Follow Us on Google
United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc has graduated and inducted 374 young professionals into its workforce as part of efforts to strengthen its leadership pipeline across Africa.
The new employees are graduates of Cohort 21 of the bank’s Graduate Management Accelerator Programme (GMAP), its flagship talent development initiative.
The ceremony, held in Lagos, brought together graduates from Nigeria and seven other African countries where UBA operates.
The cohort comprised 223 women and 151 men, with 345 graduates from UBA Nigeria and 29 from its subsidiaries in Guinea, Tanzania, Kenya, Mozambique, Uganda, Zambia and Côte d’Ivoire.
The GMAP programme is designed to equip young professionals with banking skills, mentorship, training and practical experience. UBA said the initiative has now produced more than 5,000 young professionals.
Speaking at the ceremony, UBA Group Chairman, Tony Elumelu, urged the graduates to make customer service a key priority as technology continues to make banking products increasingly similar.
“Products can be commoditised, but service never can, because there is always a differentiator in how you serve and how you create,” Elumelu said.
He added: “As everyone leverages technology, the differentiator becomes how that technology is used to make our customers happy.”
Elumelu expressed confidence in the ability of the new generation of professionals to take the bank forward.
Other News
“As future leaders of UBA, people like you give me confidence that if we hand over to your generation, UBA will be safe,” he said.
He also urged them to maintain their passion while pursuing hard work, discipline and excellence throughout their careers.
UBA’s Group Managing Director/CEO, Oliver Alawuba, described the graduates’ certificates as a commissioning rather than an end to their learning journey.
“You came from different countries, with different experiences and disciplines, but today you have graduated as one UBA family, united by one ambition, to build Africa’s future,” Alawuba said.
He urged the new employees to approach every assignment with commitment, regardless of their preferred posting.
“Your first posting may not be your preferred destination, but make it your platform and give it your best. No assignment is too small to reveal a great attitude, and no role is too modest for excellence,” he said.
Alawuba also charged the graduates to keep learning, protect their integrity and turn their potential into measurable performance, in line with the bank’s values of excellence, enterprise and execution.
The latest cohort further expands UBA’s pool of young professionals as the bank continues to invest in talent development across its African operations.
