My First honorarium

Hi guys, I know it’s been a while you’ve read from me with the Easter break and all. Hope your break was fun. I had an exciting time as I crossed a major milestone in my career…i.e. Speaking career. The week before Easter, I was “kinda” delegated by my mentor to facilitate a speaking occasion somewhere within the Lagos metropolis. I said kinda, because it was an option that was thrown to 3 of us who he felt could handle it. I immediately accepted to go and represent him once I saw the mail and replied in that vein.

He acknowledged receipt of my acceptance promptly and wished me the best. The reason he actually turned down the occasion was because he had to travel out of town to attend some other important function, otherwise, he would have taken the opportunity himself.

So, here am I saddled with the responsibility of going to deliver on a talk titled “Character in Leadership” to a group of over 200 youths in a particular church. On the eve of the day – the day was Saturday, 22^nd March, 2008; I suddenly realized that I didn’t have the venue of the engagement. To add to my disappointment, I didn’t have the phone number of the organizers and so couldn’t reach them for directions. My mentor’s phone was not reachable because wireless telecommunication network service was limited where he went.

I tried all I could to get the contact’s phone number but I couldn’t. At some point, I got really discouraged and as a result didn’t prepare for the youths. This condition of incommunicado remained till Saturday, the day of the event. I planned my day and went for a retreat in the morning. I came back home with a feeling of forlorn. I couldn’t help but blame myself. “Why didn’t I ensure that I had the details before my mentor left?” I scolded myself.

I still couldn’t bring myself to prepare for the program which should originally have taken place by 4pm. It was about 2pm now and all efforts to get the address of the engagement proved abortive. I resigned myself to fate and was contemplating going to work to study some materials when I thought “Why not give it one last shot?”

I picked up my phone and dialed a colleague’s number who I knew would be around my mentor and whose line hadn’t gone through since about 4 to 5 hours before then. The call went through and he picked his phone after the first ring. Hurriedly, he told me to hang on as he sped to where my mentor was to hand him the phone. He explained as he was moving towards my mentor that he – my mentor had been trying to call me since the day before and all day that day. The calls wouldn’t just go through.

He quickly gave me the numbers of the contact for the event he had and wished me the best. My morale rose immediately and I sat down to prepare for the event. I couldn’t help but ask myself though if I was qualified to give such a speech. “Am I a person of character?” I silently asked myself. “If my secret life was to be viewed by the youths I was going to speak to 1 hour before I got there, would they still want to eagerly listen to me?” as these thoughts ran through my mind, I put in a call to the contact and informed him that I was available to handle the seminar if they were still expecting me?

He heaved a sigh of relief informing me that he had tried as much as was possible to get across to my mentor and when it seemed as if all hope was lost, he was beginning to give up just before my call. My session was rescheduled because of the late information and I settled down to draw up my slides. At about 4.15pm, I picked up a colleague and we drove down to the venue. It took some time finding it, but when we finally did find, we got there just in time. After waiting a few minutes, which were premium minutes for me because I was able to add pictures to my slides in that time, I was asked to present.

Now because of the change in schedule, I ended up being the last speaker. I was conscious of the fact that I would be subconsciously or consciously compared to other speakers and was slightly afraid. I couldn’t afford to settle for less. I started off with motivating them with an aluta progressive clap routine, got them to introduce themselves and when they warmed up to me, got them asking for more with an interesting opening story.

I had all the time in the world since I was the last speaker and was able to drum home the importance of core values and character in the building of a lasting leader. Altogether, I enjoyed talking to the youths and answering their questions during the Q&A session. I have always desired to impact youths at this level so I guess I was able to do so to many of them at once at the seminar.

The president of the youth group who invited us for the seminar said he was quite impressed and made me promise the youths to come again. We had been at the university together even though he left several years ahead of me and had belonged to the same fellowship while on campus.

Surprisingly, as I was about to get into the car, I was handed an envelope as a token of appreciation for a job well done. I wanted to reject it but I wasn’t given an option. I felt good however, on my way home that I had just crossed a milestone in my career. One I had been looking forward to for a while. I HAD JUST CONTRIBUTED PART OF MY QUOTA TO DEVELOPING THIS NATION BY IMPACTING THE NEXT GENERATION.

I had to attend to a lot of questions after I left the hall and offered some guidance to as many of the youths as came to me requesting such. I just pray and trust God to help me grow and develop the values that would make me more a leader of character ultimately than I am now.

For those who are curious, the envelope contained several N1000 notes!!!!!! LOL

No related posts.