Taking Praise to the Bank

The Grace of Acceptance

In life, whatever you do, whether by nature, through practice, or by good fortune, compliments do not come easily. Perhaps they do for others; however, what matters most is having the grace to accept those encomiums when you have been appreciated.

Yet sometimes familiarity makes praise seem either mundane or biased. I am occasionally embarrassed by how Brian compliments me; the thought crosses my mind that he cannot possibly be talking about me. His words can be effusive and quite adoring. I suppose a sense of modesty suggests it is too much, whilst a feeling of inadequacy implies I have not yet reached the standard for which the applause has been loudest.

An Unexpected Exposure

Then this afternoon, a work conference segued into a conversation between two. Idle banter touched on many things, and then she said, “I found your blog.” She had been searching for information when the results led her to my blog. Shock and surprise on my part brought the realisation that I had been exposed.

However much we try to compartmentalise our lives through secrecy, segmentation, or even sequestration, we can only be so successful when we leave footprints online. I got my first email address in 1994, just as I began a subscription to CompuServe. My identity number is just about to slip from memory in the present — I remember it now.

The Weight of Recognition

Not only had she learnt a great deal about me, in blogs spanning almost 23 years, but she also appreciated my writing: my use of language, and the ease of reading. She enjoyed everything she had read and pleaded with me not to stop blogging. Amid this deluge of compliments, I was close to blushing.

There is no day when I do not receive compliments, usually from strangers, and I respond with thanks. It is different when a colleague at work, who knows you in a particular setting and character, sees another side of your expression and acknowledges, commends, praises, and compliments that aspect of your art. You want to take it to the bank and cash it.

Cashing It In

In this case, I have taken it to the bank of this cache of over 4,250 blogs and cashed it in as an acknowledgement. Brian has always maintained that I can make a blog out of the simplest moments or interactions. This is one of those instances. Thank you—you know who you are.

The Evolution of my Blog from 2003.

A Google NotebookLM AI Audio Overview Discussion of this blog

Nobel Laureates and Limitations: The Perils of Unearned Omniscience

All accounts balanced

James Watson, who died at the age of 97 on November 6, 2025, was a DNA pioneer who won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1962 jointly with Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins at the age of 34.

When I received news of his death, I remembered that I might have written something about him. That was back in 2007, when, during a book launch, he veered from the science of genetics to the pseudoscience of eugenics by suggesting that intelligence could be genetically differentiated by race.

There was swift retribution for that aired opinion: a suspension followed by a resignation. The controversy became the benchmark by which Dr Watson was judged, rather than on his more significant work with DNA.

Intelligent monkey talk

I had also forgotten that in writing my first blog in October 2007, I recounted a story of someone suggesting I was a monkey and how I was blessed with the wit to respond, not out of offence, but with a willingness to engage. If I were a monkey, I would have become so intelligent that I could communicate with human beings; alternatively, my interlocutor would have acquired the ability to cavort with simians.

An apology followed, of course, but the damage had been done. Way back in innocent 2007, Dr Watson was cancelled, ostracised, and consigned to a scrapheap of ignominy. His groundbreaking work in discovering the double helix structure of DNA at the age of 25 and subsequently winning the Nobel Prize was overshadowed by controversy. His eugenics remarks created a dual legacy of brilliant scientist versus reprehensible public intellectual.

Dr Craig Venter, known for leading one of the first draft sequences of the human genome, had this to say at that time: "Skin colour as a surrogate for race is a social concept, not a scientific one. There is no basis in scientific fact or in the human genetic code for the notion that skin colour will be predictive of intelligence."

The folly of universal expertise

The Nobel Prize is a high accolade, but it does not confer polymath status on the recipient. Upon being named, laureates do not suddenly become omniscient or experts in every imaginable field outside the sphere of their expertise. They should also possess the self-awareness and presence of mind to dismiss questions that seek their opinions on issues beyond where they have been accorded due recognition.

Contrasting Dr Watson with Dr Arthur Kornberg, who won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1959, for his work on RNA & DNA, and died around the same time as the 2007 controversy, one sees that Dr Watson could have learnt how to carry oneself and manage one's opinions when conferred with the Nobel Prize. There should be a resounding memento mori in the ears of a Nobel laureate, for in the mortality of man lies the enduring power of memory.

Though he paid a heavy price for his indiscretion, the work he accomplished was worthy of celebration and commendation. May his soul rest in peace.

