Princess Kelechi Oghene is a Nigerian entrepreneur and fashion executive and the founder of GMYT Academy, a fashion institution headquartered in Lagos State, Nigeria.
What does it take to build multiple businesses, lead more than 100 employees and train over 12,000 people through a fashion academy? For Oghene, the answer is not simply capital, talent or ambition. It is resilience, continuous learning, problem-solving, disciplined systems and the willingness to keep moving even when business becomes difficult.
Speaking on The Builders, Naidacity’s podcast, Oghene shared the story behind her growing business portfolio, which spans fashion, education, media, real estate, awards and investments. Her journey is less about overnight success and more about years of experimentation, setbacks, learning and reinvention.
Her entrepreneurial journey began after school, when she started buying jewellery from Idumota and selling it at her mother’s office and to people in nearby offices and banks. When customers began owing her beyond the end of the month, she realised she needed a more structured approach. That led to her first shop at Ojomu Supermarket near Alpha Beach.
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The jewellery business eventually gave way to clothing. She began buying outfits from Balogun Market, stocking her shop and gradually expanding. One small shop became two, then a larger roadside location, before she moved to Lekki Phase 1 and began offering bespoke fashion services. From there came the foundation for what would become GMYT Academy.
The academy itself was born from a challenge Oghene experienced while running her bespoke fashion business. Despite working relentlessly, including overnight, she struggled to achieve results that matched the effort being invested. She sought solutions through courses, mentors, coaches and training, including studies at Lagos Business School. But when she returned with new knowledge and attempted to introduce better structures into the business, she encountered resistance from some employees.
Some long-serving staff had the technical skills but were unwilling to learn, document processes or adapt to new ways of working. Oghene came to recognise that this was not just a problem within her own organisation but a wider challenge in the fashion industry. Talent, she realised, was not enough. People also needed training, accountability, discipline and a willingness to keep learning.
That realisation became the foundation for GMYT Academy. Over more than a decade, the institution has trained more than 12,000 people, many of whom entered without prior fashion skills. Its programmes have evolved from shorter three- and six-month courses to longer programmes designed to teach both the creative and business sides of fashion. Courses now run for one year or 24 months, reflecting Oghene’s belief that becoming genuinely competent requires more than learning how to sew.
“Talent is not enough,” she emphasised. In her view, creatives need coaches, accountability and a willingness to continually refine their abilities. She describes herself as a practical example of this philosophy, continually investing in courses, research and professional development and implementing what she learns within her businesses.
As her businesses expanded, Oghene also recognised that growth would remain difficult if every decision, process and solution had to pass through her. Her answer was systems. Standard Operating Procedures, policies, offer letters, job descriptions, performance targets and appraisal systems became central to how she manages her organisations. Instead of simply telling employees what to do or asking them to buy into her vision, she increasingly relies on documented processes that allow people to understand what is expected of them.
For Oghene, documentation only becomes valuable when it is implemented. Her approach has helped reduce founder dependency and create businesses that can function through established processes rather than personality alone. She says the systems she uses today were not simply borrowed from business textbooks; many were developed through years of facing problems and learning what worked and what did not.
Problem-solving is at the centre of her entrepreneurial philosophy. Oghene describes her superpower in business as refusing to shy away from problems. For her, problems are not merely obstacles; they can also reveal opportunities. The fashion academy itself emerged from identifying a gap in the industry and creating a solution people were willing to pay for.
The same thinking led to another venture. Students and clients travelling from outside the country for training needed accommodation, so Oghene identified another problem and created accommodation facilities to meet that need. Her approach is therefore not simply to ask what business she can start, but what problem people are experiencing and whether there is a sustainable solution.
Despite the breadth of her businesses, Oghene does not present entrepreneurship as a smooth journey. She openly admits to having failed several times, including ventures such as a restaurant and a salon. Those experiences taught her that having money, capacity or enthusiasm for an idea does not guarantee success. Market research, data and customer feedback matter. Before investing heavily in a new venture, she believes entrepreneurs need to test whether people are actually interested in paying for the proposed solution.
For Oghene, failure has become a form of business education. Each unsuccessful venture provides information about what does not work and helps her make better decisions in the future. Her experiences have also given her the foresight to recognise potential problems before repeating mistakes she has already encountered.
Operating multiple businesses has also taught Oghene that not every business makes money every month. Her strategy has been to build interconnected businesses across different sectors so they can support one another during periods of lower revenue. If the academy is between student batches, another business may be generating income. If the hotel is slower, media may perform better. If media is slower, the awards business or investments may provide another source of revenue.
She emphasises the importance of knowing the numbers and making decisions based on data. Although she now works with an accountant, she remembers when she was simultaneously the accountant, driver and virtually everything else in her businesses. Today, she closely reviews the financial performance of her companies and uses the numbers to guide decisions.
Managing more than 100 employees has brought another layer of complexity. Oghene has developed a performance-based culture built around measurable goals. Employees have defined responsibilities and Key Performance Indicators, with targets structured using the SMART goal approach. Progress is reviewed weekly, bi-weekly and monthly, with employees expected to identify the problems they are solving for the organisation and demonstrate the results of their work.
She has also learned to pay herself a salary rather than simply withdrawing money from the company whenever she needs it. Separating the founder from the business financially, she believes, creates greater discipline and reduces the temptation to treat company funds as personal money.
Another part of Oghene’s growing business portfolio is an awards platform that has been running for more than a decade. The idea was partly inspired by her own experience of seeking recognition and discovering that visibility could be difficult without celebrity status or established networks. Rather than waiting for recognition, she decided to create a platform that would recognise deserving people while also creating opportunities for networking, collaboration, visibility and business positioning.
Underlying much of Oghene’s journey is an intense commitment to learning. She describes learning as her “safe space” and says that when she becomes overwhelmed, she turns to courses, books, research, writing and reflection. She continues to pursue formal education and professional development, including studies in international business law and a DBA programme.
For Oghene, learning is not about collecting qualifications. It is about implementation. She believes entrepreneurs should research problems rather than depend entirely on other people for answers. Information, data and experience provide the foundation for better decisions, while reflection helps determine what worked, what failed and what needs to change.
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Looking ahead, Oghene’s ambitions extend beyond simply building more companies. She wants to impact more people, expand her network, increase her investments and acquire more properties while continuing to build a lasting legacy. Her definition of success is increasingly connected to impact, scale and the ability to create opportunities for others.
For the young entrepreneur watching her journey and wondering whether it is possible to build something meaningful in Nigeria, her message is direct: believe that you can, but understand that belief must be followed by work. No one else can take responsibility for becoming who you are meant to be. “You have to do the work,” she says.
And the work does not necessarily become easier. “It doesn’t get easier. It just gets better.”
That philosophy captures Oghene’s journey, from a young woman selling jewellery after school to an entrepreneur overseeing multiple businesses, a fashion academy with more than 12,000 alumni and a workforce of more than 100 people.
Behind the businesses are years of failures, difficult employee decisions, financial pressure, continuous education and countless moments of starting again. Oghene admits that she still feels like giving up sometimes. But, as she explained, she remembers that nobody is coming to save her. So she picks herself up and keeps moving—not simply for the sake of activity, but in the direction she believes she should go.
