‘We are focused on doing everything that will sustain the business beyond today’
Muhammad Kassim Olatunde, chief executive officer of Global Property and Facilities International
MKO BALOGUN, a trained Mechanical Engineer, is the chief executive officer of Global Property and Facilities International (Global PFI)—an offshoot of the merger between DOME Facilities Management Company and WSP FMC. In this interview with CHUKA UROKO, Property Editor, Balogun looks back to 10 years of this union and explains why they celebrate. He also explains what it means to be a CEO and what a day means in the life of a CEO who is also a husband
Global PFI as a company is an off-shoot of DOME and WSP merger. Looking back to 10 years of this union, what can you see?
Mergers are like a marriage which is predicated on shared vision, prosperity and ideas. As a business, our objective is to be one of the biggest and most successful real estate firms in Nigeria and Africa. We saw the opportunity of achieving that in our merger with WSP.
Sometimes, business relationships are initiated through informal conversation and that happened in our case. We had a client we were working for. A vendor was leaving and the client asked the vendor if he could find someone like him that could replace him in his building. We took that opportunity and two years after, there were discussions around working together and today, everybody is happy.
Challenges, yes, there were challenges out there but we were prepared for them from the beginning. Merger is like a marriage and it is more difficult when you have children already. If the husband had married before with children and the wife too had married with children, you have to find a way to integrate those children into the marriage.
The challenge for us was how to bring everybody together. It was a huge challenge but we were prepared. We had conversation with our employees, telling them it was the future and there was no need to panic. Looking back therefore, I would say, it has been a very good experience. It has been a good story to share with budding entrepreneurs who want to do what we have done successfully.
In the course of those 10 years, was there any time you can recall when you had cause to regret your going into this merger?
Absolutely, there has been such a time. We have had some difficult moments as individuals and as a business. As an individual, when you are trying to join two different organisations, you know you are fusing people and their attitudes. You also have challenge of selling what you have brought together.
My first presentation to our board of directors was like a business class. 80 percent of what I brought to the meeting was shut-down and I had to go back and do it again. I had to go to science and business journals to look at how it is done. I did not give up. But the question I was asking myself was whether I was in the right place and in the right moment.
So there are moments when you have to ask yourself such questions. There is nobody who runs a business, especially in an environment like ours, who does not ask such questions.
The business environment in Nigeria is not enabling coupled with the general economic downturn. How have you been navigating it?
For us, understanding the market and the environment is very important. We believe that you can’t survive in an environment where you are always taken by surprise. We changed our name in 2014. We decided to see ourselves as integrated real estate service provider. We did a study of the market and found out that it is viable with many international organizations coming. These visitors were not going to own houses. So, we created solutions for them.
We expect two things to happen as the market grows. One is that there will be increase in demand and we are asking ourselves how we can optimise. We changed our model. We did not allow our clients to ask for tender because that would be a waste of time. We just asked them to give us opportunity to come to show what we can do. We showed them areas that needed to be improved. Initially, some of them said no.
But we made them see reasons; we saved them 35 percent of their cost from day 1. That is 35 percent of what they were spending before we came. They were surprised. There were some buildings we took over and found out that there was no proper cost structure for the clients to understand what they were doing. When we came in, we corrected all that. For these reasons, in the last four years, despite Covid-19 and other challenges, we have grown.
This growth, can it be measured in terms percentages, say 10 percent or 30 percent?
Talking in terms of percentages, I would say we have grown by 3,000 percent in the last 10 years.
What are the indices?
It is a business and you have to take into consideration the various aspects of the business. We look at three things, the quality of our clients, our revenue and our profits. We can also add what we have contributed to the industry. All these parameters help us to determine our growth. In the last two years, we have done pretty well; we have expanded beyond the shores of Nigeria and have registered in 10 African countries. We are doing contract today in nine of those countries.
In both private and business life, attaining success is one thing; managing it is another. How successful have you been in managing your success?
The ultimate thing there is learning lessons. In our space, there are many companies that have collapsed and there are two things responsible. One is over-trading and the other is forgetting where you are coming from. We are continuously improving on our game; we are not resting on our oars. We don’t believe we have arrived; we train our people and discover new ideas.
In this company, we don’t over trade. We don’t do what is beyond our capability because this is where you run into trouble. We see people as the most important component of the business. We are also focused on everything that will sustain this business beyond today. We are not over-aggressive.
The facilities management industry is largely unregulated; it is an all-comers affair. How is this affecting the growth of the industry and your operations?
We don’t see that as a challenge. The industry is large. What is important for us is to ensure that we have proper structure within the industry. We are focused on training and development right from our DOME days. We want to have professionals in the industry. You can’t run away from an environment where people are looking for opportunities and jobs; where they are looking for the easiest way to start a business.
Let us now come down to you as a person. Who is MKO Balogun?
My name MKO means Mohammad Kazeem Olakunle. There is a story behind it but that is for another day. I just shortened those names for convenience because of the kind of work I do and the kind of people I meet on regular basis. I started using MKO right from my university days and it has stuck.
I am passionate about what I do; I am driven and I like to ensure I am successful in all ramifications. I get bothered too. I do develop myself. I found myself in this industry by accident because my passion has been to be in the auto industry. I read Mechanical Engineering with specialisation in Automobile.
Arguably, you have enough to show as a CEO, a lecturer, a worker and a student, all happening almost simultaneously. Where does the strength to do all these come from?
I had said it earlier that I am driven and passionate about what I believe in. I am also focused and most of the things I do are connected. I do what I do to ensure that the industry works not just for myself alone. Across Africa, I have gone to set up FM departments in universities. I also like giving back to society. In my 50th birthday, I set up a foundation aimed to support the young ones. For me, that is what life is all about.
What does a day mean in the life of a CEO like you who is also a husband and a father?
One CEO is different from another, depending on the kind of job he does. For me, I have been in transition in the last 14 years. It has affected my family and there is no doubt about that. I have always apologised to them that I am not always there when they need me.
The job of a CEO could be very challenging more so when you are an owner-CEO like me. This is different from an employee-CEO who can work today and goes ahead to pick another job tomorrow. But the job becomes interesting when there is progress and there is also understanding from the family.
What could be your advice for your colleagues out there, especially those that are still struggling?
They should be determined. There are some friends who started business the same time with us but are still struggling. It is not because they are not making efforts, but maybe because they have not yet seen opportunity that can change their story. There are always difficult times but you have to be determined and also believe in God.