will do. You get bonus points for doing this activity with others. Focusing on your health and fitness and putting in the ‘work’ it requires is a sure way to achieve this goal.

Recently, I asked a friend of mine if she thought her business increased since she started to exercise more. So far, this year, her business is up 70% from last year. This can be your story too.

Making the commitment to yourself to be healthier is no small thing. It demands time from our busy lives and requires a complete change in your lifestyle to be successful. But it’s worth it. It’s common that we entrepreneurs get so distracted by perfecting our business and our brains that we forget about our bodies. And our bodies are pretty damn important: after all, without them, we couldn’t run our business!

This article was first published in Maktoub Magazine

In a recent interview with Axios on HBO, Trump confirmed what many had suspected would be his next move. His proposal would deny citizenship to the American-born children of unauthorised immigrants and possibly to foreigners in the country on non- permanent visas.

Birthright citizenship is a 150-year-old right and a key provision of the 14th Amendment which grants American citizenship to every child born on US soil regardless of the immigration status of the parents. The legal term for this is jus soli, “right of the soil.”

The authors of the Fourteenth Amendment were clear about this provision in the constitution which says: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.”

Birthright citizenship contrasts with blood citizenship, or jus sanguinis (“law of blood”), in which a child inherits citizenship from its parents, often from the father if the parents do not have the same nationality. During the Axios interview, President Trump erroneously said the USA was “the only country in the world” offering such benefits when actually there are 30 countries, most in the Western Hemisphere, providing birthright citizenship. They are Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Belize, Brazil, Canada, Chad, Chile, Cuba, Dominica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Fiji, Grenada, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Jamaica, Lesotho, Mexico, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Uruguay and Venezuela.

The Fourteenth Amendment, however, has an exception which excludes a group of people who are not “subject to the jurisdiction” – accredited foreign diplomats and their families. “Subject to the jurisdiction” does not simply mean, as is commonly thought today, subject to American laws or courts. It means owing exclusive political allegiance to the U.S (Erler, 2015). Supporters of a review of birthright citizenship have picked on this clause however, suggesting different interpretations to it. John Eastman of the Claremont Institute’s Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence argued that children of undocumented immigrants are not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the US and thus should not be considered citizens under the Constitution.

Trump’s power to end birthright citizenship by executive order is debatable and if he decides to move forward with it, could set up a chain of legal battles and challenges by the courts. The executive order cannot be enforced without a huge apparatus of internal control. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will, of necessity, become the skeleton of a nationwide citizenship police (Epps, 2018).

According to Axios, Judge James C. Ho of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, in New Orleans said that changing how the 14th Amendment is applied would be “unconstitutional.” What would rather be a constitutional way of ending birthright citizenship is to accept the current interpretation of the 14th Amendment is accurate, and pass a constitutional amendment to override it. From all indications, this doesn’t look like the sort of thing that would ever happen.

Photo Credit: New York Post

The number of interested migrants quickly grew to thousands following a call on social networks relayed by a former Honduran deputy as desperation, unemployment, poverty, insecurity and political intimidation forced many to join the caravan. Bartolo Fuentes, a popular politician and member of leftist former president Manuel Zelaya’s Freedom and Refoundation Party had reposted a poster on his Facebook page inviting people on a “Migrant march” with a slogan: “We’re not leaving because we want to, but because we are being expelled by violence and poverty”.
The migrants, including women and children, got into a hitch last Thursday when they reached a border bridge between Mexico and Guatemala. By Saturday, Mexican authorities opened the border for women and children on the overcrowded bridge, taking them to a shelter in the city of Tapachula. Many later crossed a river below using makeshift rafts and continued marching north.

According to various reports, the caravan has comprised between 3,000 – 5,000 people at various times as it moved through Guatemala, but that some 2,000 had since returned home.

This march has been received with stiff opposition from President Donald Trump and the white house with threats of detaining families or separating children from their parents if they eventually reach the US border.