References

Blog - Doctor Neutralises Africans [October 2007]

Blog - Happy Retirement, Dr Watson [October 2007]

Blog - Arthur Kornberg - DNA Pioneer, dies [October 2007]

This extraordinarily amazing woman of Ejigbo community

 A life quite interesting

There is one person I do not sing enough praises of, a kind of strangeness and then familiarity that seems to escape the purview of acknowledgement of humanity, service, motherhood, tenacity and all-round extraordinary. A prophet that is somewhat without honour in their own land.

There are stories we have heard that could be hair-raising, a childhood that seem to offer opportunity but was suffused with such guardian cruelty, yet against such no malice is borne. I watched how distraught they became when that guardian passed on and the final rites were missed by an hour.

In tribulation triumphant

Dockets of tales in a matrimony that seemed to all perfect whilst it was any but, the witnesses of tension and worse that dotted occasions of détente never so sure to survive a season, the spouse pretending to fidelity rarely not there, but we do believe the best of everyone.

In offspring sometimes affected, tainted, or traumatised by that environment, there remained such support hardly appreciated or understood, a dogged focus on protecting the brood and shaping destinies in ways sometimes unintended, yet fundamentally consequential. Here is a masterful ability quite unheralded.

Exceptionally gifted to lift

A person who has charted courses less travelled to become a symbol of relevance that set them out as one to be chosen to pioneer a project of investing in young lives to build a future. The project was tough and arduous, yet adept with skills to manage and marshal, in the pit of the fire and the cold workface, hands were calloused, and faces blackened with soot, but gems were mined that have appreciated in value year on year.

And this is not a culmination, but a journey that overnight a pilgrimage was embarked on fully sponsored by the former uncut rough diamonds whose horizons were not that clear but were given the prospect of a world beyond their locality. They have in this day become persons of means and influence, extending the hand of their mentor into places of power and significance.

Dams of gratitude bursting walls

They return season after season to that anvil of life where they were forged and moulded into implements of change and the chief blacksmith invited time and again to inspect the workmanship of exquisite and priceless provenance wrought in that forge. The power of gratitude flows like brooks into streams, into rivers, into seas and waters that lap lands all over the world.

It is in this that our person is celebrated; Mrs A. J. Akintayo, daughter, lady, woman, teacher, wife, mother, administrator, principal, businesswoman, prophetess, leader, fighter, voice, pilgrim and this list is hardly exhaustive. I salute you, enjoy your trip of a lifetime and there are more to come. You shine and we are exceedingly proud of you.

With the Class of '85 of the then Ejigbo Community High School on the 27th of July 2021
You can laugh this well if you have made lives so good. My mother is in the middle.

The presentation made by the Class of '85
to my mother as the pioneer principal of the then
Ejigbo Community High School that was founded in 1977. 

It's never too late to commend an old colleague

Farm your social media wisely

Social Media is an intricate relationship and networking environment that needs nurturing much as it needs to be weeded and pruned like a vine so that it can bear much fruit for good wine.

Well over a decade ago, I attended an interview for the role of a technical specialist, it was going well and during that interview, I was promoted to the role of a technical architect. On the first day of work, it appeared everyone else who had been engaged thought I was one of the juniors in the team. It was no time to be a diva, these were people I needed to get the job done.

So, I mucked in with everyone, did and the simple and difficult whilst taking the time to teach, explain, mentor, educate as required. I was also on a postgraduate programme at the time.

Invisible acts for visible benefits

One particular young man, somewhat introverted and quiet stood out for the talent of being able to produce efficient, time and cost-saving tools that helped us a great deal. In my view, it was one of the most valuable members of the team, even if for whatever reason others did not recognise how his utilities considerably raised the productivity of the team.

After I left that the role, I never encountered someone who had significantly changed the team dynamic that way he did, and I did not seem to be presented with an opportunity to commend him and recommend him.

Never too late for a commendation

However, this evening, as I was reviewing my profile, I saw that he had visited and I could not have had a better chance to pen a few sentences down about our working relationship, because there had to be a record. That is what I did which initiated a conversation and a sanguine trip down memory lane.

If the opportunity presents itself, I will willingly work with him again, much as there are others I would love to be on my team. I have worked in many places in the last 20 years, encountered hundreds of people with various levels of expertise and camaraderie, but the few that stand out, do because they were good people first and good at what they do, and in doing what they were good at, helped everyone else get things done better, faster, and beautifully.

