TRIBUTE
Chika Amanze-Nwachuku
A prophet is not without honour save in his own country. These words spoken by Jesus Christ to the people of Nazareth, the town where he grew up is clearly not applicable to Olumide Orojimi, the Head of Corporate Communications at The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), who was recently honoured in three countries including his country, Nigeria for his exemplary role in sustainability development.
With close to two decades experience in providing thought leadership in public relations, brand management, stakeholder engagement, corporate sustainability and reporting, as well as crisis management in financial services, energy and consulting industries, any garlands to this seasoned professional, who is a tremendous asset not only to the NSE, but to any company in Nigeria and across the globe, would undoubtedly be deserving. This consummate brand and sustainability professional has had a career laced with significant achievements. These accomplishments have earned him senior management roles on the advisory and client side. Prior to his current role at the NSE, he had stellar careers in the financial services and energy sectors of the economy such as Oando and Intercontinental Bank (now Access Bank).
Widely viewed as an innovation evangelist owing to his creative zest that often see his clients and company break new grounds by leveraging a multi-disciplinary approach to building brands. A new frontier that his career trajectory is seemingly gaining wider momentum is in sustainability. His impactful and increasing contributions to the triple bottom-line of planet, people and progress is receiving local and global recognitions.
On November 13, 2019, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) headquartered in Amsterdam announced his election into its Stakeholder Council with a tenor of three years commencing January 1, 2020. GRI has championed sustainability reporting since the late 1990s, moving it from a niche practice to a discipline embraced today by an increasing number of organisations. There are thousands of reporters in over 90 countries, GRI provides the world’s most widely used standards on sustainability reporting, enabling businesses, governments, civil society and citizens to make better, sustainable decisions based on information that matters including 80pee cent of the largest 250 companies globally.
This election was followed by another recognition, this time in the West African city of Accra, Ghana, where he clinched the Corporate Communications Professional of the Year (Nigeria) Award at the 9th edition of the Marketing World Awards.
In 2018, he had won the Corporate Affairs Personality of The Year from same MWA. His employer, NSE won the Best CSR Initiative award for the promotion of sustainability reporting in Nigeria at MWA 2019. As the lead sustainability practitioner at NSE, this affirms his quality leadership to ensure the issue of ESG are well entrenched amongst its ecosystem.
Back home, on November 23rd, Orojimi was honoured for his contributions to the promotion and development of Corporate Social Responsibility and Sustainability in Nigeria during the 13th edition of The Sustainability, Enterprise & Responsibility Awards (SERAS). Other recipients of the industry honours include Bekeme Masade – CSR -In- Action; Ismail Omamegbe- First Bank Plc, and Mrs. Olajobi Makinwa- Global Compact. At the same award, he was named CSR/Sustainability Practitioner of the Year 2019.
Eulogising Orojimi, the Founder of SERAS and CEO of Trucontact, Ken Egbas said: “I make bold to say that you are a very deserving recipient for the brilliant and gargantuan contributions you have made through the NSE platform. Because of the works you have done, sustainability in Nigeria is on the upward curve”.