In a terse warning to Honduras, President Trump threatened to cut off aid to the country if the caravan was not turned around. “The United States has strongly informed the President of Honduras that if the large Caravan of people heading to the U.S. is not stopped and brought back to Honduras, no more money or aid will be given to Honduras, effective immediately!” With only two weeks to go before the United States votes in key midterm elections, the caravan has become a politically loaded issue.

This unprecedented event has posed a number of security concerns for Mexico and the US. A day after some of those 1,500 migrants clashed with security forces at the Guatemala-Mexico border, Mexico deployed hundreds of police officers, helicopters and boats along its porous southern border with Guatemala on Monday in a bid to halt the entry. One person reportedly died while many were injured during this clash.

Although limited, Honduran immigration to the United States began in the 1950s. In the 1980s however, there was unprecedented immigration both within the region and to the United States. After Hurricane Mitch struck in October 1998, illegal immigration from Honduras to the United States spiked dramatically. In 2011, around 694,500 individuals residing in the United States reported Honduran ethnicity/race, and there were roughly 491,000 Honduran-born immigrants. In the same year, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) estimated that 380,000 of the 11.5 million unauthorized immigrants in the United States were from Honduras. This means that roughly 77 percent of the 491,000 Honduran-born immigrants residing in the United States that year did not have legal status.

From all indications, the migration of Hondurans to the United States shows no signs of abating.

Photo Credit: ORLANDO ESTRADA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Researchers have attempted to find out the reasons behind this and one common conclusion has been reached by most of them – people consciously form their beliefs on the basis of information they assume to be correct, not what is true.

During the final three months of the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign, Buzzfeed, the internet media company carried out a research comparing the popularity of false election stories against the legitimate ones on social media. It was revealed that the 20 most popular false election stories generated more Facebook engagements than the 20 most popular legitimate stories in terms of shares, reactions and comments. The most popular fake story of that period was revealed to be “Pope Francis Shocks World, Endorses Donald Trump for President.”  

As such fake news gets more widespread, researchers have attempted to find out the reason why it spreads so fast, and how to stop it. Another research by the prestigious journal Science published in March 2018 investigated the differential diffusion of all of the verified true and false news stories distributed on Twitter from 2006 to 2017. Data used in this study comprised of up to 126,000 stories tweeted by 3 million people over 4.5 million times. It was concluded that “Falsehood diffused significantly farther, faster, deeper, and more broadly than the truth in all categories of information, and the effects were more pronounced for false political news than for false news about terrorism, natural disasters, science, urban legends, or financial information.”

This conclusion therefore postulates that even with the current political moment and trending news around it, we interpret new information as confirming our beliefs and reject it if it runs counter to those beliefs. What we believe depends on our personal views and ideas and this cuts across every circle or endeavor. Without extensive verification or evidence, people believe messages because they sound appealing and respond to their wishes and desires. They then seek to assert those beliefs on others, widening the pool of fake news consumers.

President Donald Trump joined this pool of fake news creators when he claimed that 3 to 5 million people voted illegally in the 2016 presidential election. He made this claim without any evidence in March 2017, tweeting that there was massive voter fraud which allegedly resulted in the popular vote count favoring his opponent in the elections, Hillary Clinton, by almost 3 million. He went further on to form a task force to review alleged voter fraud, improper voter registrations and “election integrity” in the federal election system. That group was disbanded in January, and no credible evidence was ever presented to substantiate the president’s claims.

When it comes to agreeing with fake information, people have a reflex action and immediately accept it if it already agreed with their pre-set position of things. This was the conclusion reached by a study published in the Social Psychology and Personality Science journal in April 2018. Dr Michael Gilead, the author of the research, said it was even more noticeable when the false material was about politics and social issues: “This involuntary, ‘reflex-like’ tendency to consider things we already believe in as being true, might dampen our ability to think things through in a rational way.”

It often occurs, however, that one may simply not know what to believe. This happens mostly when a person is confronted with new and false information that he has very little knowledge about. Under this condition, one may be prone to believing such false information purely on a motivational bias.

This requires urgent remedy. The disinformation spate must be countered with persistent fact checking and steps to ensure the integrity of information being churned out to consumers of such information. Improving the quality of news sharing and journalism in general is cause for serious concern and requires a concerted effort from societal institutions and the public at large.

