September 04, (THEWILL) — There is something psychologically significant about the ninth hole of an 18-hole round of golf. For those unfamiliar with the game, a standard round consists of two halves of nine holes. Completing the ninth is known as reaching the turn, the halfway point when you have enough evidence to form an opinion about how you are doing but still have half the contest ahead.
You may reach the turn several shots better than expected and begin imagining an exceptional final score. Or you may have struggled through the opening nine and feel that the day is already lost. I have played enough golf to know that neither conclusion is necessarily justified.
I have experienced both sides. There have been rounds when I reached the turn playing beautifully and made the mistake of calculating what I might shoot. Almost imperceptibly, my attention moved from playing the next shot to protecting a score that did not yet exist. The golf changed. I have also walked onto the tenth tee thoroughly dissatisfied, only to find my rhythm and finish with a score I would gladly have accepted before teeing off. The scorecard at the turn tells you where you are, not where you will finish.
Three years ago, I met the great James Clear, author of Atomic Habits, at the Global Leadership Summit, Chicago. What stayed with me was not so much meeting the man behind the book, but the practical power of an idea central to his work: outcomes are often lagging measures of the systems that produce them. The visible result frequently arrives long after the habits, decisions and disciplines responsible for it have been established.
I have seen that principle in my own life. Some things that eventually looked like breakthroughs from the outside were really the accumulated consequence of decisions, relationships, disciplines and sometimes disappointments unfolding quietly for years. Conversely, an encouraging result today does not necessarily mean everything beneath it is working well. It has made me increasingly careful about judging anything too early, whether a round of golf, a business strategy, a career or even a country.
Lately, I have found myself thinking about Nigeria in much the same way.
The latest numbers present an interesting scorecard. Nigeria’s economy grew by 2.83 per cent year-on-year in the second quarter of 2026, slowing from 3.89 per cent in the first. Headline inflation eased to 15.43 per cent in July, yet food inflation stood at 20.31 per cent. Encouragingly, as THEWILL reported this week, the country’s foreign reserves have crossed $53 billion, reaching $53.11 billion as of 24 August, their highest level in more than 17 years.
For someone who has lived and worked in Nigeria for most of my professional life, these are not abstract numbers. I have watched businesses navigate currency volatility, inflation, energy costs and extraordinarily difficult operating conditions, and sat across tables from leaders trying to make long-term decisions when underlying assumptions can change remarkably quickly. Stability matters, and genuine signs of improvement should not be casually dismissed.
But neither should the difficult numbers. Nigerians experience the economy through the price of food, transportation, electricity, school fees and rent; through whether businesses are hiring; and through what remains after necessities have been paid for. An economy can be improving on one part of the scorecard while remaining painfully difficult on another.
One development I watch particularly closely is the Dangote Refinery. As an oil and gas analyst, I understand the significance of a refinery that reached its initial maximum capacity of 650,000 barrels per day earlier this year in a country that spent decades exporting crude while importing substantial quantities of refined petroleum products.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, Nigeria’s seaborne petroleum-product exports have increased seven-fold since 2023, with the refinery playing a major role. Yet Reuters reports that approximately 30 to 40 per cent of its crude intake is currently imported. From an industry perspective, that is why what happens next matters. Sustained performance will depend on competitive crude supply, operating efficiency, logistics, regulation and access to markets.
It is almost a perfect illustration of the turn. The achievement is undeniable, but the story is unfinished. Even one of the most consequential industrial developments in modern African history still has a back nine to play.
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The same is true of the Nigerian economy. We can recognise easing headline inflation while acknowledging stubborn food-price pressures. We can recognise reforms that the IMF and World Bank say have strengthened macroeconomic stability while acknowledging that household incomes have yet to recover fully and poverty remains high. Serious analysis requires holding those truths together.
So, has Nigeria turned the corner? Perhaps the better answer is that we have reached the turn. There is still another nine holes to play.
This brings to mind an idea from Jim Collins’ Good to Great that I have returned to repeatedly over the years. Collins popularised the Stockdale Paradox: the ability to confront the brutal facts of one’s present reality while retaining faith in the eventual outcome. Optimism without evidence can become denial; pessimism that refuses to acknowledge progress can become equally detached from reality.
Nigeria needs neither. We should recognise genuine progress without declaring victory while millions of citizens are still waiting for macroeconomic improvements to translate into their everyday lives. Progress deserves recognition. Arrival requires evidence.
Golf has taught me something similar. If I have played the first nine exceptionally well, nobody gives me a trophy at the turn. I have created an opportunity, but still have to convert it. When the first nine have gone badly, experience has taught me not to attempt to recover every lost shot immediately. That is usually when one bad hole becomes two.
Instead, I ask simpler questions: Where am I losing shots? What has changed? What should I do differently? They are much the same questions we ask in boardrooms and strategy sessions. Businesses, careers, investments and relationships all reach their turn. The danger is abandoning sound strategies because results are slow, or persisting with poor ones because we have invested too much to change. The long game requires knowing the difference between patience and stubbornness.
Nigeria’s challenge is to convert stability and reform into jobs, stronger businesses, food security and rising household prosperity. Economic progress must ultimately travel from the spreadsheet to the kitchen table. The same applies to us individually: some ambitions require patience, others adjustment, while even success can tempt us into complacency.
Wherever you are, look honestly at the scorecard, but do not become imprisoned by it. Learn from the holes already played, recognise what is working, admit what is not and make the necessary adjustments. Then concentrate on the next decision, the next opportunity, the next shot.
Whether we are talking about Nigeria, a business, a career or a life, the score at the turn is only an interim result. Nobody remembers who was leading after nine. What ultimately matters is how you finish.
The author, Meka Niyi Olowola (FSPIN), is a sustainability and communications expert, business leader and avid golfer.
