Without creativity and innovation, business enterprises will stagnate and the much-need sustainable economic growth and development will not be achieved, the newly elected President/Chairman of Council, The Institute of Business Development (IBD), Prof Ifeanyi Achumba, has said.

Delivering a paper titled “Survival is not enough” during his investiture/induction of members and Annual General Meeting (AGM) in Lagos, Achumba said innovation is key to sustainable success in an increasing competitive world.

Insisting that enterprises must rapidly and repeatedly re-invent themselves to survive competition, he said the economic environment requires renewed dynamism in approach, adding that creativity and innovation are the new tonic or name of the game.

According to him, only discerning organisations can manage the inherent changes in the new environment.

Achumba, who stated that the on-going reforms of the Federal Government should be reinvigorated to achieve the desired objective of being less-dependent on imported goods, materials, services and technology, however, added that: “Our success, therefore, will depend on the seriousness with which enterprises undertake creative and innovative activities in terms of indigenising inputs, sourcing and developing new indigenous products.”

He said the society would benefit tremendously from individual enterprises undertaking innovative and creative activities, hence, they  should not be left to government agencies to execute.

 

“It therefore, becomes imperative for an enterprise to continuously challenge itself to finding new and better ways of doing the old thing or in fact, create new ways of doing new things,” he stated.

Promising to bring his wealth of experience to bear on his new position, he made a case for an inward-looking strategy to move the country forward.

The highpoint of the event was the induction of four members made up of three associates and one fellow.

The Registrar/CEO, IBD, Mr. Paul Ikele, said the induction was an aspect of the institute’s continued professional development to ensure that members acquire new knowledge to develop themselves and grow the institute. He said the fellows were expected to bring the knowledge from their various organisations to bear on it.
Ikele said the institute’s plan is to continuously innovate and be pro-active and creative, as well as think deeper on how to turn around the economic fortunes of Nigeria so it  can compete with other developed countries. “We want to build that edge to ensure we key in,” he told The Nation, on the sideline of the induction.
IBD’s immediate past President/Chairman of Council Mr. Ifeanyi Obibuzor agreed with him, noting that there is a need to make the institute more visible. “We have to be more aggressive and reach out to the media. We also need to take our institutional problems and begin to solve them. We must look into the challenges of the small and medium businesses that have survived under this environment,” he said.

 

Giving his scorecard as the third president, Obibuzor said the institute under his watch acquired a befitting office. He also said the its membership drive led to an improvement in membership.

He charged the new president to build on the achievements of his administration, saying, “We need to look at long term planning as an Institute and as a nation and then access what we have done, the gaps and how to bridge them.”

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