The participating companies and students were welcomed by the Dean of LBS, Dr Enase Okonedo and the MBA Director, Dr Uchenna Uzo. Both members of the LBS Management Board took turns to thank and assure the participating companies that they had made the right decision to hire talent for high performance.
The keynote address, given by Niyi Yusuf, Country Managing Director, Accenture, was hinged on the relevance of innovation and he emphasised in his detailed address that innovation was a necessary ingredient for survival and success in today’s challenging business environment.
At the start of the event, representatives from most of the companies expressed that they had high expectations and were hopeful to identify talent that will be good fit for their organisations. They were particularly impressed by the industry presentations delivered by the MBA students. A representative from Dalberg, a global strategy and policy advisory firm shared “It’s obvious they did extensive research, their statistics and recommendations were on point and relevant. I was impressed generally by the level of and how they applied the frameworks; clearly what they are being taught is not all theory”. After the industry presentations, each student was able to have one-on-one chats with the representatives of companies of their choice in specially prepared booths.
Interestingly, there were a number of LBS alumni who participated in the fair as recruiters and representatives of their organisations. When asked how it felt to be back, Ayomide Akindolie (MBA 8) a senior consultant said “It’s very nostalgic, my first job and the reason I have this job was thanks to the career fair I participated in as an MBA student”. Her response to how much knowledge gained at LBS has helped her in her career so far, she said “Extremely! I still have my binders and I refer to them once in a while. I remember referring to a case study, I went to dig it out. I read it and some of the recommendations based on the analysis we did then was still relevant many years later. This happened last year and I graduated in 2011. I gained so much: Time management, speed reading, even being punctual. I get feedback from people that I’m always on time and that’s because the attitude I imbibed at LBS.
Over time, some companies have valued the MBA recruits from LBS and have participated repeatedly in the MBA Career Fairs. Notable amongst these are Total Nigeria, Oando Plc, Lexcel Group, Lafarge, GTBank, BASF, General Electric, Nesle, Unilever, Friesland Campina, Schneider Electric, Airtel, Sterling Bank, Nielson, FBN Quest and Cummins. Companies participating for the first time this year include The Boston Consulting Group, Dalberg and Arla (Dano).
