‘I Came into Banking Accidentally’

Akinsola Akinfemiwa (OON), Chairman, Heritage Banking Company Limited, strayed into banking, so to say, having originally been trained for a career in the academia. But after 30 years in the money management business, Akinfemiwa says it was a career gambl

HCAREER ow did you decide on banking as a career? Actually, I don’t think I sat anywhere to decide that banking would be my career. It was far away from my own plan. The truth is that when l was growing up and even when l was in the college, all I wanted to be was a University Professor. I love to teach, I love to read, I wanted to progress from my First Degree to second degree, then do my Ph.D (Doctor of Philosophy), and later become a professor. I just love the life on campus, the environment and I love the fact that you can become an intellectual, argue and debate: that was the life l had envisaged. But along the line, l finished from school and l did very well and l was deployed to the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) for the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme. The Federal Government gave me an appointment after the National Service and l was deployed to the Federal Ministry of Planning. Again, l liked the idea but when l was taken to the place where l would resume work, and l saw the number of people in the hall, l thought ‘oh my God, how do l get to the top here?’ So, I reasoned that I didn’t want that, and my immediate reaction was to go back to my first love, which was lecturing. Thus, l started lecturing at the University of Port-Harcourt, then called College of Science and Technology. At a time we started having a discussion about how life should be and l read a magazine where l saw an advert on MBA Finance for people with science or engineering background, and so forth. l began to realise l would no longer make it in the academia. I began to see friends in engineering making it big at Schlumberger and the architects making good money in their field. I guess influences of friends made me to have a change of mind about the career l eventually chose. After having discovered the opportunity in MBA, l threw aside my admission to study M.sc in Agric Economics. After my MBA, I got influenced by an uncle of mine who was an accountant and l started training to become an accountant. Then, one day in the firm where l was, a senior partner walked up to me and told me l must go and practise in the industry because l was coming first in all my exams and one day l saw an advert asking for people with a first degree in Agric Economics. The advertisers said an MBA would be an added advantage and l said ‘wow this is just for me!’ I attended an interview with the then National Merchant Bank and the rest is history. Akinfemiwa has a slightly different idea about how people should choose the kind of career they want to do. For him, being realistic overrides passion in choosing a profession. “It is nice to go after what you love, I