Today, Nigeria is without a national airline and losing out in the global aviation marketplace. This is mind-blowing for a country of 190 million people!

Owning a national carrier could be likened to owning a football team. It is a country’s brand to the world. Asides from serving as a medium of transporting passengers to destinations around the world, a national carrier remains a tool for international trade and relations. Research shows that Nigeria loses about $2 Billion to international airlines operating in Nigeria on an annual basis. What is seldom mentioned, however, is the simple matter of national pride. Perhaps the key term in “national flag carrier” is, simply, “flag.” 

In August 2015 shortly after his inauguration as President, Muhammadu Buhari directed quick action on the establishment of a new airline for the country. A 13-member committee, set up in just two weeks, has just got down to work, with its terms of reference including ‘to consult with interested international partners on setting up a national carrier on a public-private partnership basis,’ and ‘to develop the best model for the airline for Nigeria’. Buhari, sworn in in May, said that he was worried that a country of Nigeria’s stature as the continent’s largest economy did not have its own airline. State-owned Nigeria Airways stopped operations in 2003, and the country’s biggest airline is now closely-held Arik Air Ltd, which is based in Lagos.

Considering the vital nature of the service it provides and its invaluable contribution to making the world a smaller place, why is the airline industry synonymous with ongoing losses and insolvency? Many unprofitable airlines continue to remain in business despite years of substantial losses because various stakeholders cannot afford to let them close.

Closing down a large unprofitable airline would involve the loss of thousands of jobs, inconvenience to hundreds of thousands of travelers, and millions in losses for the airline’s creditors. Not to mention the loss of national pride if the airline in question is a national carrier.

Conventional wisdom suggests that states have no business running airlines. Indeed, the past few decades have seen most major economies sell their flag carriers to other airline groups or list them on the local stock exchange. The results have been mixed, at best. On a good day, a national airline is an embassy with wings transporting culture, cuisine, commerce and goodwill around the world.

The call for a National Airline

In Africa, about 47 out of 54 countries own airlines or have a majority shareholding or minority shares in designated national airlines or flag carriers. The benefits of having a national carrier cannot be underestimated. The benefits achieved by Kenya, Ethiopia, Egypt, and South Africa through their respective airlines are there for any interested party to see.

According to the World Tourism Organization, the top 5 countries with the highest direct contribution of Travel & Tourism to GDP greatest in 2016 are United States, China, Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom. This comes as no surprise as some of these countries have the highest investment in their tourism industry. In the ranking of countries with the highest capital investment in Travel & Tourism in 2016, the United States also tops the list. Following closely are China, France, Japan, and India.

Interestingly, in the ranking for the countries with the highest growth in visitor exports in 2016, Nigeria tops the list. Following closely are Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Iceland, and Mexico. International tourism receipts grew to US$1.4 trillion in 2017, corresponding to an increase in real terms of 3.9% from 2016. It’s evident that the billions of dollars raked in by tourism are also shared by the national carriers of the respective countries. Nigeria shouldn’t be missing out on this.

Of the top largest airlines by passengers carried, four of them are based in the United States; three of them are based in China. Well, here we could argue that the US and China are vast territorial countries. The list is also populated by Irish and UK low-cost budget airlines Ryanair and Easyjet making it to the top ten respectively. When it comes to fleet size, still five out of ten are based in the US, China has two, Germany, France, and Canada with their respective national carriers Lufthansa, Air France and Air Canada making it to the top ten. In terms of the countries visited by airlines, the top four airlines are national carriers namely Turkish, Lufthansa, Air France, and Qatar Airways. It’s evident that a functional national carrier spurs growth in tourism which is a multiplier effect in the profitability of the airline business.
 

A global problem

Challenges facing the airline industry are familiar and persistent: cyclical nature of the business, slowing down of the global economy, the uncertainty of fuel prices, technology, environment, and slow pace of liberalization. African airlines and Latin American airlines are struggling to survive even in the best of times—2015, 2016, 2017. Asian, European, and Middle Eastern airlines are still below the cost of capital, shareholders’ expected rate of return on invested capital (ROIC). The only airlines that seem to be spared from this are American airlines, which have shown robust net profits and ROIC above expectations of shareholders.

