Professor Olayinka (Yinka) David-West, appointed as the new Dean of Lagos Business School (LBS) effective January 2025, is steering the school towards a strong emphasis on digital transformation and inclusive finance as fundamental pillars of its future direction. With over three decades of experience in IT and financial services, she brings extensive expertise in information systems, digital policy, and strategic management interventions to foster digitally transformed businesses and societies.

Professor David-West has served as Associate Dean and is currently a Professor of Information Systems, boasting over thirty years of experience in IT and financial services. She is a fervent advocate for digital transformation and inclusive finance. Her research and practical engagements include policy and strategic management interventions for digitally transformed businesses and societies.

Olayinka is a member of the African Women in Finance and Payments. She is a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA), certified in the Governance of Enterprise IT (CGEIT), and an academic advocate for the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA). She is also a qualified Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA) practitioner. Additionally, Olayinka serves as an independent non-executive director at Stanbic IBTC Asset Management and Sterling Bank Ltd. Moreover, she is a member of the Mastercard Policy Centre Advisory Board.

Lagos Business School is ranked #40 worldwide in Executive Education (Financial Times, London, 2024) and has been featured in the Financial Times Executive Education Rankings for 17 consecutive years.

Professor Yinka David-West’s new direction for the Lagos Business School focuses on leveraging digital innovation and inclusive finance to prepare future business leaders for a rapidly evolving global economy. Her leadership is expected to enhance LBS’s impact in Africa and beyond through strategic research, policy engagement, academic excellence, and championing diversity.

This vision aligns LBS with contemporary global trends in business education, emphasising technology, sustainability, and inclusivity as foundations for growth and leadership in the 21st century.

New Direction Under Professor David-West

Central to David-West’s vision is the expansion of LBS’s operations and activities beyond their current scope. The goal is to “put LBS as the premier business school operating out of an emerging market”, maintain LBS’s vision and “inspire leaders who transform Nigeria and Africa”.

In her 2025 message, David-West declared a renewed commitment to building a Citadel of Excellence. “In today’s rapidly evolving world, the role of business schools has never been more critical. At Lagos Business School, we are determined to elevate our legacy and build a Citadel of Excellence—a place where leadership is forged, academic rigour meets innovation, and the future of Africa is shaped.”

These will occur under five strategic pillars: 1. Delivering a Remarkable Participant Learning Experience; 2. Conducting Significant Impact Research; 3. Enhancing our Engagement; 4. Driving High Performance through People, Processes, Systems, Culture, and Values; 5. Increasing our Internationalisation.

Technology is key. She told BusinessDay: “With limited capacity and resources, we extend our reach using technology to expand to new market segments. We are working on a project that supports Africa’s youth in building relevant competencies to excel in the new world of work. Young people with limited skills and experience but eager to learn and develop. A digitally savvy community to deliver content to the audience. We collaborate with our partners to co-create products and services that provide opportunities and experiences to learners across the continent. Our programmes are delivered with partners within and outside Africa to promote interrelated, practice-oriented, experiential learning.”

These programmes include the

Prof David-West added, “Partnerships are central to the LBS mission, and we would not be where we are today without the relationships and alliances with individuals and institutions that share in our vision of developing responsible leaders to inspire Africa’s growth. Our partners support our work through various means, including funding, knowledge exchange, exchange programmes, sponsorships, and more. Our recent collaboration with the Gates Foundation on the National Cassava Investment Accelerator is just one example of our commitment to making a tangible, lasting impact on the continent.”

The Nigeria Cassava Investment Accelerator (NCIA), approved by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is an initiative to transform Nigeria’s cassava industry. The initiative started in late 2024 to catalyse investment funding into cassava industrialisation and create an economy based on cassava. Cassava has multiple uses beyond food: starch, ethanol, cassava flour, and sorbitol. This initiative aims to build a sustainable and diversified economy for Nigeria.”

David-West, an acclaimed researcher, affirms, “Research is the pathway to industrialisation.”

There is another accelerator, this time focused on a core area of the business school’s emphasis: entrepreneurship. David-West states: “The LBS Business Innovation Accelerator, which was created in 2022 in collaboration with the Bank of Industry, offers entrepreneurial training to startups and SMEs across Nigeria. It is an end-to-end programme, going beyond the classroom to provide apprenticeship-style mentorship, access to market, and access to funding modules. We have found this to be most effective in ensuring that SMEs gain the necessary skills for growth and sustainability by the end of the programme. The impact is clear in under three years: a cumulative increase in annual turnover to N7.6B, 29 grants won, over 120 entrepreneurs mentored, and 65 trainers trained.

BIA aims to cultivate innovative and problem-solving entrepreneurs whose successful businesses will revitalise the national economy through job creation and the global commercialisation of their products and solutions. This initiative is designed to enhance job creation, significantly improve the success of SMES, and reduce loan default rates resulting from business failure. The Centre will also provide an ecosystem to support and develop the technical, managerial, financial, and leadership skills of entrepreneurs across Nigeria.

One of her five pillars, “Enhancing our engagement,” significantly relates to contacting LBS’s 8,000-plus alumni body. The Dean states, “We maintain strong and dynamic relationships with our alumni through various platforms: sector-specific forums and affinity groups, continuous learning and networking programmes, mentoring initiatives, and impact-driven community projects. These engagements are not one-way; we deliberately create spaces for our alumni to share insights, influence curriculum development, and co-create solutions with us.

In addition, we are deepening our global engagement and community impact through our regional chapters in Nigeria, along with international alumni chapters in the US, UK, and Canada—under the leadership of our Global Alumni President, Dr. Owen Omogiafo, Group CEO of Transcorp Group. These chapters promote the LBS brand worldwide, fostering professional networks and cross-border collaborations. Our sectoral alum groups also facilitate tailored engagement, addressing specific industries’ unique needs and opportunities.

LBS has two centres and several initiatives that engage in research, conferences, and programmes relevant to the industry. These initiatives are focused on specific thematic and nuanced areas to unearth knowledge and evidence that can be applied to solve problems. Such areas include retail, hospitality, family business, healthcare management, public sector, agribusiness, etc.

Our Master’s in Management programme is the latest addition to our degree offerings and is conducted in collaboration with the School of Management and Social Sciences. It targets recent graduates with limited work experience and commenced with a class size of just 12 students.

In our interview, Yinka David-West skilfully addressed a recurring question that Nigerians often ask: “When is LBS coming to Abuja or Port Harcourt?”

She stated, “As an institution, we are very conscious of our responsibility to society and the environment and demonstrate this efficiently. We are proudly Nigerian, domiciled in Lagos. We go everywhere our market is. We work outside of campus. Our online and hybrid programmes allow us to reach people across geography. Our facilities have been upgraded to enable blended learning. Lagos is the commercial city. We support businesses everywhere.”

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