– Because spreadsheets don’t shake hands; people do.
August 24, (THEWILL) — On paper, it looked perfect. The numbers checked out. The forecasts were optimistic. Everyone smiled in the boardroom of the high-rise tower tucked away in Victoria Island, Lagos. And yet, somehow, the deal quietly unraveled. No drama, no headlines, just a slow fade into “maybe later” or “not the right fit.”
This happens more often than we admit across Africa’s business landscape. Because despite all our metrics and models, deals don’t collapse because of numbers. They fail because the human part didn’t hold.
Trust was thin, communication was patchy, assumptions were made but never said out loud. And beneath all the polish, there was an unspoken misalignment of values, pace, and how each party defined success.
The African Context: Where Relationships Rule
Across our continent, business is not just transactional, it is relational. From the Ubuntu philosophy of Southern Africa, to the communal values of West Africa, we are a people who understand that connection, respect, and mutual understanding form the bedrock of sustainable partnerships. Yet in our rush to embrace global business practices and impress international partners, we sometimes forget what makes African business truly work: the human connection.
Walk through any major business district, from Sandton in Johannesburg, to Airport Residential in Accra or Nairobi’s Westlands and you will notice something. The deals that stick are rarely concluded in formal boardrooms alone. They are sealed over shared meals, during conversations that stretch long into the evening, in the car park after church on a Sunday afternoon or at a CEO’s relative’s celebration at the weekend, where real talk finally happens.
This is not primitive business practice, it is sophisticated relationship building. Because across Africa, we inherently understand something that many international business schools are just beginning to teach: sustainable business is built on sustainable relationships.
When Culture Meets Commerce
Consider the story of Ivy, a Climate Tech entrepreneur from Kenya who spent months courting an international investor. The numbers were compelling, her startup, using drone technology to monitor waste, had shown 90% growth, her team was solid, and market research thorough. The investors flew in from The Netherlands and attended presentation after presentation. Everything looked perfect on paper. But something wasn’t clicking.
The investor kept pushing for aggressive timelines that felt unrealistic to Ivy and her team. He spoke about “disrupting waste monitoring” without understanding that in Kenya, trust in local communities is hard-earned and easily lost. Most importantly, he never took the time to understand the cultural nuances of their target market – rural communities like Mukuru, where relationships and reputation matter more than slick apps.
The deal collapsed not because the business model was flawed, but because the investor never invested in understanding the people behind the numbers. He saw spreadsheets where he should have seen stories. He saw market segments where he should have seen communities with deep-rooted values and behaviors.
The Unspoken Rules of African Business
Across Africa, we operate on multiple levels simultaneously. There’s the formal business conversation: professional, structured, and documented. But there’s also the relationship layer, where trust is built through small gestures, consistent communication, and mutual respect.
When Chief Aneke, a successful manufacturing executive in Aba, partners with new distributors, he doesn’t just look at their financials. He wants to know: Do they treat their staff well? How do they resolve conflicts? Are they respected in their communities? Because he knows that a distributor who cuts corners in relationships will eventually cut corners in business.
This wisdom is not unique to Nigeria, it spans the continent. From the spice traders in Zanzibar, who build loyalty through generations of fair dealing, to the mining executives in Johannesburg who understand that community relationships can make or break a project, the principle remains the same: relationships are not separate from business, they ARE the business.
The Cost of Rushing
In our fast-paced world, influenced by Silicon Valley’s ‘move fast and break things’ mentality, many African entrepreneurs and business leaders feel pressure to close deals quickly. But this often backfires spectacularly across the continent.
Take the case of a promising partnership between an Ivorien logistics company and a foreign e-commerce giant eager to expand across Francophone Africa. The international company was excited about the potential and pushed for a quick partnership agreement. They offered generous terms, spoke about immediate scaling across Cote D’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Mali and Senegal, and presented impressive projections.
The company, flattered by the attention and excited about the regional opportunity, signed quickly. Within eight months, the partnership had collapsed. The foreign company didn’t understand African logistics challenges – from varying customs procedures across borders to complex relationships with local transporters, traders, and local bureaucracy. More critically, they didn’t grasp the importance of building relationships with different communities, understanding diverse cultural expectations, and navigating the unique regulatory environments.