An airline business needs top management; aviation is a highly volatile business and needs great care and handling. The main reason why most of the national carriers have gone under is mismanagement. In most African countries, the challenges include multiple taxations, high cost of acquiring aviation fuel, high cost of procuring spare parts and importing them. Nigeria is a very harsh operating environment for any airline, especially the domestic airlines. Adding to these problems are poor airport infrastructure which is unfavorable for both the airlines and the passengers.

Enhancing the Aviation Industry

The aviation sector is a key driver for economic and social development as it facilitates international trade, stimulates tourism and investment, and helps connect people. Air transport infrastructure has traditionally been the preserve of the public sector. Facing increased demand from citizens for better infrastructure, more governments are now recognizing that the private sector can play a major role in developing their transportation and aviation networks. Experience around the world has shown that private capital and expertise, as well as commercial discipline, can make a big difference in the delivery of aviation services and infrastructure as they contribute to more efficient services and substantial savings for governments.

To improve on existing levels of aviation safety in the light of the continuing growth of the industry, additional measures are needed. One such measure is to encourage individual operators to introduce their own Safety Management System. Such a system is as important to business survival as a financial management system and the implementation of a Safety Management System should lead to the achievement of one of civil aviation’s key business goals: enhanced safety performance aiming at best practice and moving beyond mere compliance with regulatory requirements.

Today’s savvy travelers are seeking solitude in technology, and aviation companies are working to keep up with the advancements. It’s the way of the world now. We’ve all become habitual multi-taskers, and the aviation industry, like many others, is scrambling to align itself with the evolving needs of its customers. New business and process models will help the aviation sector in optimizing cost and improving efficiency. Digital solutions could also revolutionize the way talent is skilled and groomed to enter the sector. The country’s aviation sector is on the cusp of aggressive growth and technology disruption. The key to success for airports and airlines would be to create a carefully crafted digital strategy and road map. Under the guidance of governments, the industry works hard to improve processes and develop new technology to counter the evolving threat to aviation security. Lengthy processes to get new technology into operation is, however, a bottleneck that needs to be fixed.

The right approach to re-thinking aviation in the digital paradigm is to design new business and process models rather than simply the automation of the various process areas for ease of traversing customer journeys, increasing efficiencies and cost optimization. As the outlook for demand in the sector for the next five years, both airports and airlines need to smartly deploy cutting edge digital solutions such as analytics and artificial intelligence. This would help to increase operational efficiency as well as enhance revenue generation.

Although the prior studies have proposed tools for measuring airline safety performance, they all had one thing in common: they did not discover the genuine cause of accidents. Further research is required so as to reveal the causality between root factors, causes, and accidents. This situation opens a window for further research. With the discovery of root factors leading to causes of accidents, a model that targets on accident prevention and safety training could be formulated.

What next for Nigeria?

At the beginning of the year, Nigeria’s Minister of Aviation, Sirika Hadi, told journalists in Abuja that Nigeria will have a very strong, viable national airline before the end of 2017. According to Hadi, the national carrier will be driven by the public and private sector partnership. Taking a clue from the Ethiopian airline, it has proven that the government is incapable of running a national carrier on its own promising that the national carrier will provide good service.

It is our hope that this government learns from past mistakes and gets it right this time around. Setting up a national airline will enhance a healthy competition between airlines thereby promoting a better quality of service.

According to research, growth in passenger traffic peaked at over 15 million in 2014, surpassing the 2013 record by 5%. In 2016 however, the Nigerian aviation industry saw a decline in passenger traffic due to the deep economic crises.

Airlines provide a vital service, but factors including the continuing existence of loss-making carriers, bloated cost structure, vulnerability to exogenous events and a reputation for poor service combine to present a huge impediment to profitability. While a handful of low-cost airlines have successfully managed to post consistent profits, by and large, profitable airlines are few and far between. 

