Before January 17, 2018, Adia Sowho was the Director, Digital Business at EMTS (Etisalat Nigeria, now 9 mobile). In her departing note from the company published on Medium, she shared the strategy of how the company was able to break through in an ultra-competitive telcos market in Nigeria.

Her story also tells how businesses can develop a workable strategy, ensure full implementation and build one of the finest companies in Nigeria. She revealed that Etisalat Nigeria (now 9Mobile) was able to grow from 2.3 million to 23 million subscribers and $1 billion in revenue within three years (2011-2013).

Adia said: “I joined Etisalat in 2010, about a year after it launched as the 4th entrant into the Nigerian market — undoubtedly an ultra-competitive market with the competition kicking off operations 7 years before we did.”

“We had 2.8 million subscribers while the other 3 shared a combined subscriber base of about 88 million. So how did we become the most feared challenger and $1B company?”

Just like everyone would like to know how she was able to achieve such a feat within a short period of time, Adia said: “So how’d we go from the early days to a peak 23 million customers and $1 billion in revenue? One post isn’t enough to articulate everything — but, in my mind, three ‘things’ were probably the most crucial for me, and the part I played.”

Based on her experience and advise, here are the three things Etisalat Nigeria did to achieve this feat.

1. The Team

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Team work is key.

 (tips)

According to her, one thing that made breaking into market possible was recruiting the right leader for each team driving the process. These have two basic duties: achieve the goals set and get the best out of people.

“What I had to figure out here was the type of leader I needed to be to deliver on the goals of each of these units and get the best out of my people — both units were by nature, quite different. One was strategic and planning-focused while the other operational and revenue-focused.”

2. The Approach

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Approach is also important to business success.

 (Hot Studio)

Getting the best team is not the only thing, but adopting an approach that helps get the results is also important. Hence, Adio said: “My inner geek always boils a problem down to the brass tacks and is usually some version of ‘what do I need to do to meet the goal?’.”

“…What you ‘do’ is defined not only by a simply articulated statement but what can affect you/the goal and if you’re not aware or prepared, you’re screwed. I’m well practised with the screw-ups, along the way I picked up a few tricks to recover.”

3. Execution

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Execution of plan is the only thing that guarantees success.

 (connective-concepts.co.uk)

Execution is the only thing that would make having a good team and approach enough to guarantee business success. According to her; “…this is an especially prickly problem because of the uncertainty in the influencing people, processes and systems. That uncertainty is driven by the lack of set standards and quality in education, leadership, and work experience amongst many other things.”

“Delivering in a complex, corporate organization with 7-figure dollar goals, required a kind of adaptability that I had to find.”