[In Conversation] Keji Mustapha from Connect Ventures

“Always treat your employees exactly as you want them to treat your best customers.” –Stephen R. Covey, Author

Hello Hello.

It’s podcast time. A few months back, I had the absolute pleasure to sit down with Keji Mustapha, Head of Networks of Connect Ventures. Keji and I met earlier this year and hit it off immediately. I have a lot of time for ventures that are providing ‘human’ support to their portfolios in the early days - from mental health to managing yourself, as well as managing others - to help them address the challenges and opportunities of being a business and people leader.

In this podcast, we talk about the journey a lot of founders embark on when they start and as they grow their business. Keji brings a wealth of experience from seeing the common points of tension that founders face as they grow their business.

Some of my key takeaways; 

🦋If you’re one of those original ‘pirates’ who can do it all, letting go and letting others to help you out is a really hard, but necessary, transition to make.

❌ Flat structures don’t work when you grow fast and big.

🤔 Thinking of starting a business (or have just started) Keji says to start focusing on generalist skills sets with the right behaviours when making your first few hires.

🤷‍♀️ Don’t half-ass your values. If your not able to live it don’t force it.

🙏Great athletes don’t achieve greatness doing it solo. Like a coach, leaders need a experts to help them shape where they are going, the skills they are missing and the strengths they can leverage.

🎉 OverTime leader will be working with Keji at Connect Ventures, to design and deliver a series of workshops as part of the leadership development programme created for the members of their Founder Network. 

Until next time,

Gillian 🤘