For the new carrier, resilience will seemingly be the byword following the financial trauma of the last few years, with the alternative being not to beat but out rightly flatten the odds.

This article was published in Maktoub Magazine

Although economic downturns are a recurring phenomenon, the most recent recession was exceptional in its duration and depth. Nigeria slipped into its first recession after more than two decades, plunging the economy into a serious crisis, leaving Nigerian households with a huge debt overhang and the economy with a large gap in output and employment. Unemployment rates skyrocketed, housing prices and stock portfolios plummeted, and the lives of millions were disrupted. 

The situation came about largely due to the persistently low crude oil prices. Crude oil sales account for 70 percent of government income and 90 percent of export earnings. Nigeria got dealt a heavy blow by the collapse of oil prices from the highs of about $112 a barrel in 2014 to less than $50. The oil price crisis plunged the country’s revenue to a record low and affected the general spending and consumption with the attendant shortage of foreign exchange.

When a recession happens, the most significant vulnerable countries will be the exporters of manufactured products and industrial commodities, particularly oil. The Nigerian economy felt this hit in a very bad way. Price of oil is subject to market forces rather than any concerted action by oil exporters. Historically, as oil prices fell, industrial production increased. That is no longer the case because the problem now is finding customers at any price, not keeping production costs low. Lower oil prices might solve a few problems for exporters of manufactured goods, but they create massive problems for oil exporters.

In the wake of the oil price drop over the past few years, investments in energy exploration and production fell sharply. Exxon’s capital expenditures in the first quarter of 2017 were at their lowest level since the first quarter of 2005, and that’s in nominal dollars. In real dollars, you’d have to go back further than that. Less investment now will eventually mean lower production in the future and tighter supply.

There is little debate that the worldwide economy is stagnating, and despite what some would like to argue, Nigeria has not been immune from this slowdown at all.

But who should take the credit for digging us out of the recession and what lessons have we learned? Let’s take a look.

Positive and Negative outcomes of a recession

It’s certainly better for economic activity to be increasing rather than decreasing, but the focus on whether the economy was in recession or not can miss a lot. 

The official technical definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters during which economic growth is negative. The economic growth of a country is measured by its Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which is the combined value of things like manufacturing, employment, real income and the balance of trade in and out of the country. As such, recessions are an integral part of the business cycle and essentially unavoidable.

Very often, even the bad news of a recession has been tinged with the good: People are saving more, and consumers have cut back the use of bank loans for business financing. Both trends are good for individuals’ long-term financial well-being, but not so good for the Nigerian economy as a whole: Lower consumer spending means fewer customers for companies, fewer jobs for workers. Moreover, the gradual but steady decline in the official unemployment rate masks several related phenomena that signal continued weakness in the labor market.

But just as the economic cycle affects banks’ lending standards, those lending standards affect how entrepreneurs behave. In boom times, entrepreneurs can borrow money quickly. Here’s where the length of the boom matters: after a short boom, the entrepreneurs seeking to borrow money are still relatively strong. But the longer an economy booms, the more banks see weaker entrepreneurs looking for credit. And when a long boom ends, the pool of prospective borrowers is full of those weaker entrepreneurs. When a recession hits, entrepreneurs may be temporarily unable to borrow.

How a Recession affects Businesses

The dynamics of the downturn has enlarged the gap between successful and less successful business models and fostered shakeouts of the latter. Furthermore, the occurrence of new business models has accelerated.

Economic analysts would argue that recession is actually a good thing. Economies need recessions to take a breather every few years, as well. Growth can’t continue uninterrupted forever. Although they’re painful, recessions are needed to weed out the strong companies from the weak, as many companies go out of business during the downturns and new ones emerge. While they’re painful in the short-term, if you have the guts and capital to make purchases, recessions can offer some of the best buying opportunities in the long-term.

How a Recession affects Individuals

Recessions are unpleasant and hurt some people disproportionately. 

While unemployment rates rose to all-time highs, even the employed struggled too. Their average, inflation-adjusted earnings declined significantly. Only a small percentage of workers see their current job as part of a career, while an even larger percentage state that they are not making enough money to live the kind of life that they want to live.

