My Bio
 

Welcome to andyadewale.com

It is a huge honour and privilege to see that your quest either for excellence or curiosity (or both!) has brought you here. I appreciate you spending your valuable time here and I am so excited that by visiting us, you will feel energised and empowered by many of the powerful ideas, solutions and strategies for transformational change that we promote.


I am commonly acknowledged as a creative business strategist, an inspirational business leader and a dynamic wealth creation coach. I have for over two decades modelled, tested and synthesised the ideas and strategies of many of the world's leading experts in the areas of personal development and wealth creation. If anyone knows which idea works, and which idea doesn’t work, I do.

As a wealth creation visionary and an international real estate investor I have built multi-million pound businesses. My passion is to make a positive difference to the lives of everyone I meet.
 

My early life
 

As you can imagine, I haven’t always been all of the descriptions highlighted above. Probably like you, I started my life from a very humble beginning. I was a middle child from a large home – a largely “dysfunctional” family; with extensions comparable to that of a large octopus!

Despite the challenges of growing up as a little boy in a large family, I inherited a number of powerful gifts and values from my parents and from those around me. Many of these gifts and values shaped my life and took me on the roller-coaster journey that led me to where I am today.

Top of the list of gifts and values that I inherited were;

1.    The importance and value of education. In the early years of my life, I only really knew and appreciated formal school education and I did alright at it. Little did I know that there were other forms of education out there, and those that were not commonly known types of education that would not only propel me to self-actualisation but ultimately shape my destiny!

2.    Helping, Sharing and Giving. The joy that one derives from giving to others is immense, especially giving to those who cannot give back. My desire to serve and give to others led me to create this portal and to begin writing my first book, which is due for publication imminently. The book enables me to share with you the very best of what I know on the subject matter of financial education and wealth creation.

3.    Doing and giving your best, always. You cannot try to do things. You either have to do them or don’t do them. This value alone has made an immeasurable contribution to my life.

Aside from the values and gifts I learned or inherited as a bright little boy who needed to find his place in the big world out there, my commitment to learning has given me exposure and access to some of the most successful and best teachers in the world – I am grateful! Their ideas and teachings govern most of what I do today. One of the reasons for this is that I consciously became aware of the fact that top amongst the secrets to the success of these world renowned experts and teachers were in fact the three gifts and values that I learned and inherited from an early age and that were already second nature to me.

Whilst going through formal education, I learned a lot of principles and ideas in the discipline that I studied. However, I learned the secret to success and financial freedom through self education.
 

My working life
 

Having completed school and intermediate higher education, I obtained C.N.A.A. Post Graduate Diploma in Management (with Distinction) from Slough College of Higher Education (now Thames Valley University). I followed with a Masters of Arts Degree in Management at the University of Kent at Canterbury, United Kingdom and I was ready to commence my life in the employment world.

I encountered one of the biggest stumbling blocks that bright new university graduates around the globe encounter every day whilst seeking employment and that was that to a prospective employer, I had “no experience”. I knew I was academically sound, I achieved top three results in my post graduate courses but I was wet behind the ears as far practical work experience goes. My frustrations mixed with the laser focus I had on what I wanted to become in life led me to take up employments in fields which were totally unrelated to my discipline. Those jobs were even considered to be menial jobs for someone with a Master’s Degree and a Diploma in Marketing!

Eventually, I began my working life in a fast food restaurant as a crew member (that is right!). I also did other causal jobs including packing perfumes in a Faberge’ factory, and testing Greyhound dogs for doping at a Greyhound stadium, which was local to my grand home of a 12ft by 9ft rented box room in a shared rented accommodation in Slough, Berkshire, England.

My first breakthrough came in 1987 when I joined a financial advice brokerage company named FPS (Management) Ltd. I was hired as a Financial Consultant. Although my job title was “Financial Consultant”, my job was really to find clients - beginning with my friends and family and to sell financial products to them on a commission-only basis. Despite the fact that I knew only a handful of people at the time; many of whom were ordinary people who struggled to make ends meet, I was excited by the potential of what the job offered to me. From working in a fast food joint, I was able to do what I knew my education deserved-which was to go into a high quality office every day, wearing a suit, tie and a pair of business shoes! My excitement was beyond words. Even though I was relatively bright even back then, it did take me a while to really understand what selling insurance related products on a commission only basis really meant. It meant plenty of cold calling, knocking on doors of homes late into the night in order to generate prospects and potential clients, taking rejection after rejection etc. Despite these challenges which sometimes included going through an entire month without any income, the training I received and the positivity of many of the people who were around me at this company shaped my life beyond what anyone could have imagined. I eventually progressed into sales management with the company before I moved on to greener pastures.

