Fela Durotoye is a Nation Builder and the Chief Executive Officer of the Gemstone Group, a Leadership Development Institution aimed at raising leaders of excellence and exemplary values who would be committed to building Nigeria into a most desirable nation to live in by Wednesday the 31st of December 2025.
Fela Durotoye is considered one of Nigeria’s leading strategists and business consultants with expertise in Culture Transformation, Service Leadership, Workforce Activation and Facilitating Strategic Retreats.
The list of corporate clients in the private sector that have been assisted by Fela Durotoye in their quest for phenomenal service leadership culture and corporate transformation management spread across different spheres of the economy.
His clients in the Banking & Finance sectors include Access Bank, GTBank, First Bank, Zenith Bank, First City Monument Bank, Diamond Bank, Fidelity Bank, United Bank for Africa, Skye Bank, Stanbic IBTC Bank and Standard Chartered Bank, ARM Pensions, Vetiva Asset & Management Ltd and Cordros Capital.
His clients in the Oil & Gas sector include Shell Petroleum Development Corporation, Oando, Total, Addaxx Petroleum, Masters Energy, Bell Oil & Gas and the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas Company.
In the telecommunications sector, his clients include Airtel, MTN, Etisalat and Multichoice Nigeria.
In the Manufacturing & FMCG space, his clients include, Peugeot Automobiles, Printserve, Lafarge, Procter & Gamble, Unilever, Nestle, Sanofi Aventis and Pfizer.
In the multilateral and public sectors, the client list also includes Eko Electricity Development Company (EKEDC), Benin Electricity Development Company (BEDC), African Finance Corporation, The European Union (EU Nigeria office), The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) as well as the state governments of Lagos, Oyo, Kwara, Abia, Anambra, Bayelsa, Rivers, Ondo and Ekiti.
Fela currently mentors over 15,000 leaders in business, enterprise, education, religion and the professional services sectors on the platform of The Fela Durotoye Leadership Network.
Fela holds a Bachelors degree (B.Sc.) in Computer Science & Economics along with a Masters degree in Business Administration (MBA) from the prestigious Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife where he wrote his MBA thesis on The Management of Change in Complex Organisations.
He is also an Alumnus of Kennedy School of Government Executive Education program of the prestigious Harvard University, Boston (Massachusetts). He has completed the High Impact Leadership for a Better Society program at the prestigious Yale University, New Haven (Connecticut). Fela also attended the Future Candidate program at The Leadership Institute, Arlington (Virginia) all in the United States of America in addition to being a certified leadership coach of the John Maxwell Team.
In 2015, Fela completed the Executive Seminar program on Strategy, Innovation & Governance with specific focus on Sustainability for NGOs and Corporate Organizations at the prestigious Lagos Business School (LBS).
Fela, in his firm belief that effective law enforcement will play a vital role in our social stability and national development, signed up for and completed the Supernumerary Police training program at the Nigerian Police Training School, Ikeja and received the Distinguished Student Award at his graduation and passing out parade.
Fela Durotoye is a guest lecturer on ETHICAL LEADERSHIP at the prestigious STANFORD UNIVERSITY| Seed Program to CEO’s of businesses with operations across the African continent.
He presently sits on the board of several companies across the spectrum of Nigerian’s economic space such as O NAPHTALI (leading scratch card print company in Nigeria), and BUBEZ FOOD COMPANY.
He is currently the chairman of the boards of Directors of some of Nigeria’s leading companies Homebase Mortgage Bank Limites, I-Aspire Media and Orbra ICT.
Fela is on the advisory board of Nigeria Canada Forum (NCF) based in Regina Canada.
Fela Durotoye has been at the forefront of the movement to build a New Nigeria for over a decade. He is renowned for history making on the national or global stage. Over the past decade, he has built a track record of National Transformation projects, many of which are so bold and audacious; near impossible tasks.
Notable among the too many to mention transformation projects which Fela has championed is the largest urban renewal project in Nigeria’s history known as MUSHIN MAKEOVER where Fela mobilized over 2,000 volunteers to paint 296 houses across 7 streets of the Mushin suburb of Lagos, AT NO CHARGE to the owners and resident of the buildings.
In the course of the Mushin Makeover project, over 100 unemployed youths were trained by Berger Paints PLC in ‘The Art & Technique of Painting’. Today, they have become vibrant painters and are able to earn a living as a result of the Mushin Makeover project.
On the 24th of November 2012, Fela Durotoye organized the epoch making Gemstone Global Reading Festival where over 12,000 students spread across 18 state capitals in Nigeria as well as in 9 countries across Africa, Europe and the USA all read out aloud in their various locations selected sections of Fela’s book 17 Secrets of High Flying Students (17 Secrets) at the exact same moment in time at the same time across several time zones.
