Audrey Abakah, the Head of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) at ABSA Bank has stressed the importance of employee orientation for the growth and development of SMEs.

Speaking at the Citi Business Festival SME Development Roundtable, Audrey Abakah emphasised that effective leadership and orientation are crucial for employees to understand the company culture and contribute to its success.

Audrey Abakah noted that many SMEs fail to provide adequate orientation, leading to a lack of understanding and a “do as you please” attitude among employees.

She encouraged entrepreneurs to develop leadership skills and build a structured recruitment process that includes proper orientation for new employees.

She underscored that a bad culture within an organization starts with the business owner, and it is essential to check oneself and make necessary changes.

“The question we need to ask is how are the entrepreneurs themselves leading the people? Are they leaders, have they built the leadership capacity, the leadership strength, skills and expertise to manage people because people live because of people? And these SMEs because in most cases the businesses start with them, everything revolves around them, they possess all the knowledge of the business, when they recruit people, in most cases, their recruitment is not even through the right process.”

“When you come in, there’s not any proper orientation to orient you into the culture because every business must have a culture and businesses that centre around human beings, the culture of that organisation is the person. So if you have a bad culture within the organisation as a businessman or woman, then you have to check yourself.”

The Citi Business Festival 2024 is powered by 97.3 Citi FM and Channel One TV in partnership with Absa Bank and is sponsored by MTN Business, GIRSAL, AMG Fertilizer, Nsano Ltd and Agri-Impact Limited.