A certified international entrepreneurship training programme has been launched in Nigeria today, expanding the country’s pipeline of qualified professionals capable of providing structured business development support to small and medium-sized enterprises.
Simply Exponential Consult Limited, working as an ILO-certified Master Trainer organisation, is rolling out the International Labour Organisation’s Start and Improve Your Business Train-the-Trainer programme across Lagos and Abuja, creating a new category of certified SME support professionals whose work will extend the programme’s impact well beyond any single cohort of entrepreneurs.
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What the programme does
The SIYB Train-the-Trainer initiative is designed for professionals who work with entrepreneurs and small businesses in advisory, training, development finance, or business support roles, rather than targeting entrepreneurs directly. Participants complete a two-week hybrid certification process that equips them with the curriculum, facilitation tools, and methodological framework to deliver ILO-certified business training independently to the SMEs they serve.
By training trainers rather than only training entrepreneurs directly, the model creates a multiplier effect: each certified trainer can go on to deliver the SIYB curriculum to hundreds of business owners across their networks, sectors, and geographies over the course of their career. For a country with 40 million MSMEs and a documented capacity-building deficit at every tier of the small business support ecosystem, that multiplier effect is precisely what scale requires.
Founder and Managing Partner Morounfayo Williams described the programme as a two-week hybrid certification initiative designed to build the capacity of professionals who support entrepreneurs and small businesses across Nigeria, emphasising that the initiative addresses the quality of support that SMEs receive rather than simply increasing the quantity of training events available.
Nigeria does not lack enthusiasm for SME training. It lacks the methodology, the quality standards, and the qualified professionals to ensure that the training entrepreneurs receive actually changes how they run their businesses. ILO certification is one of the most credible international frameworks available for addressing that gap.
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Why this matters for Nigeria’s SME ecosystem
The capacity-building deficit in Nigeria’s SME support landscape has been consistently identified as one of the structural barriers preventing small businesses from becoming bankable, scalable, and financially resilient. The SMEDAN ACE Project, the iDICE Growth Lab, the 234Finance SME Bootcamp, and multiple bank-led training programmes are all addressing parts of this gap, but the supply of qualified trainers and advisers capable of delivering internationally benchmarked support remains significantly below what the sector requires.
The ILO SIYB curriculum, which has been deployed in over 100 countries and reached millions of entrepreneurs globally, provides a proven framework for covering business planning, financial management, marketing, and operational improvement in a structured, replicable way. Certifying Nigerian professionals to deliver that curriculum independently builds local institutional capacity that persists well beyond any single donor-funded programme cycle.
Building the ecosystem of skilled SME supporters is as important as building the businesses they serve. A country with thousands of certified, ILO-trained business advisers serving its SME population is structurally better positioned than one that delivers the same training through occasional workshops that participants forget within weeks.
