Chidinma Chukwuemeka and her Husband are Building Nigeria’s biggest Footwear Academy in Aba

I have closely followed the activities of The Footwear Academy since 2019 when I became acquainted with its Co-founder, Chidinma Chukwuemeka on LinkedIn. As an active member of the networking platform, she would often write about her work at the shoe company, sharing lovely pictures of different kinds of shoes all manufactured by her students.

I had always wanted to ask her some questions about The Footwear Academy but never really had the chance to do that until now. For Business Elites Africa’s latest issue, we talked to her on a whole lot of issues, including her experience as a fashion entrepreneur building from Aba. Enjoy the read.

Q: May we meet you, Mrs Chukwuemeka?

A: My name is Chidinma Chukwuemeka. I’m the Co-founder of The Footwear Academy. My husband and I started The Footwear Academy officially in August 2017.

Q: Nice to meet you. Recently, you wrote a post on LinkedIn about a bad job experience you once had. Would you say that experience made you decide to become your own boss?

A: I don’t think it had any effect on me becoming an entrepreneur. But it has actually had a huge influence on the kind of boss that I am today. I’m quite sensitive to the needs of our team members that I supervise directly. I always try to evaluate the decisions that I make and how empathic I am to their needs because I have had a bad boss. So, I really do not want to ever come off as the reason why someone would go into depression or hate their job because I want to get things done. So yes… even though the experience had nothing to do with me becoming an entrepreneur, it did, however, teach me how to become a better boss.

Q: So, why shoe-making?

A: Well, I think it has more to do with the influence of my husband because he liked it and he wanted to open up a shoe company and a training school for shoemaking. He had a big vision about it and I bought into that vision and today we have an academy…

EDITOR’S NOTE: Read the rest of this interview on page 70 of our latest magazine edition- 15 Entrepreneurs Disrupting Africa’s Fashion and Beauty Industry. Click here to read now.