Funke Olaode, Thisday Editor, earns executive certifications from Harvard and two global institutions

By OLAWUYI AWOFISAYO

During her National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) year through 2003 and 2004, she served as Course Instructor at the Department of Mass Communication in Sokoto Polytechnic, teaching Communication Skills, Fundamentals of Communication, and Fundamentals of Public Relations.

Every great journalist has a story detailing his or her origin. For the vivacious and detail-oriented Olufunke Olaode, it began in the classrooms of The Polytechnic, Ibadan, where she graduated with an Upper Credit (with Honours) in Mass Communication back in 2002. Looking back now for the woman widely known as Funke, it was clear that emerging the Best Female Graduating Student in her department and Overall Best Graduating Student represented an early demonstration of what would become the hallmark: an unwavering commitment to excellence.

Instead of waiting to graduate and be gainfully employed in the Nigerian mainstream media, Funke blazed the trail as an undergraduate. Freelancing for Thisday, she interviewed notable personalities in Ibadan, Oyo State engaging the likes of former Governor late Lam Adeshina, late Richard Akinjide, SAN, and legal luminary and Founder, Afe Babalola University, Chief Afe Babalola, SAN, among defining moments.

During her National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) year through 2003 and 2004, she served as Course Instructor at the Department of Mass Communication in Sokoto Polytechnic, teaching Communication Skills, Fundamentals of Communication, and Fundamentals of Public Relations. Giving a good account of herself in an academic setting, she earned an Outstanding Performance award, an early recognition of excellence that continues to define her career decades after.

Most professionals with 20-plus years of experience would coast on what they know but Funke, whose career has been about constantly pushing herself to grow, is clearly cut from a different cloth.

Five years after her first degree, whilst managing a demanding job at THISDAY, in 2007, she made a decision that changed everything: she would pursue a Master’s at the University of Ibadan.

Anyone who knows the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway knows about its brutal nature; ceaseless traffic at both the Kara and Iwo Road ends, contempt for unsteady drivers and so much more. In the late 2000s, it was even worse, being a nightmarish combination of potholes, speeding lorries, and unrelenting chaos. For someone with limited driving experience, choosing to drive that route regularly was courage in action.

“Going back to school five years after my first degree was a feat,” she says now. “When I decided to go to UI, it was a challenge. But I faced it squarely. I was driven by self-development, which is what pushed me to get behind the wheel even when I could barely drive. I faced the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway head-on. For two years, I was on that road.”

Call her statement about being “driven by self-development” an understatement and you would be right. She woke up early, battled that highway, attended lectures, researched, wrote assignments, all whilst handling breaking news and deadlines at one of Nigeria’s most demanding media houses.

Colleagues at THISDAY watched in amazement as she maintained this punishing schedule for two years (2007-2009). The day she submitted her final project, on 25 June, 2009, is burnt in her memory. Whilst the world mourned Michael Jackson, the global music powerhouse known for his garlands of honours, invigorating dance steps, she quietly celebrated a victory that represented sacrifice, determination, and belief in the power of education.

She earned her Master of Communication Arts (M.C.A.), specialising in Communication and Language Arts. But more than that, she proved that discomfort is the price of growth, and that age doesn’t limit ambition.

Fifteen years after UI, with her career at its peak, Assistant Editor at THISDAY, Editor of ‘Crime and Punishment,’ sought-after media consultant, Funke made another bold move. This time, the classroom would span three continents. She was following the trail of that same drive; the refusal to settle for the normal, the willingness to embrace discomfort towards growth.

Given Thisday, her employer’s support and encouragement to be the best in their endeavours, Funke’s Study Leave was granted. In 2024, more than two decades into her journalism career, this move would eventually take her to Harvard and two other prestigious institutions. This time, she relocated to London, United Kingdom where she shuttled between the Europe and America.

In her new pursuits, she completed an unprecedented sprint, earning credentials from three institutions that represent the peak of global education in Strategic Communication, Effective Organizational Communication and Crisis Communication.

