The Guest of Honour and Chancellor of the University of Ghana, Mary Chinery-Hesse
The Chartered Institute of Marketing, Ghana (CIMG), has named the CEO of MTN, Selorm Adadevoh, and the CEO of the Business & Financial Times (B&FT), Edith Dankwa, respectively as the Marketing Man and Woman of the Year 2020.
The awards were conferred at the 32nd CIMG Annual National Marketing Performance Awards held at the Labadi Beach Hotel last Saturday.
The Marketing Man of the Year 2020, Selorm Adadevoh, was recognized for leading MTN to a stellar output with the company’s revenues growing by 16.4% of GHS6.03 billion, made up 41.4% voice, 29.6% data, 21.2% Mobile money, and 3.1% digital revenue.
Under his leadership, MTN Mobile Money (MoMo) revenue grew by 32.2% to GHS1.3 billion while the number of active MoMo users increased by 16.3% to 10.6 million, making a significant contribution to the nation’s financial inclusion agenda.
The Marketing Woman of the Year 2020, CEO of the Business & Financial Times, Dr. Edith Dankwa, received a huge round of applause and a standing ovation as she made her way to the stage for decoration. She was recognized for among other things, successfully leading the development of some wonderful products in the media space that has brought significant transformation to the industry.
Besides the mainstream business newspaper, the Business and Financial Times, the company has also introduced b&ftonline.com, Business Time magazine, and Energy Today magazine. Additionally, the B&FT group also organizes the annual event, Ghana Economic Forum, which brings together key stakeholders to discuss issues pertaining to the Ghanaian economy. All these happened under her able leadership as CEO and subsequently, her appointment as Board Chair of the group.
Also on the personality awards list were the Marketing Practitioner and Marketing Students of the year 2020, which went to Mr. Eli Hini, CEO of MTN Mobile Money, and Ms. Erica Marfowaa Din-Chin, who emerged the overall best student in the professional Marketing examinations. Other awards categories are Hall of Fame, Media/Marketing Communications, Business Organisations, Products, and Not-for-Profit Organisations.
With the continuous discourse on the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), the CIMG deemed it appropriate to highlight the future opportunities this agreement presents Ghana, hence the theme: “Repositioning Ghana to Leverage AfCFTA for Economic Development”.
Addressing both virtual and in-person participants, the National President of CIMG, Dr. Daniel Kasser Tee, intimated that if Ghana is determined to take advantage of AfCFTA, it needs to recalibrate the educational curriculum with marketing and entrepreneurship weaved into it. Dr. Tee also said that instilling a marketing and entrepreneurship mindset in our youth and the future generations from the classroom is the way to go.
Dr. Kasser Tee further added that “We can deploy this strategy at the senior high school level and at the tertiary level, as MUST TAKE courses for all students, so as to produce potential entrepreneurs with the requisite skills for building business. This is because the Doctor, Agriculturalist, Engineer, Accountant, etc, all require basic entrepreneurship and marketing competencies to successfully set up their practicing firms as well as small businesses to be able to contribute meaningfully to the economy of Ghana.”
He believes it is about time we changed the orientation of the youth of Ghana, away from overreliance on the public sector for jobs.
“They should focus on the private sector, where they can start as entrepreneurs or employees of entrepreneurs, with the opportunity of learning to set up businesses of their own without fear. The idea in the minds of many young Ghanaians that government must employ everyone, is a silent blight, plaguing their fertile minds, which can be grounds for brilliant business ideas,” concluded Dr. Kasser Tee.
The Guest of Honour for the awards ceremony, Dr. Mary Chinery-Hesse, who is also the Chancellor of the University of Ghana (UG), revealed that what was rated as mere rhetoric of African Leaders, is now a reality with the bold step to establish a single market, that might well be the World’s Largest Trade Area.
Advising policymakers, she emphasized the need for new training systems to be established that would enable young people to equip themselves with the required skills for new job markets, as a result of AfCFTA.
“Let us listen to the Captains of industry who strongly advise drastic adjustments to the content of the curriculum of our education system, right to the tertiary level, so it can respond more relevantly to the demands of the world of work. Policymakers must listen to those at the fireside who can give more pointed advice as to approaches, which would lead to the creation of new value chains and business areas which can help create jobs,” she highlighted.
Dr. Chinery-Hesse further called on Captains of Industries and the business community, to prioritize, develop and implement smarter local strategies to seize the increasing opportunities in manufacturing and industrialization across a variety of sectors, even as you pursue local strategies to face up to global competitiveness.
“Countries which have strong manufacturing capacity, cheaper costs of doing business, high productivity, good infrastructure, and easy access to loans and financing will have a better comparative advantage,” Dr. Chinery-Hesse urged.
In her concluding remarks, the UG Chancellor tasked the CIMG to help reposition Ghana to reap maximum benefits from AfCFTA, since the CIMG has a very critical role to play in improving the competitive urge of Ghana, within this anticipated competitive environment.
The CIMG Annual National Marketing Performance Awards is the Institute’s annual recognition platform to create awareness about the relevance of marketing for the success of businesses, promote higher professional standards and excellence among practitioners, and stimulate healthy competition among organizations, while ensuring improved quality of products and services offered by organizations.
