Temi Alade-Mustapha is the Executive Director of TAM Money Mastery Academy, an institute that seeks to help individuals better manage their finances and create sustainable wealth. In this interview with NCHETACHI CHUKWUAJAH, Alade-Mustapha, who has worked in various aspects of the financial sector for over 15 years, speaks about the vision behind the Academy, the future of banking in Nigeria and how entrepreneurs can overcome the challenge of funding.
Why was TAM Money Mastery Academy established and what does it hope to accomplish?
I believe that whatever happens to us in life is a message for others to learn from. I have had some challenges in my finances and I was able to overcome them. The lessons I learnt from that incident helped me to create a framework for managing my finances and I also made up my mind to help other people do the same.
Being a banker for over 15 years, I have seen a lot of financial errors people make. Keeping them to myself would have meant being selfish. So, I wrote my first book, Money Maths, in 2019 and I began to train individuals to manage their finances.
One of the burdens in my heart has been how to effectively bring about community transformation in a sustainable way. Over the years, I have done all types of training in different areas in a bid to help people bring sustainable change to their lives, family and society.
Despite all my efforts, the results were not encouraging and that caused me to begin to look for real answers. I discovered that without financial education and wealth creation, it is almost impossible to bring any lasting change in society.
I am passionate about sharing the principles of money and wealth creation as a means of eradicating systemic poverty and bringing cultural transformation.
The framework I used was what was later developed into the curriculum for TAM Money Mastery Academy.
This Academy was set up for three reasons: to raise awareness about the need for everyone to become financially responsible and intelligent; to help founders of startups and emerging leaders access world class and highly subsidised financial mastery training; and to build a network of leaders who are financially successful and are working together to provide strategic platforms and support to those within their communities through sustainable initiatives, programmes and projects.
The eight weeks intensive training exposes students to money making, money management, money multiplication and money sustainability mastery.
If they successfully complete the course, they will become trained money mastery and personal financial management professionals.
Our simplified and practical-based programmes help people to make, manage, multiply and sustain their money in order to build enduring wealth.
Looking at the impact the graduates of TAM Money Mastery Academy are bringing to their communities, I feel strongly that I have found the true solution to bring about lasting impact.
What are your plans for the Academy?
We believe that no matter who you are, where you are from or what you do you need to be financially intelligent. Financial intelligence makes responsible individuals.
So our plan is to ensure that everyone from anywhere around the world can access it and that is why we have the online as well as physical version of the academy which is on our online platform and can be accessed from anywhere around the world.
With the success of the first cohort of the Academy, what are the lessons learnt and how will you improve on the success?
For me, it has been an exciting journey seeing people move from being clueless to mastery of money in a few weeks. It means that whatever one sets one’s mind to achieve, one can actually achieve it, especially with the help of a coach or a mentor the journey will be short. That is what our goal is at TAM Money Mastery Academy – to help ordinary people become masters of their finances.
What should people who want to join the Academy expect?
Those who are coming to the academy should expect to learn how to make, manage, multiply and sustain their money and become trained money mastery and personal financial management professionals.
The training comes with practicals, project execution, certificate at completion, physical and combined graduation ceremony.
The course modules include money making mindset, emotional intelligence, selling codes, accounting essentials, and others.
We will be taking them through a practical financial management journey. This model has proven to be effective.
The Academy accords students the opportunity for self discovery; intrapersonal motivation, that is, getting inspired and challenged from within; and of course, getting the very best out of oneself.
Students are encouraged to get through the classes by their own sustained hard work while developing the much needed courage to face the challenges of learning. They are also encouraged to develop certain qualities of character and mind to whatever feat they set their minds on.
These qualities include empathy, rigour, the capacity to think independently, to listen politely, and, when necessary, to disagree without being disagreeable. Equipped with these qualities, students are fully empowered to seek out new opportunities with confidence knowing that they can contribute, that they are ready, and that they can overcome challenges and unexpected setbacks.
Registration for the next cohort which starts in October has begun and will last till October 12 while classes will start on October 15.
What category of students do you admit or seek to admit into the Academy?
The category of people who can join the Academy include career and business professionals, entrepreneurs and any serious minded individual who wants to master how to manage his or her money sustainably.
People who work 9 to 5 jobs and need other streams of income in addition to their paid employment are also encouraged to join the Academy.
Having been in the banking sector for many years now, what, in your opinion, is the future of banking in Nigeria?
The future of banking in Nigeria will continue to be shaped by innovation and technological disruptions.
The journey from the analog to industrial age and now information age, specifically the use of the internet, has unlocked unprecedented disruption of banking business.
Funding is a huge challenge for entrepreneurship, especially in Nigeria. How do you think this can be overcome?
There are lots of ways entrepreneurs can get funding in Nigeria. Governments, individuals and organisations are actively working on this.
Entrepreneurs need to position themselves and their businesses to be able to get the right funding for their type of business.
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