Below: Photo of me (Tayo K. Solagbade) as a 25 year old Graduate Management/Brewing Trainee in Guinness Nigeria Ikeja’s Training Centre – seated beside Richard Chambers, expatriate Brewery Training Coordinator at the time (1995) .
NB: See 3 past articles at the bottom of this piece, in which I made reference to Richard Chambers)
Today, I use advanced Excel-VB coding to build custom spreadsheet software that I sell internationally. However I first learned spreadsheet automation using Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet macro programming by sitting/watching Richard DOING IT in the Ikeja brewery training centre, anytime I was FREE – even during lunch breaks.
We never had a formal training session or class. Neither did he sit me down to lecture me on how to do it.
All he did was GIVE ME his laptop, to help with checking for formula errors in an app he was building for use by the company’s top managers in headquarters – AFTER he noticed my keen interest.
As time went on, I would sneak views at his coding interface in the app he gave to me. Then as my curiosity got the better of me, I began running bits of the code in isolation to see how they worked. At a point i began trying my hands at writing my own code.
Not once did Richard let on that he noticed I was becoming familiar with the macro programming he did.
But when I arrived in Benin Brewery, and his fellow expatriate there – Joe Sheehy (who was also Training Coordinator, like Richard) told him of a major challenge they had using the app for the Brewery’s Monthly Technical Review Report preparation,
Richard simply told him: “There’s a Graduate Trainee who just arrived at your end called ‘Tayo’ – he can help you with any problem you have.”
So it was that I was barely 2 weeks old in Benin Brewery, when I got called over to the Training Centre by Joe Sheehy.
Pointing to the computer screen, showing Richard’s app that I had spend many months playing around with in Lagos, he asked “We need to get the brewery report out before the deadline, but we’re getting some formula output errors in the reports. Rik tells us you can help us. Is that so?”.
I replied without hesitation “Yes/”
From that day on, my life would NEVER be the same again. Till I left that company, my passion for spreadsheet automation would open multiple doors of opportunities for me, to the extent that I earned VERY EARLY high level exposure at senior levels, in terms of assignments/secondments, that few of my peers could boast of.
The above taught me that no experience is ever wasted. That’s why wherever I find myself, I always HUNGRILY seek ways to learn new and useful ways of doing things that add value to others.
Someone defined luck as being what happens when preparation meets opportunity.
The way I see it, you can therefore increase your chances of getting lucky by DELIBERATELY making out the time and effort to improve yourself, in every single way you know will make you better prepared for the opportunity (or opportunities) you seek to achieve your life goals.
Doing that will leave you perpetually ready to SEIZE such opportunities, if/when they appear, making you seem “lucky” to others.
Related Articles (in which I made reference to Richard Chambers)
2. Want To Get Promoted? Develop The Habit Of Going The Extra Mile (GTEM)
3. Achieve Recognition and Attract Career Advancement Opportunities By Being A Change Agent