My kind of life: Queenette Archibong

Queenette Archibong is an Executive Director in Global Markets at Goldman Sachs and the founder of an NGO, Social Mobility for Women, which helps provide greater opportunities for women in Nigeria. She is currently studying on the Executive MBA course at LBS.

The three words that describe me are driven, ambitious and compassionate.
I love my job and I love working in financial services, but I am also aware that I have had opportunities that many other women with my background have not. The joy for me is also being able to give something back, which is why I am very keen on mentoring at work and why I set up my NGO to help women in Nigeria.

My experience in FinTech was really exciting. It meant hiring a new team and creating a new culture.
We were building a business from scratch. We had all the challenges of a startup, such as finding the right people, building products from the end-customer perspective and reviewing the success of products based on feedback from customers.

Training as a lawyer gave me resilience, tenacity and the ability to assimilate complex information and present it in a coherent way to aid decision-making.
A law degree is a real test of character and a lot of hard work, but it has paid off because I use my legal skills every day. I spent the early years of my career in the legal sector in Nigeria, involved in M&A, PE, real estate and litigation, which gave me a great understanding of financial markets.

My current role is truly global.
I am constantly required to come up with solutions for complex business issues that touch on so many jurisdictions. Creating the right team is so important. It’s about making sure you have the right people in the team who understand and share your vision and the culture of your organisation.

Being at LBS has been transformational.
It gives you an incredible experience of meeting so many different people of different nationalities. It has changed my mindset both on a personal and professional level. It has opened me up to new ways of thinking and challenged views that I’ve held for a long time. The teaching is exceptional and the lecturers are so thought-provoking.

My parents gave me the courage and confidence to dream big.
I was born in a small town in southern Nigeria, where there are far fewer opportunities for girls. Despite this, my parents encouraged me to aim for success and told me I was capable of achieving anything I wanted. That has given me a life-long confidence that still serves me well.

There are amazing and entrepreneurial women in Nigeria but for many, choices are limited.
That’s what inspired me to set up my NGO. It’s about helping Nigerian women to gain greater opportunities and social mobility. They have so much potential but they don’t have access to the education and financial freedoms that they deserve.

There aren’t many women in finance, and even fewer black women.
Sometimes there’s extra pressure in needing to work harder to prove myself and break down boundaries. That’s why I am keen to mentor other women.

I came to the UK when I was 10.
It was a big culture change for me but I am so grateful for the support of my family and the opportunities I have had working here. I came from a small town where oil was the main industry, so it has been very different living in the UK and having an English education. I studied Law at King’s College in London and first heard about LBS when I was an undergraduate. It became a dream of mine to be a student at LBS.

In the future I would love to work again in the FinTech space.
I really enjoy the cutting-edge of finance and technology here. I finish my LBS Executive MBA next year and it has given me such great insights that I want to use my talents and my passion to the fullest.