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My name is Richard. This section of my page on the web was set up to share experiences with friends, family and young business students seeking a career mentor.
I spent the better part of my teenage year's in Lagos, Nigeria before traveling out to pursue graduate studies in the United Kingdom (UK).
While in the UK, I attended the University of Essex in Colchester, where I graduated with a postgraduate diploma in Development Economics. Following a brief work engagement in the UK with the Ford Motor Company, I decided to return to Grad School to pursue further studies in the United States.
I attended Northern Illinois University, where I graduated in 2000 with a masters of science degree in Management Information Systems, with emphasis in Economics, which I did in a double Masters degree program.
Having lived in 3 out of the 20 largest cities in the world, I sometimes consider myself a "megacity Kid".
I currently work as a senior analyst consultant in the Telecommunications (Telecom)field. I have also worked in Wireless, Banking and Insurance, Publishing and Academia for mostly top US 200.
I consider myself to be an Information Technology/business solutions consultant with a strong passion for entrepreneurship. My interests are in integrating businesses in global market places with new opportunities in "emerging world" markets.
I would also like to get involved in a mentoring program to assists individuals and small businesses deal with the stages of getting a business idea past the conception stage into a fully functional and thriving enterprise, of course after I have accomplished this goal for myself.
Thank you for visiting my page and please feel free to visit other sections on this page and share feedback.
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Please feel free to drop me a line and thank you for visiting my page.
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FAMILY
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In West Africa and particularly in Nigeria, part of being successful in typical middle class families, included not only the ability to provide comfortably for one's family, but acquire landed property and to build a comfortable home for every family member to live in with their own rooms. These days of course, most children raised from middle class homes that I grew up with have set slightly higher expectations and aim to not only provide the best education possible for their own children, but to also leave a legacy to them for the next generation.
I was born at a time when my parents were at their peak of their professional careers, so they named me ILOME (my traditional name), "Our child, born in our first home", which in our custom, signified that I came to them at a time of "plenty". Their typical worries at that time included not only providing the best for their own children but also being a guardian (and somewhat "BIG Uncle/Aunty") to quite a few extended family relatives. Though this sounds almost ridiculous today, this was quite common with first generation educated Africans. They were expected to take on major responsibilities of mentoring and supporting multiple relatives through high school and college in some cases, with no expectations of being paid back. The mindset was quite different then in that when you help others in the family develop their gifts, you are not only a blessing to their lives but you hopefully impact the local community. This extended family set-up was quite characteristic of my childhood years. I grew up always having an older family member, in addition to my parents, to learn about life from. My mom and dad are thankfully both alive today and are retired from active service. My mom (Janet Namme), worked in education for over 35 years taking on many roles as a school teacher, principal and educational administrator. She is now retired and has been trying to institute a Non-Profit program to promote the study of English and Mathematics among high school students.
My dad (Chief Laban Omowale Namme) was in the media & publishing business for more than 45 years, and retired in 1991 as the Chairman, of the Daily Times Group of Companies. Dad, also served in various public service roles, including being a founding director of Nigeria's Central Bank in 1959. The have been married for 50 years.
By now, you may have already guessed that I must be the "baby in the family". Well you're right! I am the last of three sons from my parents. My elder brothers, Albert and my late brother Viv, who sadly passed away in January 2008.
 Mom and Dad at AVMC Church
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FRIENDS
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Most of my friends are scattered all over the world, since I have travelled and lived in quite a few different world cities. However, I still keep in touch with a few who are presently in the US and in Nigeria. These close friends attended King's College Lagos, where we all graduated from in 1988.
11 years after, we planned a class reunion, in July of 1999 at the Mariott Hotels, World Trade Center, Downtown New York.(Before the Sept. 11th disaster). KCOB's 88 Reunion 1999 Report. It was a 'smashing' success and I was proud that my efforts to get members of my graduating class at King's College together, yielded fruit. In the year 2000, some of my friends took over the initiative to host the Boston 2000 Reunion (July 7-9)as well as the set of 88 reunion meeting in Lagos (August 27th, 2000). This tradition has continued annually with a lot of the younger Alumni's now taking the responsibility to organize similar events, except that quite a number of my class mates are now married with families of their own.
Most are already fairly successful in their respective careers. My graduating set from high school (King's College Lagos)was quite a unique because 24 of the alumni set members went on to become either medical doctors (including 2 US trained surgeons) or pursued doctorate degrees in the sciences. At our last high school reunion, we attributed this to being the "guinea pigs" of the 6-3-3-4 system, which was an experiment program that the Nigerian Government implemented in the early 80's. I am told the program was terminated after several years. In January 2001, I took on an initiative to set up an online mentoring program for Alumni grads from our my old school to act as mentors to others considering pursuing similar careers. My goal was to have at least 150 Alumni's from various sets sign up by January 2005, and yes! that goal was met and exceeded. In the year 2005, a close friend of mine, and member of was elected the worldwide group secretary to the larger body of King's College alumni's and we are now working closely together to coordinate and centralize the network of older and more established alumni's with our much younger group.