Of those people, we must when given the opportunity, speak up for them, support them, commend them, provide glowing references, and promote them. We can see the best of humanity in the work environment and celebrate it too.

Our mother, the example of community involvement

Our mother, the partisan

My sister, Ibukun Olawepo-Johnson, wrote on Facebook about our mum and her activism, even I learnt a few things too that I had to ask if I could share what she had written, below.

Yesterday I was talking to my cousin about the presidential visit (to Lagos), I told him I can bet my last kobo that my mum was at the stadium in Surulere.

It dropped in my mind that we have a lot of lazy youth in this country, my mum retired from the civil service after 35 years of service. I think she was even kept on for one extra year because of the beautiful work she did when she was in service.

Our mother, the principal

All throughout the time I knew her, she was a principal and she was a principal in all the trouble areas in Ejigbo, Okota and Oshodi where she had running battles with thugs and difficult students, (I would add, teachers and some presumably family friends who thought she did not deserve her position), she fought them to a standstill and won the battle. She was last promoted to special principal grade.

[Some backstory information, my mother was asked to start a school from scratch at the age of 34 in 1977, she created and ran Ejigbo Community High School for probably 13 years. Just over a year ago, I think in the 40th year of the establishment of the school, the alumni of the school honoured her with a commemoration and thanks for her leadership, mentorship and contributions to the community.]

Our mother, the activist

After she left service she was still very active, later when she moved to her house in Ejigbo, she joined the Community Development Association (CDA) group on her street and became the Chairman of her CDA, somewhere along the line she joined politics and she is a strong member of APC in her area.

My mum had the option of retiring and watching things unfold in her community, but she chose to be involved. Even when my younger sister was ill, and she was her primary caregiver, she still found the time to be involved in what was going on in her community.

When glaucoma almost made her blind, she was still attending CDA and APC meetings and activities at over 75 years old. [We were able to get some of the best medical help to save her eyesight. She is even more up and about with community, political and church activities.]

Our mother, the example

It's a shame on all of us that are under 70, we have the power to be involved in our communities, yet all we do is make noise on social media, criticising the government in our various offices and the country without getting involved to bring about the changes we want.

No one will hand power over to us, we need to be involved get involved in politics.

It is time we clean it up if we feel it is a dirty game.

We need to stop all this ranting and noise making, we need to make the next necessary move to bring on change and take our communities to the next level.

The elders will only hand over to the youth if only the youth are actively involved.

Campaign for your own candidate, don't say my vote does not count; go out to vote and ensure that votes are counted before leaving the polling booth. Demand good governance in your locality and attend CDA meetings.

Change begins with you and me.

Start from your house, move into your street, on to your local government area, then your office, all the way until you get to the very top.

Postscript

This characteristic of community involvement is not unique to our mum, our dad is also quite involved in the community also. From as far back as I can remember when we returned from the UK, the renovation of our homestead, the bringing of electricity supply to our village, the building of the new village cathedral, a new secondary school and many other activities to help people in their careers, businesses and general needs.

They are examples of a standard well beyond whatever we have ever attempted, yet they show a way to what can be achieved when we have the commitment, drive and a vision to make a difference in people, situations and communities.

In this, we begin to commend that exemplary lives of our parents.

Opinion: Asking for the opportunity to prove ourselves

This is good acting

I watch very little television if I watch any at all, the things that fascinate me are murder mysteries, educational documentaries, detective series, trains and travel.

However, from the moment I saw the trailer for How to Get Away with Murder starring Viola Davis, I was hooked, by both the title and the drama. When I eventually got into the series, I was quite enamoured by the strength of the character of Professor Annalise Keating as portrayed by Viola Davis, I recorded the whole series.

In the weekend, Viola Davis, unbeknownst to me became the first African-American lady to win the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Actress in a Drama Series and her acceptance speech so seriously deviated from the norm by paying a glowing tribute those who had opened the way before her in the quest for the recognition and adoration of their peers in entertainment.

A speech well made

This is the full text of her acceptance speech as transcribed by the New York Times, but one cannot help but excerpt a cogent part of the speech. “The only thing that separates women of colour from anyone else is opportunity.”

