Nordica Foundation Announces Second Edition of The Dr. Abayomi Ajayi Mentoring Programme

Rebecca Ejifoma

Nordica Foundation has announced its second edition of The Dr. Abayomi Ajayi Mentoring Programme for 12 non-practising doctors which will run from mid October this year to the end of the first quarter of next year.

The foundation noted this at a media parley, which was held in Lagos to announce the second edition.

The Convener, Dr. Abayomi Ajayi, highlighted that the Mentoring Programme seeks to change the mindset of Nigerian doctors and hopefully stem the brain-drain by proverbially teaching them how to fish instead of giving them fish.

Through the mentoring model, Ajayi said they expose young Nigerian doctors to the wealth of experience of successful Nigerians in different fields of industry as mentors. “It is to equip them with the expertise needed to build successful enterprises, and to help build a robust healthcare system in Nigeria”.

While conceding that the first edition was a huge success, with the 12 mentees attesting to how much they were greatly impacted by the series of training and mentor-sharing sessions, the convener anticipated a much more impactful edition.
He assured newsmen: “We will be deepening the scope of input in the 2nd edition, which should commence by mid October 2021 and run till the end of the 1st quarter of 2022. The call for entries is currently on-going and the selection process will be rigorously demanding on prospective entrants.”

Fully funded by the Nordica Foundation since inception, Ajayi said the life-transforming project requires the support of well-meaning organisations to be able to impact more doctors in their goal to increase the number of yearly participants.

According to Ajayi, whose goal is simply to give back to the society, in his experience as a trained Nigerian medical professional, he observed that the major weakness in “Our doctors is a dearth in entrepreneurial education.

“That is, the capacity to see the breadth of opportunities that brings professional and financial reward. It is said that success is the application of knowledge to solve problems. In a country like ours with the myriad of challenges in healthcare, Nigerian doctors are meant to be extremely successful if they apply entrepreneurship skills.”

He, however, cited a recent online media report that showed Nigeria lost over 4,500 doctors to the UK in the last six years. In another report last July, at the height of COVID-19, the UK revised its migration visa rules to encourage more doctors to migrate from countries like Nigeria to the UK.

Ajayi listed: “At that time an average of 20 doctors left the shores of Nigeria weekly to the UK. The story is not much different when we see what is happening in countries like the US, Canada, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa to mention a few. This brain-drain in the medical/healthcare sector should be of tremendous concern to us as a people.”

Hence, the Dr. Abayomi Ajayi Mentoring Programme was created to change that narrative, and help these non-professional doctors to find their paths and see opportunities that lie in the country.

Sharing their experiences as participants at the maiden edition, Dr. Mariam Al-hassan and Dr. Yejide Okungbaye listed some benefits of the programme including financial literacy, emotional intelligence, business planning, investments, and networking among others.

Meanwhile, the second edition promises to crack more opportunities for the mentees to have a more engaging relationship with the mentors.