From September to January 2025, Funke earned an Advanced Certificate in Strategic Communication from the Rotterdam School of Management, Corporate Communication Centre, Erasmus University, The Netherlands.

Rotterdam gave her sophisticated tools for strategic thinking, stakeholder mapping, and high-level communication planning. The programme’s focus on corporate communication strategy meshed perfectly with her journalism background and she learnt how to think beyond storytelling to strategic positioning and crafting narratives that serve organisational goals whilst staying authentic.

In November 2024, Funke completed an eDiploma in Effective Organisational Communication from the Harvard Division of Continuing Education, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.

According to her, studying at Harvard transformed how she thinks about communication and she learnt how to create messages that resonate with diverse stakeholders, position executives for maximum impact, and build relationships that prevent crises and drive growth.

“Harvard taught me that communication isn’t just about conveying information, it’s about creating understanding, building trust, and driving action,” she explains. “In today’s complex organizational world, these skills aren’t optional; they’re essential.”

From October to December 2024, she obtained a Certificate in Crisis Communication from the International School of Communication, London, United Kingdom.

In an era that corporate crises can explode on social media within hours, the focus of the International School of Communication, London on crisis preparedness and reputation management was invaluable and Funke learnt frameworks for anticipating crises, developing rapid response protocols, and protecting organizational reputation.

“ISOC helps all kinds of people to build better professional communication skills: 2 Prime Ministers, 15 Royals, 26 CEOs, 25 Central Banks Governors, Top Government Officials, 10 Business Professionals and still counting. Global brands trust ISOC for Communication training. its outstanding records are mind-blowing. It is a privilege to attend one of the most prestigious communication schools in the world,” she enthused
The combination of Harvard’s organisational communication expertise, Rotterdam’s strategic frameworks, and ISOC, London’s crisis management created a comprehensive skillset that puts Funke amongst an elite class of communication professionals globally.

If you are wondering why someone with over 20 years of journalism success, a thriving consultancy, and senior editorial responsibilities invest time and money in intensive programmes across three continents, Funke has it captured in indelible lines.

“I’m relentless when it comes to seeking knowledge,” Funke says.

She saw early that the media landscape was shifting. Traditional journalism skills, interviewing, writing, editing, whilst valuable, weren’t enough anymore. Organisations need communicators who think strategically, manage crises proactively, and build reputations systematically.

Her consulting work through the years for organisations like Sustainable Energy for All (SEforALL), United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), Rural Electrification Agency (REA), and Caverton Offshore Support Group (COSG), National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) and many more exposed her to complex organisational communication needs. And she desired the formal frameworks that would elevate her practice from intuitive to systematic.

“Over two decades of media experience helped broaden my horizons and improve my career prospects in Strategic Communication,” she reflects. “But I needed to understand not just how to tell a story, but how to create messages that align with organisational objectives and drive success.”

Funke’s academic pursuits have been supported by and at the same time, enhanced her work at THISDAY, where she’s spent her entire career since joining as a trainee reporter in January 1999.

Over 25 years, she’s climbed the ladder: trainee (1999-2000), freelance reporter (2000-2003), full-time journalist (2004-2018), and since June 2018, Assistant Editor. In December 2023, she took on editing ‘Crime and Punishment,’ a weekly Wednesday column on Nigeria’s crime and justice system.

Her body of work is impressive: she curated the Saturday weekend column, ‘Memoirs’ for 15 years, building a global readership and conducted high-profile interviews with Governors, CEOs, Diplomats, and industry leaders; managed ‘The Glitterati’ lifestyle magazine, which saw her featuring over 4,000 personalities; and oversaw the birth of ‘On the Couch,’ which achieved a 4% monthly visibility increase for the platform.