This was the first-ever simultaneous global reading of a book in 17 cities in Nigeria and 17 countries across the world at the same moment in time (via live streaming). The reading was done simultaneously, taking into account, the different time zones of each reading centre.
During this project, Fela Durotoye donated 17,000 copies of the 17 Secrets to students from public schools, many of whom could not afford it all across the nation with the aim of enhancing the reading culture
Also in November 2012, Fela broke the world record for “autographing the largest number of books by one author” when he autographed non-stop 10,000 copies of his book in one-seating over a period of 8 hours and 43 minutes.
In 2014, the Deliver The Future Project was founded and embarked on a leadership and personal transformation tour to tertiary institutions such as University of Ibadan, Ahmadu Bello University Zaria, Benson Idahosa University etc.
The aim is to leave its trail in academic excellence by encouraging the academic and non-academic staff of schools to improve the standard of communication and process of knowledge transfer to create a more conducive learning environment.
The Gemstone Network actively engages transformational leaders at all levels of the society; through the Gemstone Leadership Clubs in over 300 primary and secondary schools as well as Gemstone Leaders Connect Network on more than 70 campuses in tertiary institutions across Nigeria. The Gemstone Leadership Corpnetwork activates recent graduates on the National Youth Service Corp program to engage is community transformation projects across 30 states of the nation.
Perhaps Fela’s most significant contribution to Nation Building is the value system which he developed and is currently endorsed and actively promoted by over 30,000 Nigerians across all gender, tribe, social class or religious affirmation.
The 10 Values are encapsulated in a Personal Creed of ten lifestyle statements as follows:
Make a Positive Impact on everyone you meet and everywhere you go. Be a Solution Provider and not a part of the problem to be solved.
Be a role model worthy of emulation. Be your best IN ALL YOU DO particularly the things you are naturally good at.DO THE RIGHT THING AT ALL TIMES regardless of who is doing the wrong thing.VALUE TIME and make the best use of it.CARE & SHOW RESPECT TO ALL through your words and actions.CONSCIOUSLY BUILD A GREAT LEGACY starting now, today and everyday.LIVE A LIFE OF INTEGRITY AND HONOR.MAKE YOUR FAMILY, NATION AND GOD PROUD.
The 10 Values have been adopted by individuals and organizations. They have also been adopted by professional associations such as Association of Private Educators of Nigeria, the Nigerian Institute of Mechanical Engineers and the Mortgage Bankers Association of Nigeria to mention a few and more recently government agencies and parastatals.
In 2014, the government of Anambra state formally endorsed & adopted the 10 Values for the citizens and civil service of the state, also in November 2014, the government of Lagos state trained 500 of its top civil servants across all ministries & agencies on the 10 Values.
The VALUES INFUSION project is the largest non-governmental effort at reorienting the citizens of a nation and integrating a value system into our nation’s consciousness in recent times.
FD, as he is fondly called by his friends and protégés, has emerged as a credible voice of leadership for a new Nigeria across the wide spectrum of the young and old as well as business and political leaders. His fan base on Facebook currently about 285,000 and he is followed by about 205,000 on Twitter and 123,000 on Instagram.
In February 2013, Fela was profiled by the US-based Black Enterprise magazine as one of the 10 Power Men in Africa on Twitter.
Fela has won several National and International awards for his leadership development and nation building activities including the prestigious Nigerian Achievers Award in 2009. In recognition of his contributions to the field of Human Resource Consulting, Fela was honoured with the “Excellence in Human Resource Consulting Award” by NIPRO, a body of Nigerian Professionals based in the United Kingdom and the United States of America, at their global convention in Miami, Florida in December 2004.
In July 2005, he was awarded the most prestigious Award of Excellence, by the Chartered Institute of Personnel Management of Nigeria (CIPMN), in recognition of his excellence and professionalism in extending knowledge frontiers in Human Resource Management.
Others awards include Nigerian Achievers Award Institute (NAAI), Fly Network Africa Integrity Award, City People Young Male Achievers Award and the prestigious Role Model Award given by the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC).
In 2006, he received the Heart of Africa Award by the Federal Ministry of Information and Communication in recognition of his efforts towards building a new Nigeria.
In 2011, Fela Durotoye was recognized by the Universal Peace Federation and the Youth Federation for World Peace as a United Nations Young Ambassador For Peace.
In 2017, Fela received an Honorary Award from The African Young Entrepreneurs network in recognition of his efforts towards advancing youth enterprise and nation building in Africa and particularly in Nigeria.
Most recently, in February 2018, Fela Durotoye announced his aspiration to contest as a Presidential Candidate in the 2019 General Elections on the platform of the Alliance for New Nigeria (ANN) party.
Fela is married to Tara, a renowned beauty entrepreneur and Chief Executive Officer of the House of Tara and together they have 3 sons: Mobolurin, Demilade & Morolaoluwa who think their dad is a Super Hero.
Source: opinions.ng