Other friends are from NIU, where I last studied and worked on campus as an active and influential student leader. They come from all over the world, unfortunately, I haven't kept close contact with them as I would love to.
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I love to travel and to learn about the diverse world we live in.
From what I see, most people get so caught up in an endless "rat-race" cycle where you simply live to work and pay bills. Very few people seem to take full advantage of their "gifts or talents" during their active years(21 - 50). Most times, this is caused by not having the right social, political and financial support in place to realize these dreams. However, I have found in more recent years that you can live in a prosperous society like "America" where supposedly, a lot of infrastructure is in place and still completely "miss the boat" if you do not set clear goals on what you want to do at each stage of your life. It is so easy to get distracted by the challenges of everyday living, so it is easy to see why people never accomplish their dreams in their active years, because most great ideas have a time and season. So it becomes more convenient to just continue in the rat-race like everybody else till you are in your fifties, and hope that you things will work out better than the previous generation did, when you retire.
Looking back at my life so far, I think being the youngest in my family gave me a "great eye and ear" to observe and learn from capable mentors in various areas of my life. I also quickly learned that behaving exactly the same way others did in certain areas of life, will only get me the same results they obtained. So I am learning to seek the knowledge of today and the wisdom of yesterday to conquer some new challenges in my life.
It didn't take a rocket scientist to tell me that a top priority for me was to focus on getting out of the "rat race" lifestyle quickly, acquire skills to be an effective entrepreneur. As far as I am concerned, you are limited by what your employer plans for you as an employee and subject to the limitations faced by the business environment and culture you work for. I know this because I have worked for some of the largest companies in the world and can say, I have seen what they can do at their best and at their worst, and have learnt from it.
So here's what can I share so far at a really high level:
- Task 1: Start tackling your ideas in a systematic way, i.e Write them down, develop simple steps and processes(how to's) to accomplish them, analyze how they fit with the vision you have of the future, analyze your current situation - family, finances, and commitments and be realistic. Find a reliable mentor who you can share your goals with and who will hold you accountable for milestones you commit yourself to.
- Task 2: Cut off all unnecessary baggage that puts a drain on your life. Seperate wants from needs and unhealthy relationships from those that build you up. For me this involved not only cutting excesses with what I spent money on, but also time and the scope of things I embark on at each stage of my life. Whatever is a mental or physical drain, CUT IT OFF. True, this is easier said than done, when you are not debt FREE. So strive for that first.
- Task 3:Take stock and assess where you are in life and to start a process of developing proven systems to replace your "earned income" with new passive income streams. This is one of the difficult steps.
There are too many distractions, all sorts of people throwing ideas at you etc, Think deeply about this task 3rd task or you can easily be distracted if you do not really know what you enjoy and have the skills to do. Put yourself to the test. If people (the market) cannot pay well for your skills, then you may need to consider more than one option. For me, I love to solve problems, so I transitioned from working as a systems engineer to working as a business analyst, because it is something I not only have the training and skills for as a professional, but have a natural flair for bottomline issues that most business executives care about.
The wealth building process starts with acquiring the right knowledge and skills, and then having the ability to create value, which gets you started in the process of realizing your vision. Finally, one should be to transfer knowledge effectively, so you set up a system that adds new value at each growth stage. Economists refer to this as "creating a multiplier effect, and I am sure there are other ways to describe this concept. Basically, each additional unit of work or resources added to a successful business venture MUST be able to multiply its profits in significantly greater units than its initial input.
A favorite quote I like to share is from King Solomon -the wisest King that lived. He said "Of what use is money in the hand of a [self-confident] fool to buy skillful and godly Wisdom- when he has no understanding or heart for it?" (Proverbs 17:16)- AMP version. To paraphrase, of what use is money in the hands of a fool, if he/she has no desire to gain wisdom". It is not uncommon to see people fail to plan for the next generation. Most times, we are all caught up in the endless rat-race cycle, leaving the hope for tomorrow (our children) with the mundane task of "reinventing the wheel again.
I end here, by saying that the most important part of my life so far, has been learning to find some peace in the midst of turmoil. My search to understand my purpose in life led me to a closer relationship with God. With all the challenges that life is sure to throw at you, it is important to develop yourself spiritually also and while I cannot tell you what to do, I can only share with you the source of my peace and joy. I am sure everyone's story is different because the Creator made us all unique in our ways and in how we relate to him. I hope at the end of my life, I would have discovered all my "gifts," applied all my talents and left the world with a better understanding of what it means to "live more abundantly".(John 10:10).
This is my life so far and my story. I hope that I have inspired you in my own little way. May you be blessed richly to touch the lives of others in your journey.
Please feel free to email me at any time.
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