For those who want to make it out of the recession stronger, one key thing to note is that portfolio diversification plays an even larger role than normal. It is wise for investors, even in times of plenty, to have a wide variety of investments included in their portfolio to ensure them no matter which way the economy turns.

Laudable Efforts of the Government

Nigeria’s path out of recession is lined with commendable efforts in improving the ease of doing business through the Presidential Enabling Business Council (PEBEC). Chaired by the Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, the Council implemented a 60-day National Action Plan on Ease of Doing Business and was able to tackle some of the critical bottlenecks and bureaucratic constraints that had hitherto defined the ordeal of doing business in Nigeria. Collectively, the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) agenda, foreign exchange interventions by CBN, and the PEBEC are expected to improve the Nigerian business environment in the next quarter.

Meanwhile, the non-oil GDP grew by 0.72 percent to record the best performance in four quarters, when compared to -0.33 per cent in Q4 2016 and -0.18 per cent in Q1 2016, as NBS attributed the sector’s growth to activities in the Agriculture Sector (Crop Production), Information and Communication, Manufacturing, Transportation and Other Services.

What next after the recession?

While the technical definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth, it is a little more complex than that. A recession has leading and lagging indicators. Some results of a recession take longer to become apparent as companies take some time to fully appreciate the changing environment and react. A meaningful rebound in Nigerian economic activity is now underway, and we expect growth to exceed potential over the next few quarters.

In reality, the recession persists for the economically disadvantaged demographics of Nigeria’s 190 million population. It might take a few years, but the saving rate is expected to rise much higher than it was at the end of the previous expansion. And workers are just starting to see signs of a pick-up in wage growth. Hence, the effects of long-term unemployment in reemployment rates may be concentrated among younger workers but maybe less devastating for the economy as a whole.

For the Nigerian economy to move forward, we must understand that each economic and stock market environment is unique. There are no playbooks that will tell you when to get out and when to get back in again. The severity of the next recession will have a lot to do with how things play out in the stock market, but it all depends on how well investors handle it when it finally arrives. The level of panic will rule the day, and that’s not something that can easily be calculated or forecast.

Economists hold the views that the way forward for Nigeria includes reducing the emphasis on oil and re-directing attention to the agriculture and solid minerals sector to retool the economic. Another school of thought opines that experts want the government to cut down on allowances of officers by 80 percent and channel the fund to agriculture to reboot the economy. They also called for the removal of multiple taxation and provision of stable electricity to enable cottage industries to thrive. An increase in the local production of goods is one of the ways to force down per-unit cost

To recover from a recession there needs to be either a rise in Aggregate Demand or a readjustment in prices and wages. Classical economists argue that a recession will only be temporary because labor and product markets are flexible. However, Keynesians argue that wage and price rigidity can keep the economy below full capacity for a long time. For example to regain equilibrium it may be necessary to reduce price and therefore reduce nominal wages by an equivalent amount. However this may be difficult because trade unions will resist cuts in wages, also firms would not be willing to cut wages because it may lead to lower productivity amongst workers.

Nigeria surely needs an intervention. How long the recovery from recession takes largely depends on the scale and success of such intervention and how long it needs to take hold.

This article was published in Maktoub Magazine

As an entrepreneur, you should constantly be learning. Whether you have attained your business goals or are just launching your startup, you need the right resources to build a massively successful company where you call the shots.

Here’s a selection of 5 must-reads that we think have the potential to transform your business and take it to the next level.

1. 101 Lessons They Don’t Teach You In Business School by Chris Haroun

Many crucial business lessons are not taught in business school, including how to get a job, how to find customers, or how to network.

In the book, Haroun shares worthwhile lessons that even MBA graduates didn’t learn at school, including how to get a meeting with anyone and how to reinvent yourself and your career, as well as some of today’s biggest entrepreneurs’ success secrets. The book incorporates advice based on thinking and do-or-die actions of renowned leaders such as Marc Benioff, Richard Branson, Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg.

