You have to follow the money

TUNDE OYEDOYIN

Tunde Oyedoyin is a London-based personal finance coach and founder of Money Intelligence Coaching Academy, a specialist academy of personal finance. He can be reached as follows: +447846089587 (WhatsApponly); E-mail: tu5oyed@gmail.com

Seems a famous Londoner is loving it on the pages of this newspaper. Guess who? It’s no other than the illustrious supermodel, Naomi Campbell, who as it turns out, had been referenced in last week’s column. She’s also made the cut in this piece. The 54-year old definitely knows how to follow the money.

Yours truly was at the Whitechapel Mission – a homeless charity – to have breakfast on the last Wednesday of February, when, while watching the ‘Lorraine’ segment on ‘This Morning’ on ITV, she was featured walking the runway at the Milan Fashion Week. As disclosed last week, Ms Campbell wouldn’t have dragged herself out of bed to head for the Italian city if the sums didn’t make sense to her.

She’s surely following the money, just as the boxing elites and others have been following the money to Riyadh.

Well, not everyone is going to have the privilege of jetting from one part of the globe to the other to chase some bucks, though. In fact, you don’t actually have to be a model or an Anthony Joshua to do that. Part of what is required to follow the money is simply for you to be willing to throw your hat in, wherever work opportunity is available. That’s what Campbell, Joshua and even Ruth Kadiri do. They go where they’re offered work. Be it to go and endorse a product or shoot another Nollywood movie like Kadiri.

Except you have a loaded bank account, you must not only develop the mindset of presenting yourself where there’s work, but also not see any work beneath you. If you take this approach to following the money, chances are that you will always have something to look forward to on payday.

Another strand of following the money is to regularly check what’s leaving your account. Go through your bank statements. Perhaps, it may be at least once a month. Follow the money there and see what and what you’ve been spending on.

By the way, the idea for this piece came while recently chatting with two senior elderly Caribbean women at a McDonald’s restaurant. One of them said to me: “You have to follow the money” when told the location of my employer’s premises requires jumping on two train journeys within the capital.

Cash to the rescue

I’d arranged to meet someone for breakfast at the Stratford Broadway McDonald’s over a fortnight ago, when, on getting there, yours truly realised his bank card was at home. I don’t use Apple Pay as I don’t fancy all of me on the phone. So, my options were limited.

Boy oh boy! With just five minutes to the meeting time, dashing back home to yank the card off where it was hiding wasn’t possible and neither could I suggest that the person I was meeting pays for the breakfast.

Thank God there was a fiver in the phone case. That aside, my guest had an urgent bill to pay and so, wanted help with that rather than breakfast. Took care of his bill by wiring the needful to his account. With the cash in the case, I went to the counter to grab something for a grub.

business a.m. commits to publishing a diversity of views, opinions and comments. It, therefore, welcomes your reaction to this and any of our articles via email: comment@businessamlive.com