Oluwatimilehin Adeoti

Sometimes, the impact of a learning experience is measured not by what one person takes away from it, but by what they do with what they have learned.

For Timilehin Adeoti, that journey began in 2023, when his organisation enrolled its product leadership team in the Silicon Valley Product Group Masterclass, a two-day programme that brought new perspectives on building products to the team at Interswitch. Today, Timilehin works on the product leadership team at Interswitch, but one of the ideas from that Masterclass continues to shape how he thinks about his work: product discovery.

The experience became even more significant because senior leaders from the organisation participated alongside the team. They were not simply hearing about new approaches second-hand. They were in the room, learning the same things and engaging with the same ideas. That shared experience created an opportunity to take the learning further.

The first step was to bring those lessons back to the wider division. Timilehin and his colleagues organised a session where they shared what they had learned with their teammates, opening up the conversation beyond the people who had attended the Masterclass. From there, the language of product discovery began to spread. It became easier to have conversations about discovery across different roles, whether someone worked directly in product or not. More importantly, product discovery began to move from an idea discussed by a few people to a process that became part of the organisation’s approach to strategy.

“We are still on the journey, but we are definitely not where we were three years ago.”

For Timilehin, that progress is a reminder of what can happen when the right people are given access to the right knowledge, and when that knowledge is carried beyond the room where it was first shared. He credits Innovate Africa Foundation for helping make that possible, not only through the Masterclass, but through its broader commitment to creating communities that are deliberate about developing product talent across Africa.

“I’d like to say thank you and well done to Innovate Africa Foundation for partnering with us on this journey and for their resilience in building communities that are deliberate about upskilling product talent in Africa.”