‘I Feel Like the New Tax Law is One of The Vehicles That Will Convey Us to The Promised Land’ – Titilope Adisa-Obafemi

Titilope Adisa-Obafemi, principal, Blaque Swann Legal Practitioners, and convener, Ascend360, in this interview with JOHN SALAU shared some business/legal insight. She also disclosed that the conference was designed to equip entrepreneurs with the knowledge, legal frameworks and growth strategies needed to build, protect and scale their businesses. Excerpts:

Records have it that between 5% and 10% of small businesses do not make it past their 5th year. What do you think we can do to curb this and deepen the ecosystem?

A lot of businesses collapse because they don’t have structure. They don’t even have a legal foundation. An average person just wakes up one morning and decides, okay, this is what I want to do. You know, the Nigerian ecosystem allows for ‘anyhowness.’ Anybody can just do whatever they want to do, whether it is lawful or not. And at the end of the day, the law does catch up. And when it does, everything is in shambles; because if you do not build the proper foundation, your structure can definitely collapse – and that is what we’ve seen in the business space. You see someone doing fantastically well. After about a year, two years, three years, they start having issues. They start having problems. Oh, my staff are stealing from me. My staff are running my business down and things like that. And what we can do to correct that is part of what we’re doing today – to educate people, to let them know that you need to learn how to build properly; so that you can scale your business properly.

Is it necessary for every small business to come into the formal sector?

So, if you look at a typical Nigerian that actually travels abroad, they will tell you that, oh, I’m going to so, so country – it’s a better place; they do this, they do that. That’s because they’re structured. Even as a small business, even if you’re doing minimum buying and selling, it has to be structured. If it is not structured, it cannot last. There are some businesses that we feel are generational. You’ve seen families building one particular business, and the business has been there for years. What are they doing differently? They’ve put structures in place. And they’ve passed it on to the next generation. So the foundation is very important.

This is the maiden edition of the conference tagged Ascent360; what inspires that name?

So, we came up with the name Ascent360 because we are looking to impact every aspect of the lives of our participants. We didn’t want to do 16 degrees or 180; we wanted to touch all around. If you look at the lineup of speakers, they are from different walks of life. And right now, the person that is speaking currently is speaking from the angle of motherhood, which is something that is a bit different from most conferences. So, that was why we came up with the 360. Ascension is when you go up, when you move to the next level. That’s why we chose the word Ascent; 360 is supposed to be every aspect of your life.

One of the speakers spoke about her upbringing, linking spirituality, passion and business; but you would agree with me that – one thing is to have the passion for something; another thing is to move the passion into a business. So, how can business owners leverage their passion for business growth, and transformation?

So what I would say is – life itself is deeply spiritual. And basically, whatever you are building, you are building something worthwhile. We, as natural human beings, we are creatives. God created us to create. Now, passion is not enough. You can have passion – anybody can have passion. What are you doing about that particular passion? Don’t forget, I said something about the anyhowness of the system. Yes, I can have a passion for doing something. Before I actually do it, I already have something in my head. I have an image in my head of how I want it to be. I want it to be different and all of that. At what point do I start thinking, okay, this is the right thing to do. This is how to put it. The family is the smallest unit in society. It only takes a good percentage of families within our Nigerian ecosystem to get it right, and we see changes in the society.

You spoke about human beings being creative and all of that. Now, what is the relationship between the spiritual part of the man and the social/business part of the man; and can an individual bring all of this together to create a business identity?

They are all interconnected. The business part of the man is still the man. The spiritual part is still the man. The social part is still the man. You are still one and the same person. What needs to change is your mindset. If there is a shift in your mindset, then your spiritual life, your business, and your social life are going to be upright at the end of the day. The spiritual aspect of business and the physical aspect is that there is nothing special about what you are doing. There are one thousand and one people that also love you. So, what makes you different?

At what point should that shift go in?

Now; Effectively immediately. The shift should start from now. Nigerians or people in general, idolize money. They believe that if they have plenty of money, they can solve all their problems. Money cannot actually solve all their problems. Because tomorrow, the government can wake up and tell you that all the millions that you have in the bank is no longer a legal tender. What will now be the legal tender is something else. The legal tender will now be a pair of socks. How many pairs of socks do you have? That’s what will determine your financial net worth. Now, something that comes from my passion is the ability to tell a story. However, managing a business is a strategy.

So, where does storytelling and strategy come into managing a business and how can business owners and entrepreneurs blend both?

Storytelling itself is a form of strategy. And of course, like I said earlier, there’s nothing special about the business that you’re doing. It is how you’re doing it that is speaking to the strategy of whatever it is that you’re doing. Now, how do the two of them work together to create an identity? Like they say – if you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything. If you are looking for a story, it has to be something that is unique to you. Something that makes you stand out. Yourself, your brand, whatever it is, it has to be something that makes you stand out. For it to even make any sense in the first place, and to convert that into strategy. The strategy that works for me will probably not work for you because we are different from each other. So, you have to first of all identify yourself. Who are you as a person? What strategy works for you? What is your story? Your story is different from my story. You’re coming from a different cultural background. So, what works for you definitely does not necessarily mean that it will work for me.

As someone who is in the legal profession, what lessons do you think business owners can take from working hand-in-hand with professionals, either in the legal or consultancy view point, to secure their business from the very start?