This practical experience gave her credibility in the classroom; she wasn’t a student learning theory in a vacuum but a practitioner looking for frameworks to enhance what she already knew. Funke, true to her nature, didn’t wait to finish all her certifications before applying what she learnt. Even as she moved between Harvard, Rotterdam, and London, she was integrating the new frameworks into her consulting work.

Between April and June 2025, right after completing her programmes, she did an apprenticeship as Communication/Media Strategist at Caverton Offshore Support Group Plc. This wasn’t just another assignment; it was a testing ground for her new strategic communication capabilities.

At Caverton, she provided communication support for internal and external audiences, disseminated information through press releases and advertorials, helped prepare the CEO’s speeches, and played a key role in the company’s presentation for formalising the NNPC Shipping Joint Venture, UNITY Shipping Worldwide, a collaboration between NNPCL, Caverton, and Stena Bulk.

The stint at Caverton showed that her investment in educational advancement was already paying dividends. She wasn’t just writing press releases but was thinking strategically about stakeholder engagement, crisis preparedness, and reputation management. Exactly what Harvard, Rotterdam, and London equipped her to do.

In early 2024, Funke dominated the Nigerian media landscape for good reasons. She met Amina Olufunmi, a 36-year-old house cleaner who dreamt of becoming a fashion designer but had no capital or family support. Funke didn’t just see a service provider but as a human being who deserved empathy, opportunity and much-needed support. She became the convener of the ‘Amina Olufunmi Must Be Empowered’ initiative, reached out to influential contacts, mobilised resources and within two days, through the Ibeji Foundation led by education administrator and philanthropist, Alhaji Rafiu Adisa Ebiti, Amina was enrolled in fashion school with a monthly N20,000 stipend, paid accommodation, and sewing equipment.

“Through Madam Olufunke, my life became a roller coaster,” Amina stated, adding: “God will bless her and those who supported me to become somebody when all hope was lost.”

It was a powerful lesson in strategic communication that she could conceive and execute such a project that some organisaitons take weeks and several hands dealing it. This is the lens through which Funke sees her journalism, consulting, and academic endeavours, a belief that communication, at its best, is supposed to serve organisations and people and also lead to opportunities.

Funke has been a regular at the World Bank Group/IMF Annual Meetings in Washington DC since 2015 and attended the UN Pledging Conference for SDGs in New York (2015), visited NASA Space Centre in Houston (2019), and covered international conferences in London, Dubai, Istanbul, Johannesburg, Dakar, and Lusaka. Also, she has participated in the American Spaces Nigeria Training Workshop for Journalists (2024), the European Union’s workshop on reporting corruption (2022), and countless other capacity-building initiatives that broadened her understanding of how global narratives intersect with local realities.

With international qualifications verified by World Education Services (WES), the gold standard for credential evaluation, Funke’s credentials from Harvard, Rotterdam, and London represent the latest chapter in a career-long commitment to bringing global best practices to Nigerian communication challenges. Beyond her academic credentials, she is an Associate Member of the Nigerian Institute of Public Relations (NIPR) and a member of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ).

“I’m a consistent, committed, multi-tasking individual who strives for excellence,” she says. “And I’m relentless when it comes to seeking knowledge. This isn’t the end of my learning journey; it’s a new beginning.”

She envisions using her expanded skillset to help Nigerian organisations navigate the complex 21st-century communication landscape. Whether helping government agencies communicate policy effectively, supporting corporations in managing reputations, or equipping journalists with strategic communication capabilities, she feels the opportunities are endless.

As Nigeria’s media landscape continues to evolve, with organisations facing increasingly complex communication challenges, as the line between journalism and strategic communication blurs, Nigeria needs professionals like Olufunke Olaode who combine deep practical experience with rigorous theoretical grounding and can blend local insight with global perspective while understanding that the best communicators are also the best learners.

For young journalists and communication professionals wondering whether further education is worth it and if they should step outside their comfort zones, Funke’s journey offers a clear answer.

Olawuyi Awofisayo, ANIPR, Strategic Communications Expert, writes from Lagos