Leke Alder is a trained Lawyer, a renowned Nigerian business brand and marketing consultant – an industry he is a pioneer of and certainly, both known and celebrated for locally and internationally.
Born as an only child to his parents of Lagos and Abeokuta origin respectively, he nursed the dream of becoming a Lawyer from an early age. Like with every other Alder, his father purposed in his heart to send his son, Leke, to Igbobi College, Lagos. However, Leke moved to another secondary school in Lagos – Kings College – too after some time.
Leke went on to study Law at the then University of Ife, now ObafemiAwolowo University (O.A.U.), Ife, Osun State. He graduated from the university in 1985 and was called to bar in 1986. Leke’s entrepreneurial spirit had been clearly exhibited right from his days at the university, where he ran a chamber that charged a fee to argue cases for students.
Upon graduation from Law School, he was posted to Bauchi State where he served for six months before returning to Lagos due to a facial paralysis he suffered at the time. During his Youth Service, he registered a company, Leke Alder & Company, albeit not a law firm, rather the company focused in Visual Identity Design. Leke Alder worked with Wale Lofun& Company during Youth Service and was there for two years after before he left to start his own entrepreneurial pursuit.
Business growth for Leke Alder was not intentionally planned. According to a source, he did not see the vision this big but began very small and kept progressing, moving from one stage to the next.
He started out by giving business advice to people for free. However, when the business owners saw how the advice he offered turned their struggling businesses around in few months, they paid him commensurate to the profit they made. This was his turn-around; for every good work done, he got a referral and the cycle kept going.
Alder Consulting was founded in 1996 by Leke Alder with a vision to transform companies in the advertising industry into brand communication companies. This was ‘Alder 1.0’. Sometime around the year 2000, Leke Alder gathered a group of people, lodged them in a hotel room in Ikoyi, Lagos, and they brainstormed for solutions to Nigeria’s image problem. This was a time when Nigeria was widely known for prostitution, 419 (fraud), and kidnapping.
This brainstorming session launched ‘Alder 2.0’ (a project launched with nation branding at its focus) which led to the conceptualization of the Nigeria Image Project (Heart of Africa Project) and a Brand Research that led to the publication of the Alder Brand Reporting, where banks were rated according to the strength of their brands. This stride opened new opportunities to him and he began consulting for the Federal Government of Nigeria and also, Federal Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Solid Minerals, Education, and Information & Communication on policy formulation.
‘Alder 3.0’ has been launched. Its focus is on developing ideas that lead to viable products and the marketing of such ideas. That is, Ideas, Strategy, and Brand Marketing.
Leke Alder has been involved in many other projects as member, Chairman, or Consultant. Some of such projects include the Steering Committee for the World Economic Forum on Africa, Sub-Committee on Media, Host Broadcasting & Advertising. He has also been a member of the organising committee of the Nigeria Economic Summit Group (NESG) and a Member of the Board of Trustees of Day Waterman College.
Furthermore, he has spoken at various events including Women in Management & Business (WimBiz), The Platform, hosted by Pastor PojuOyemade, Entrepreneurial Development School (EDS), Nigerian Bar association, Financial ADFocus Conference, South Africa, Leadership Forum, Ghana, among many others.
Being a multi-talented, Leke Alder is a writer, cartoonist, photographer, painter, lawyer and consultant. In addition, he designs furniture, clothes and interiors, and writes computer codes.While at the University of Ife, he hosted an art exhibition that had over 2,000 guests in attendance. It was so successful that the exhibition was reported by a national newspaper. This success drove him to set up a Greeting Cards company and then he proceeded to producing religious greeting cards.
Currently, Leke Alder has a company called Leke Alder International, which is a separate brand from Alder Consulting. This company oversees the production of greeting cards, his notebook line and the publication of his books.
Beside consulting and writing, Leke Alder runs a relationship advice forum called ‘Jack &Jil Live’. This forum features letters written to ‘Jack’ and to ‘Jil’. He does this with a vision to set the stage for wholesome romantic and marital relationships among opposite sexes.
Leke Alder is married to Morenike (nee Popoola) and they have two children together.
References
www.lekealder.com/bio
www.ayodejijeremiah.wordpress.com/2010/01/24/“ideas-change-nations”-leke-alder-a-man-of-many-parts/amp/
www.alderconsulting.com/our-history/
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This article was first published on 6th July 2018
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