Whilst, I will not be too forward in suggesting I have suffered the loss of opportunity, I can fully understand the sentiment that informed her speech where for whatever indecipherable reasons I have missed out on opportunities not offered to me when for all intents and purposes I am well qualified for the job I interviewed for.

Then again, I cannot put it down to overt racism, yet when having been interviewed and well considered an executive at the BBC in 1991 decides he’ll rather not give me the job because I was not extending myself enough or in his words, I was short-selling myself, you wonder.

Open for opportunity

More recently, it was an interview with a major bank where apparently I did not pass the muster for Miss Congeniality for the job. These experiences begin to introduce doubt and literally beat you down that you have to find strength from within to rise beyond that situation.

Blog - Thought Picnic: As Runner-Up Miss Congeniality, I Didn't Quite Make It

Yet, I could paraphrase Viola Davis and say that for many, “The only thing that separates minorities in any society from everyone else is opportunity.” Being given the opportunity to prove that they are both able and capable because some assumption, presumption or dare I say, prejudice has led to people at the gate not letting others into their fold for all sorts of reasons.

She goes on to say that, “You cannot win an Emmy for roles that are simply not there.” By extension, you cannot win accolades, praise, recognition or promotion for opportunities not granted to those who generally by default are not amongst the first to be considered for such placements.

Entitlement debasing opportunity

Then again, I see other areas where people who generally get given these opportunities abuse and squander them foisting their sense of entitlement into the situation.

In the light of this, I find myself antithetical to the smart and apparently beautiful Charlotte Proudman and I note the significance of her surname when on being complimented for her looks in connecting with an eminent male lawyer on the LinkedIn professional network took umbrage at age-old chivalry to deem it sexist. [The Student]

There is an element of political correctness in this reading that bothers somewhat old-fashioned people like myself who will have the tendency to compliment, offer a seat to ladies, take off my hat when speaking to a lady or step forward to open a door for a lady – that is the cultured and expected decorum expected of gentlemen and it in no way belittles the professional attributes of the lady.

Try some emotional intelligence too

In a way, I felt quite sorry for Alexander Carter-Silk who being a generation ahead of the lady was slightly conscious of the possibility that a compliment might be taken wrongly and yet chose to make it in good faith. The Internet shaming of the man shows how discretion is no more a matter of valour for another generation. [LegalCheek]

For all the commentary for and against that episode, I will very well understand and quite sadly appreciate that Miss Proudman with all her academic intelligence and feistiness might have blown certain opportunities that would naturally be open to her in the pride that always presages the self-fulfilling prophecy of a fall. The requisite amount of emotional intelligence always helps in communicating umbrage or agreement.

Then again, Miss Proudman because of her extrovert self-esteem and intelligence displayed a sense of entitlement and effrontery that can be both emasculating and aggressively off-putting, she will go far.

Yet, I commend all those who grasp any opportunity they are given to become and excel and for that also I commend Viola Davis.

40 Best Blogs for African Studies Students

An unexpected commendation

Out of the blue on the 7^th anniversary of my launching this blog I receive an email citing my blog again as one of the 40 Best Blogs for African Studies Students [1].

I am almost embarrassed by the commendation offered which in their words reads “Akin: Highly eloquent, insightful and provocative, Akin is essential reading for any undergraduates or graduates with a particular affinity for Nigeria — though topics from other nations (and the continent as a whole) do frequently crop up as well.”

Coming from the AccreditedOnlineColleges website I can only suppose that as academia is moving online more of their reference material will be sourced from opinions of people who have ideas to share about different issues.

I remember almost 2 years ago my blog was cited by BachelorsDegreeOnline.com as one 100 Best Blogs for Learning About Africa their commendation drew a different perspective of my writings and it has evolved over time.

I am most grateful for this acknowledgement. In closing, I must not fail to mention that NigerianTalks.Org and NaijaBlog were cited too.

Sources

[1] 40 Best Blogs for African Studies Students | Accredited Online Colleges.com

[2] 100 Best Blogs for Learning About Africa | Bachelors Degree Online

100 Best Blogs for Learning About Africa [akin.blog-city.com]

The importance of nurses, bedpans to my career

Exuding the arrogance of expertise

Many a time, I have been caught up in what I might now with humility call the arrogance of expertise, where your confidence and assertiveness find voice in sound bites to make the listener very understanding of your position.