2. Thrive by Ariana Huffington

In Thrive, Arianna Huffington makes an impassioned and compelling case for the need to redefine what it means to be successful in today’s world. Drawing on the latest groundbreaking research and scientific findings in the fields of psychology, sports, sleep, and physiology that show the profound and transformative effects of meditation, mindfulness, unplugging, and giving, Arianna shows us the way to a revolution in our culture, our thinking, our workplace, and our lives.

3. Shoe Dog by Phil Knight

Shoe Dog, Phil Knight’s memoir about creating Nike, is a refreshingly honest reminder of what the path to business success really looks like. For the first time ever, Nike founder and CEO shares the inside story of the company’s early days as an intrepid start-up and its evolution into one of the world’s most iconic, game-changing, and profitable brands. Phil takes us through, with tremendous detail, his business negotiations with not only the Japanese manufacturers, but his bankers, employees, how he met his wife, and even chalks up a couple of life lessons he’s learned along the way.

4. Leading Change by John P. Kotter

In Leading Change, John Kotter examines the efforts of more than 100 companies to remake themselves into better competitors. John Kotter’s now-legendary eight-step process for managing change with positive results has become the foundation for leaders and organizations across the globe.

This highly personal book reveals what John Kotter has seen, heard, experienced, and concluded in 25 years of working with companies to create lasting transformation.

Unsuccessful transitions almost always founder during at least one of its phases. Realizing that change usually takes a long time, says Kotter, can improve the chances of success.

5. Start with Why by Simon Sinek

Start with Why takes a look at some of the most crucial questions every leader should ask: Why are we in business? Why are we inspired? Sinek relays how asking why at the outset is the core to understanding your value system and how it translates to your customers and team. This mentality has taken numerous folks far, and could do the same for you.

This article was published in Maktoub Magazine

About a decade ago, Nigerians paid much to browse at cyber cafes to check vital information on websites as well as to read and respond to emails in their mailboxes. Then, social media was almost unheard of in this part of the world. The most common thing then was to go to the cyber cafe to go and check a personal mailbox or to google search a project or an assignment.

The story is no longer the same today. The social media and the growth of internet service providers has birthed a whole new virtual world for all to get excited about. Youths do not need to throng the Cybercafes as much as they used to, as almost everyone now has the enabling device to go online from the comfort of their homes.

Research shows that nine out of ten youths sampled randomly are either using a Blackberry device, an Ipad or a smartphone with an internet connection. Within this huge number, statistics reveal that an average Nigerian youth with a smartphone is having one or more social media and virtual chat applications actively running on it. From Facebook to Twitter, Instagram, We Chat, Whatsapp, 2go and Blackberry Messenger, Nigerian youths are finding more ways to connect in the virtual world.

The benefits of such virtual chat apps and the ease of social media has however been two-fold. For some, it has caused their pitfall as they have spent too much precious time on it, resulting in negative impacts on their academics, businesses, relationships and so on. In some extreme cases, people get defrauded, bullied, and cajoled into devious relationships that could lead to death. Last year, the social media was agog with the news of Cynthia Osokogu who left her school, Nasarawa State University, Keffi to meet male friends she met on Facebook and was murdered by these same friends in a private hotel in Lagos. Similarly, in the UK recently, a 14-year-old girl committed suicide after repeated bullying by her friends at school and on social media.

On the flip side, there are several advantages of social media. Many have used it to build relationships, grow their business, establish their fan base and much more. To some people, the social media affords them an opportunity to chat and escape from boredom, while some see it as an avenue to explore the world of opportunities available on the internet.

Lots of jobs search sites abound online, with many testifying to have gotten their dream jobs via such sites. In the area of information dissemination, many have argued that the social media is the future of news sharing and that it is only about time when people will no longer wait for the traditional media sources to get news. As a matter of fact, before most traditional media sources report news stories, it would have already been trending on social media. Most traditional media channels have as well joined the social media to meet the yearning and expectations of their teeming followers.

Many have been duped by people on social media, many have gotten their dream job through it. Many have gotten breakthrough from the social media, while many have as well met their waterloo at it.

In the virtual world, its different strokes for different folks.

This article was first published by TelegraphNG