At Appzone, everyone, irrespective of gender, race, creed, or culture, is treated equally and fairly with empathy. Our recruitment process is non-discriminatory, and the total rewards structure is built on equity -Omonuwa Olulano.
Omonuwa Olulano is the Chief Human Resources Officer at Appzone, bringing to bear a wealth of knowledge and an array of experiences across diverse sectors including Financial Services, E-Commerce, Non-profit, and Technology. In this interview, she talked about work culture, tech talent, and employment in Nigeria. Excerpt:
INTERVIEW QUESTIONS & ANSWERS
- Remote working drastically spiked as a result of the covid-19 pandemic and talents are able to work with companies from across the globe, how is Appzone positioning itself to adapt to these changes?
Ans: Pre-Covid, we understood the future of work was borderless and had started building structures to guide our positioning. Hence the ease in migrating to Flexi-work. We hire professionals from around the globe, so our employees have considerable latitude in choosing where they would like to work to deliver on their goals. Their preferred location could be a workstation, home office, or office complex.
However, we have specific events that are physical to deepen collaboration. Even in this mode, we still have structures to accommodate employees outside our operating base, Lagos.
- Let’s talk about your company culture. What differentiates Appzone from every other ‘cool’ and agile tech start-up?
Ans: Our culture is people and performance-centric. We are very focused on the enabling environment we create for our people, allowing them to deliver on the job and advance their careers. As an organization obsessed with productivity and performance, we have designed processes and built structures that shape our high-performing teams across departments at Appzone today. So, every business objective, perk, and benefit is centered on this ideology. Our core values have been deliberately integrated into our thinking, processes, and approach to problem-solving at Appzone.
- Finding and hiring tech talent is one of the biggest challenges companies face these days. Knowing Appzone to be home to best-in-class talents, how have you managed to recruit and retain this set of people over the years.
Ans: Our strength is in two-fold. There is the part where we “create” Appzoners, and in the other, we “nurture” Appzoners. In creating, we have partnered with specific Universities, Institutions, and Communities where top talents are identified, recruited, and trained (technical and behavioral skills specific to Appzone) through our Learning academy.
The second aspect relates to our intricate recruitment process that identifies top talents and hires them into a challenging, rewarding career journey.
Regarding retention, a couple of factors have worked for us, from our investments in employee benefits to investments in learning and development programs for talent. Research shows that top talents are always interested in doing impactful work. At Appzone, our technology is novel and home-grown; we built it. It is a big attraction for our technical talents who want to be a part of something meaningful and monumental and are looking to grow their careers.
- Let’s talk about technology in the workplace. As the first to build a decentralized payment network in Africa, are there interesting technologies built by Appzone that are leveraged within the work environment, to simplify processes for your talents?
Ans: As a company with a hybrid work model, we rely heavily on technology to get the work done. We currently do not have technologies built by Appzone as work tools. However, we have partnerships with specific providers that have modified their systems to meet our unique peculiarities and needs.
- Despite national conversations about gender diversity in tech, women are still underrepresented, underpaid, and often discriminated against in the tech industry, according to several reports. How inclusive is the culture at Appzone?
Ans: At Appzone, everyone, irrespective of gender, race, creed, or culture, is treated equally and fairly with empathy. Our recruitment process is non-discriminatory, and the total rewards structure is built on equity.
Our philosophy is that we reward and compensate based on value-add. So, suppose you have two Engineers performing the same function with similar levels of competence and skill sets but different genders (male and female). In that case, they are compensated within the same compensation band.
We also respect the perspectives and individuality of our people because therein lies our true strength.
- Finally, unemployment in Nigeria is currently high with about 40% of the youth unemployed? What quota is Appzone contributing to the Nigerian economy to close this gap?
Ans: Our impact can be seen in two ways – our recruitment preference and the future development of our employable youths. Our recruitment process focuses primarily on Nigerians living in Nigeria because they directly impact our economic growth. In 2021, 90% of our new hires were from this group. We are also passionate about developing graduates and making them work-ready through our Learning academy. At the academy, they are exposed to technical skills and work ethics. Currently, the focus is on developing tech talents; however, our plan from 2023 is to expand the focus to other disciplines (Product Managers, Product Designers, QA Engineers, Operational functions, etc.) within Appzone.
The endgame is a Technical Institute where technical skills and knowledge are taught/imbibed to graduates to prepare them for their desired profession and the workplace.