After some five and a half years at FPS, which later became General Portfolio FPS during my time, I joined another UK financial services company’s sales force in Colonial Mutual Group. Colonial was a long established Insurance company with roots in Melbourne, Australia. Oh, I loved Colonial because it had real substance and it treated its staff and agents well.  When I first joined Colonial though, I hated the place - it was old fashioned, dull, uninspiring and the company did most of its business with clients in the working class sector – I almost left after a week of joining, but – thank goodness I didn’t.

Eventually, I understood Colonial’s psyche and their way of doing things- I became “a Colonial man”. I wore the corporate pin with pride. I had an outstanding Sales Manager who believed in me and in the qualities I brought to his team. Despite being a very young manager at age 23, my then manager was a real gem of a person. At Colonial, I eventually got the breakthrough I craved, I was promoted into sales management.   

After over 9 years with Colonial in sales and in various management roles (including relocating with the company twice in less than a year and being made redundant twice and recalled twice), I was finally ready to let the depth of my capabilities do the talking. I accepted the fact that working for Colonial or anyone else was no longer an option for me.

When Colonial closed its UK business in the year 2000, I knew immediately that I was going to work for myself properly and create a special legacy that I’d be proud of. I became an authorised Independent Financial Adviser (IFA) and an Area Co-ordinator/Recruiter for a national IFA firm. It was from my experience of working with the company in question, and in particular seeing the way that their owner Directors operated, that gave me the determination to build a bigger business in which I would be the one making strategic decisions which may impact on my future as well as the futures of other people around me. I got to a point in my 15 month relationship with the organisation in question that the way they operated in many ways conflicted with my values and beliefs. On the back of this and with limited resources to fall back on, I resigned, created and co-founded a competitor IFA network named Mint Financial Services Ltd (Mint) in May 2002.  I even took this organisation to an employment tribunal and received a financial settlement - I was that daring!

With financial investment and support from a number of individuals to whom I remain eternally grateful, we built the structure of Mint, got Mint regulatory authorisation, ran and built Mint from zero staff, zero clients, zero revenue to some 28 staff, 368 agents/clients and over £15 Million turnover and over £500,000 profit, all within five short years from November 2002 to December 2007. By goals, desire, coincidence and some good fortune, we sold Mint as a profitable going concern in February 2008 and the business, under its new owners, is still going strong today. In the Sunday Times Fast Track Mint was voted the 22nd fastest growing company in the UK over the three years to October 2007. I look back with amazement, pride, gratitude and fulfilment - I created and left an enduring legacy. Wow!

Following Mint, my burning desire to build further credibility and leave yet another legacy led me to create Unleash Advice Partnership Ltd (Unleash), a second IFA network and with the audacity of setting up shop literarily next door to Mint. Unleash Advice Partnership Ltd was born with my vision, creativity, drive and leadership and Unleash quickly grew from zero to over £1.25M turnover in less than three years during a period of global economic collapse. Whilst running Unleash I learned many useful lessons, most of which I didn’t learn at Mint. I became more conscious of myself, the people around me, and the risks associated with being ultimately responsible for liabilities attached to businesses which operated in our sector. I also poignantly became aware of the fact that both the economic climate and the regulatory landscape within which we operated had unexpectedly changed so much within a short period of time - the excesses of the past had gone, the profit margins of the past had gone and my belief in the sector was no longer the same. The moment I articulated these realities, I shared my inner thoughts with my closest allies and some of our shareholders, and to my surprise, I received the encouragement and support from them to sell or close the business as soon as I found a safe opportunity to do so. Despite the advice and encouragement, I nonetheless powered on with a laser focus on providing a value-added home and regulatory safety to our agents and clients, until a series of coincidental events connived together and led to the safe closure of the business in December 2011. The day I wrote the corporate bulletin to inform our staff and our agents, over forty of them, that the company was to apply to cancel its regulatory authorisation and let them go was one of the toughest days of my entire life. I saw a disturbing analogy that “I created a baby and I was responsible for killing that baby”. It was hard. There were a number of dark moments and a heavy heart, but we safely closed the business with a high degree of professionalism and support to our agents, most of whom have since found new homes and are once again running thriving financial advice practices.  Wow again!

Upon closing Unleash, I summoned the courage to only now do what I love. I love working with and I love helping people become the best they can be. I also want to help the less privileged, and I want to make a difference to our world through the promotion of financial education and philosophies on wealth creation. My passion is to accomplish these objectives through my writing, teachings, mentoring and coaching, and I hope you derive value from them.
 

My family life
 

I am blessed with a soul mate, three beautiful children and a step son. They are the rock of my life. I love you, guys.
 

Closing
 

Thank you for sharing in my journey. I look forward to hearing your story of financial freedom.
 

Remain Outstanding! And remember, success leaves clues!