Introducing Solomon Adegbie-Quaynor (aka Slack Barry) ….

What were you up to soon after leaving 6^th form in 1982?

After Achimota, I left Ghana to study in the US – BS in Applied Physics from the Atlanta University Center, Masters in Electrical Engineering from Georgia Tech, and an MBA from Northwestern University.  In between Georgia Tech and Northwestern, I was a professor in Math and Engineering at my alma mater, Atlanta University Center. The best four years of my young professional life!

After B-school, made a U-turn from Math/Engineering and went into investment banking in NYC with Merrill Lynch for three years and then Bear Stearns for two years, focusing on M&A, IPOs and leveraged transactions.  However, this U-turn was not by accident as while I was doing my Masters in Engineering, I kept taking Finance courses as I admired Michael Milken and Reginald Lewis, two well-known investment bankers worldwide.

After your initial working years in the US, what made you decide to re-locate to Africa?

During my tenure as a Vice President at Bear Stearns, I quickly realized that the successful investment bankers were those who had the right and strong client relationships and not those with product expertise, that is,  they lived in the same neighborhood growing up or as adults, went to the same universities and were friends, were in the same country clubs with the CEOs and CFOs of our target client companies, or at worst had one degree of separation with a mutual friend who could create these links for them!

Clearly, I did not have these factors in America, so I decided that after 17 years it was best for me to move to Africa where I may already have or could build these relationships quickly. I explored opportunities with Goldman Sachs, Morgan Grenfell, my former employer, Merrill Lynch, but quickly realized that they just wanted to parachute in and out of Africa (primarily South Africa) to pitch for deals in the resource sectors.  No real commitment!

So while I was looking for corporations/institutions where I could harness my finance skills in Africa on a sustained basis, I came across this new animal called development finance institutions in the form of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), private sector arm of the World Bank Group.  My recollection from childhood was that these were the Bretton Woods institutions that imposed conditionalities on African countries!  Needless to say, I joined IFC and worked across the globe but made it clear that I joined to work on Africa.  I have since lived and worked out of Ghana, South Africa and Nigeria, invested and financed companies in various sectors from financial services – banks, insurance, microfinance, PE funds; TMT – telecoms, media, technology; agribusiness; heavy industries such as cement and fertilizer; power; transport – ports, airports, railways, airlines; VC including fintech; commercial property – shopping malls, hotels, warehouses; affordable housing; water.

Can you tell us a bit more about the next phase of your career?

After 20 years at IFC, I decided to leave to pursue select leadership opportunities in businesses I enjoy as my last structured professional hoorah before my type of “retirement”.  Until the right leadership opportunity comes along, I am doing the following: serving as a senior advisor to Rothschild investment banking across sub-Saharan Africa (excluding SA): senior advisor to two major west African PE funds undergoing restructurings; Senior Advisor to IFU, the Danish development finance institution; serve on the investment committee of a $350M PE fund; on select boards of key companies/institutions creating risk asset classes for African pension funds, especially in infrastructure; and Chairman of a women-founded African foods company. Best way to describe my career so far is that I have been an investment banker harnessing the development finance platform to deliver positive impact in people’s lives in my beloved continent Africa, while making good investments that deliver attractive financial returns!

What profession have you enjoyed the most in your varied career?

While I absolutely enjoy investment banking and development finance, being a college professor was my most enjoyable professional experience.  I woke up excited to go to work and did not want to come home at the end of the day.  That is because I like to teach, coach and mentor young people to be the best they can be.  It is not a sprint but a marathon, and people develop and learn at different paces.  I look forward to teaching seminars at various universities when I am in my final phase of active “retirement”.  Otherwise, it will be my grandchildren that I will be teaching! ?

What about Family life?

I am married to Linda (nee Thompson) who went to Mfantsiman. We have been married for 25 years and have three wonderful children.  Linda is a Partner at Deloitte Consulting in Nigeria heading the Clients & Industry and Financial Services practice in West Africa.  Our eldest daughter Kwenorkie will be 21 years old this year and attends Brown University and the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, RI.  Our next child is our son Nii Addo who will be 19 years old this year and is in a foundation program at Leeds University in the UK.  Our baby daughter Kwenorkuor will be 15 years old this year and she is with us in Nigeria in secondary school at CIS in Lagos.

What do you do for relaxation?

I am a workaholic but mix in sports for relaxation and health maintenance – tennis with a trainer sometimes, cycling 20-30km every other day when not traveling, volleyball (can’t jump like I used to), basketball with my son who is 6’7” but my daughters join sometimes, swimming, and exercise walking. Given my traditional vocation of fishing as a Ga man, I just love the sea!  Getting out for a boat ride, sitting on the beach, swimming occasionally, walking along the sand, and playing beach volleyball, are absolutely relaxing. Spending time with my kids discussing their topics of interest and playing and engaging them is also relaxing.

Of all the countries you’ve visited in Africa, which would you describe as the most beautiful and why?

In Africa, and as it regards pure beauty as a country, it is South Africa!  From game reserves, to spa resorts nestled in nature, to the beautiful mountain peaks of Cape Town, then the beautiful seaside villages such as my favorite Simonstown, sumptuous variety of lighter foods in the best restaurants, to the vineyards and wineries in the western Cape, and to the absolutely best architecture and building designs of homes in the world, South Africa reigns supreme.  However, if you were to ask me which city has the best potential for what my dreams are, it is Freetown (Sierra Leone). I call it the Monaco-wannabe of Africa.  The high mountainous peaks immediately overlooking the ocean is where I would like to build a holiday home in this war-torn country that is on the mend!

Retirement loom around the corner for most of our year group, and after being well travelled, which country can you foresee spending your retirement years and why?

Home is home! Home is where you find family and old friends. So after all the travels, it will be to come home to Ghana. Have a home in Accra as the center, spend some time at my father’s farmhouse near Aburi, and spend most of my time in a small beach house I dream of building in either Ningo or Lekpongnon which are off the Accra-Aflao road. Going to the canoes as they bring their haul of fish on land, and eating organic vegetables grown nearby, engaging with the villagers and supporting community development. 

If you asked if there was another country apart from home where I would like to spend 3-4 months of the year on the beach in a small beach house, it would be Barbados.  Linda selected Barbados as her holiday spot for her 40^th birthday and we absolutely had fun there together.  Not the ritzy part of Barbados but rather the rustic part with the native people of Barbados.

And finally, what do you wish you had taken more seriously in Achimota?

Learning languages especially French!  As a pan-Africanist, my limitation is I do not speak French – would be good to speak Portuguese and Arabic but if I cannot manage French then no hope.  I wish Achimota had pushed us and that I had also had the foresight to take it seriously.  Ghana is bordered by three French-speaking countries.  How are we going to achieve regional integration and its benefits when we do not speak these major languages of communication?

Solomon Adegbie-Quaynor

1E, 2E, 3C, 4A, 5A, L6E, U6E

Lugard House