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So, any business owner that is worth the while, knows that you have to work with professionals. Nigerians don’t actually have enough respect for lawyers. It’s always like lawyers are doing stuff and are always coming with their bills – they just want to bill me and all of that. To be honest, lawyers don’t even like it when you come from the beginning, because they can’t charge you a lot of money. Lawyers rejoice when you’re in trouble; so that we can charge you more money for your mistakes. So, you learn the hard way, because you have to part with so much money. And then the knowledge that you gain will stay with you for a lifetime. So, normally, for business owners, they need to understand that legal protection is non-negotiable. It is not something that you can negotiate. That you can say, oh, can I do this later? Or, is this really necessary? It is actually necessary. Because that small business that you are building, you don’t even know how massive it could be. I tell people that your business is a living, breathing entity. It will tell you when it is time to do certain things. You know, there will be a time that maybe you just start small; and then you now look at it like, ah, this place is getting tight. Your business is speaking to you that this place is becoming too small. You need to move on to the next level. And then you now be like, okay, let me start looking for another space. If I want to get another space, do I ever have enough money? And then you look into your bank account and you’re like, ah, we actually do have enough money. We can get a space. Your business speaks to you. So, it is for you to protect. It is almost like you want to give birth as a mother, and you’ve not bought clothes for your newborn.

What role is Blaque Swann playing in the conference and are you giving legal advisory to participants?

Oh, yes, definitely. So, today I’m speaking on legal armor for entrepreneurs. Just taking them through the essence. Why it is important for them to have legal protection for whatever it is that they are building. And how is it connected? We’ve always been passionate about educating people, generally, about your rights, about the legal position. Because again, when I say that people don’t really respect lawyers, it’s that people don’t even do research. They just feel like, ah, this is too difficult. Please leave it for the lawyers. They’re the ones that can read. They’re the ones that can do this. But, again, back to pregnant women. When you get pregnant, you don’t know anything about pregnancy or childbirth. Even if you did not do your research in the beginning or in the middle, when you get to your third trimester and it’s almost time; nobody will teach you before you Google one or two things. And other countries are so far ahead of us that if you were to relocate today and you want to start a business there, the first thing you would do is to first go and research. What do I need to do for me to start a business? But in Nigeria, you just wake up and go on your WhatsApp and say; I’m now selling sandals – pay to me.

How can we leapfrog?

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Well, one of the ways that we can leapfrog, apart from the program that we’re having today, I think the new tax law is one of the things that is propelling people forward to now do the right thing, because everybody is now kind of apprehensive about next year. They believe that once the new tax law kick starts, they will be forced to start paying taxes. They will be forced to register and whatnot. And I think what the government is trying to do with the new tax law is actually pretty commendable because they are now trying to make everyone become more responsible. Because we compare our country to all these other countries. But do we pay taxes? Do we actually pay taxes? We don’t. So, I feel like the new tax law is one of the vehicles that will convey us to the promised land.

As a mother and professional, what would be your advice to other women wanting to come into the business space?

I think the first thing I would say is get out of your own head. I would say get out of your own head – don’t overthink it too much. You need to understand that impossible is nothing. There is nothing that is impossible for us to do. All we need to do is to try. We need to make an attempt. You need to get up and try. If you don’t, you might end up regretting it. You might end up – kind of being too hard on yourself later in life. And regret is one of the hardest pills to swallow as a human being. We are the kind of beings that you can be seated with and you are not there because your mind has gone like 20 years back to that particular moment when you felt like you had an opportunity but you just lost it.

Finally, how would you describe yourself to someone meeting you for the first time?

I think I’m a very tenacious person. Apart from the law firm, I have other businesses that I run. I’m someone that thrives on excellence. I just want to see things done and done properly. I am a big fan of people doing the right thing at the right time. So, I would describe myself as a straight shooter – I don’t cut corners. The funniest part is that I actually did grow up in a Muslim home; I come from a Muslim background. The spiritual side of it – might look a bit far fetched, but I feel like a lot of people have forgotten how spiritual life can be. I was having a conversation with someone and the person was talking about religion. And the person said, when we were born, we are already at a disadvantage because we didn’t get to choose which family we would be born into. And we didn’t get to choose from a very young age which religion we would prefer to practice. So, we have most of all these things forced on us. Is religion really essential? And all of that. And what I told the person was, you see, religion gives you a moral code. And if you don’t have a strong moral code, you are in trouble in life because you will not be able to make certain decisions. You need to have a moral code. There has to be a moral compass that is guiding your life. Life is already very deep, right? Life is very spiritual. And, you know, one of the ways to describe it is I’m sure that even you, at some point in your life, things have happened in your life that you cannot explain. So how do you explain? You have to believe in something. There has to be something that you believe in because life itself is already too complex for you not to have something that you believe in, ordinarily. So, from my background, I had a lot of questions. And over time, I discovered that, ok; I think this part is good for me. I read a lot of books. One of my favourite books to read is the book of Proverbs because Proverbs will always let you know that you are a fool. So, when you feel like you are becoming too full of yourself, let me put all of these things together. Just go and read the book of Proverbs and then it will tell you, you are a foolish person because you are beginning to feel too big. It helps me stay grounded and always understand that this world is beyond what we are seeing in the physical.