I have never really been able to persuade any manager of mine to send me on an assertiveness course, maybe I have been just a tad dishonest, when I look at it, and I am usually able to get my views across with much clarity without having to repeat myself.

When it comes to my profession, I offer solutions and experiences in the enterprise that sometimes requires radical change, but I always strive to ensure that change is not disruptive as I also try to persuade the reluctant of the need to step out into a proven adventure guided by a man with skill rather than with a cowboy who attaches horse-shoes to his heels.

Must work at commissioning

Despite the constraints of projects, budgets and time, my goal is to implement something that works at commissioning rather than deliver something on time and then spend months trying to get things to work, this is what gives IT a bad name and reinforces the blurred vision of outsourcing.

One area where I am not like your usual big-lettered architect, specialist or a good majority in Information Technology departments is I like to see the user’s perspective of my solutions, I do not mind sitting amongst users for days just t discover where they might have issues and then I return to the design with ideas for improvement that I forcefully put through the system.

This is what I call the User Experience Perspective, when I get involved in a project, my solutions affect the users the most, then the operators and administrators need tools for management and support that do not complicate their laden, busy and cumbersome chores and workflows and finally the enterprise that expects to benefit greatly from the ideas proffered and implemented.

Worth doing well

I have no qualms with the old saying which goes, “What is worth doing at all, is worth doing well”, when I am involved in a project, people can get sickened with the emphasis on “doing well”, that Utopia is usually not achievable but there would be enough fights to bring it as close as possible to a project done well.

With all this in mind, it is no wonder that I generally prefer to report to some infrastructure manager at Vice-President level and would rather not an operations manager because operations is about keeping things running, no matter the tools and problems, one can understand why change is immediately viewed as disruptive with the foreboding of catastrophe.

I cannot stress enough how I have the greatest consideration for operations and in finding ways to simplify, improve and/or eliminate manual procedures that are prone to error.

Can I put this in a CV?

How you bunch all this up into a marketing profile or curriculum vitae, I do not know, but once I am in the organisation, I am usually able to prove my mettle and value, it stands to reason that in the last 10 or so years, my jobs as a freelance consultant have come from the network of colleagues and recruiters I have once before worked with.

Recently, after writing a commendation to a manager I last worked for some 10 years ago, I received an email stating if our paths ever crossed again, he would not hesitate to employ me again. Thanks.

However, back to the inspiration for this blog that seems to have digressed but is still on topic is the importance of operations in an enterprise and nursing in a hospital.

Nurses and bedpans are critical to treatment

That arrogance of expertise is expressed in these words, “I am doctor, I don’t do bedpans”.

Implying, whatever it means but whilst I was glad to see the doctors every once in a while when they did their rounds, it was the nurses that the carers with the extraordinary commitment to their jobs, their care, compassion and unflinching ability to do beyond bed pans and much more that has humbled me.

One morning when I could get out of bed on my own to have a shower, as my feet got under me, the rush of lively blood to my feet was accompanied with pain that could only have been like my feet being set on fire over an over-acting barbeque, I was in tears and in serious agony.

They are up to task

So, as I sat under the shower, I told the nurse, I did not care and like she was prompted she got the sponge and soap, scrubbed me all over and showered me completely. Even the crown jewels were handled with such sensitivity.

You can be so vulnerable in hospital and then have these nurses, some still students who get in, get on and are part of the essential lifeline of the treatment process. Where one does not have guests, you can imagine how we all light up when a kindly nurse returns after each break according to their rota.

Even where I thought a few nurses were a bit tough, you soon experienced the milk of human kindness and compassion beyond words.

Commending the nurses at OLVG

I took the trouble to learn all their names and address them by name, keeping friendly and accepting with deep gratitude their help, conversation and service. I do not believe that matter of bedpans would cross my lips again as a tribute to these nurses.

Without naming their names, I still must make a direct reference to these people with the angelic disposition of goodness and kindness.

I was at the Onze Lieve Vrouwe Gasthuis (OLVG) [1] for 18 days and this is for the nurses, porters and service personnel at section B.06. Thank you, one and all, I am full of gratitude, appreciation and deep acknowledgement of your service and care.

May all you lay your hands upon to do prosper and may your be rewarded beyond measure for the acts of kindness that continually flow out of your bowels of mercy and consideration. May great an abundant blessings flood your lives. In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Sources

[1] About the OLVG – Onze Lieve Vrouwe Gasthuis