The logistics company had the local knowledge and relationships that could have made the partnership successful across the region. But because both parties rushed to formalise the deal without taking time to truly understand each other’s operating environments and the complexity of doing business across multiple African markets, they missed the opportunity to build something lasting.
Beyond the Handshake: Building Real Trust
In African business culture, we understand that trust is built in layers. The initial meeting establishes respect. The follow-up conversations build understanding. The small gestures – remembering someone’s family situation, showing up to important milestone events, following through on minor commitments, create the foundation for major partnerships.
Smart African dealmakers know this instinctively, whether they are in Dakar, Kigali or Lagos. They take time to understand not just what their potential partners want, but why they want it. They ask questions about long-term vision, not just short-term gains. They create space for authentic conversation, often away from formal settings.
This is why some of Africa’s most successful business relationships are forged over weekend trips, during industry conferences where the real conversations happen in hotel lobbies, or even during chance encounters at airports where guard comes down and real communication begins. From the African Development Bank meetings to local chieftaincy coronations, the pattern is consistent: relationships matter.
The Questions That Matter
Instead of starting with “What is your profit margin?”, successful African dealmakers ask deeper questions: “What does success look like for your community?”, because across Africa, business success is often measured by its impact on communities, and social development.
“What are you trying to build beyond this deal?”, since understanding someone’s bigger vision helps predict how they will behave when faced with difficult decisions.
“Who are your trusted advisors?” Because understanding someone’s counsel circle – whether it includes traditional leaders, religious figures, or business mentors – reveals their values and decision-making process.
These questions will not be answered in a standard pitch presentation. They require time, trust, and genuine curiosity about the person and culture behind the business plan.
When Numbers Become Tools, Not Weapons
Here’s what successful African business relationships understand: when the human foundation is strong, numbers become collaborative tools for building something together. When the foundation is weak, those same numbers become weapons for protecting individual interests.
In strong partnerships, when projections don’t meet reality (and they rarely do exactly as planned in Africa’s dynamic markets), partners work together to understand why and adjust accordingly. They give each other the benefit of the doubt. They communicate challenges early instead of hiding them. They view setbacks as problems to solve together, not reasons to assign blame.
But when relationships are purely transactional, every missed target becomes evidence of incompetence or bad faith. Every challenge, whether it is currency fluctuation, regulatory changes, or infrastructure issues, becomes an opportunity to renegotiate terms in one’s favour. The partnership then becomes a zero-sum game.
The African Advantage
This relationship-first approach to business is not a weakness. It is our competitive advantage in an increasingly digital and impersonal global economy. While other markets prioritise speed and efficiency above all else, Africa’s emphasis on relationship building creates partnerships that are more resilient, adaptable, and ultimately more profitable in the long term.
African businesses that understand this are building partnerships that last decades. They are creating networks of trust that span borders, languages, and cultures. These networks help them navigate uncertainty, access new opportunities across multiple markets, and build sustainable competitive advantages that cannot be easily replicated by competitors with weaker relationships.
Building Something Human
The smartest dealmakers across Africa – from the fintech entrepreneurs in Cape Town to the agribusiness pioneers in Ethiopia, from innovators in Egypt to the renewable energy champions in Uganda – are not necessarily the ones with the most impressive spreadsheets. They are the ones who take time to build something deeper than a deal. Something human.
They understand that in markets where trust is currency and reputation travels faster than any marketing campaign, investing in relationships is not soft business, it is smart business.
Because long after the contracts are signed and the initial excitement fades, it is the relationship that makes the numbers work, not the other way around.
In Africa’s dynamic and relationship-driven business environment, this isn’t just philosophy, it is the practical path to sustainable success. The deals that thrive are built on foundations of mutual respect, cultural understanding, and genuine human connection.
After all, spreadsheets don’t shake hands. People do; and across Africa, that handshake, backed by trust, respect, and shared understanding, is worth more than any number on any balance sheet.
***Written by Aramide Abe.
Aramide Abe is a networking expert and a professional in international development. She is also the convener of an African business leader network – Naija Startups.
Follow @arams on twitter.
Website – www.aramide.ng
