‘There is no full parity for women anywhere in the world’

Jocelyne Muhutu-Remy has over 20 years of experience in business development, content creation, journalism and digital skills training. She is the Managing Director, Spotify Sub-Saharan Africa. Prior to joining Spotify, she was the Strategic Media Partnerships Manager for Facebook (now meta), Sub-Saharan Africa. A true pan-Africanist, the multilingual Rwandan and Burundian was born and raised in Ethiopia, lived in South Africa, Nigeria and Cote d’Ivoire. Passionate about the importance of telling the world a new African story, she is constantly building partnerships and joining the dots between culture and technology. With an extensive personal network and an in-depth understanding of the entertainment industry in Africa, Europe and beyond, Muhutu-Remy explores the mechanics of growth and opportunity, especially in the African context. In this interview with IJEOMA THOMAS-ODIA, she speaks on revolutionalising the African music scene through Spotify as well as making her mark as a female C-suite executive.

Coming from Meta, how have you infused your experience to drive a platform as huge as Spotify?
It’s a very different world, and Meta is just one of the companies where I worked. I have a very long experience of the media, entertainment and tech sectors in Africa. It’s all of that experience that I’m bringing. For example, I have worked in advertising, including my knowledge of the Nigerian media that I accumulated when I was a journalist many years ago; I worked at MTV and had collaborations. All of these past experiences definitely are helping with this job.

Nigeria is known for its vibrant music scene. What is Spotify offering to the Nigerian market?
We entered the markets two and a half years ago and since then we have seen an extraordinary level of interest and uptake of the products. We are one of the dominant streaming platforms in the market now, and we have contributed quite significantly to the continued expansion and exports of Nigerian artistes. And how do we do that? We invest heavily in marketing others. For example, we put many Nigerian artistes on international billboards, on Times Square in New York, London, Toronto; in the countries where there’s big interest in Nigerian music – US, UK, France and Canada. We have made sure that Nigerian artistes really explode and do very well in our playlists and this has been extremely successful. We’ve had many big milestones. The latest most important one is Rema reaching a billion streams. I can’t stress enough how important this is. There are very few artistes in the world who have reached a billion streams. We are talking of the likes of Taylor Swift or Beyoncé or Rihanna, right; he’s in that club now. Davido’s album this year, ‘Limitless’, had incredible success across the world. Locally, we also cultivate newer artistes like Ruger, Odumodu Blvck and Fireboy. We use the power of our international global presence to propel Nigerian artistes to the world and this is really very successful because now the reach is way beyond those countries that I mentioned. We see Afrobeat and other Nigerian genres doing very well in places like India, the Middle East, going all the way to Japan and Latin America. So really, it’s globalising very strongly and not just relying on the African Diaspora in those other countries.
Lastly, we educate artistes. We really need our artistes to be much more salient in terms of their business. We train them to not just manage their money better, but to track cities and countries where they are popular. We are also on the lookout for new genres and talents. I’m thinking of Afro-gospel for example. It’s doing incredibly well. We are seeing a huge rise of it on our platform. We are really very close to the culture as you can see and not just the mainstream stuff.

Nigeria has a diverse music landscape. There are various genres. How are you putting this diversity into consideration?
All of these genres are available on our platform. They’re not all promoted in the same way. But we are very aware of Juju and other genres. We tend to focus on what the young demographic are focused on, but it’s not just that. We are fully aware of all the genres and we are working with our various partners to promote them.

Are there collaborations or partnerships that you have made locally?
Yes, we have a partnership with Airtel to give cheaper access to data. We have also worked very hard to make payment much easier. In the past, it was really difficult to pay on our platform. We have worked with Fintech companies to resolve that. We are looking for more partnerships, as the market is competitive.

How are you ensuring that you stand out from the other platforms that exist in a place like Nigeria?
It’s by really emphasising our strong points, and those are our global reach. Not many platforms in this market can take an emerging artiste and put them on a massive billboard in Times Square. That’s what happens. Other platforms can perhaps support that artiste locally, but they can only do that locally. For us, we can do that locally and internationally; that’s one. And then, the strength of the platform itself, the user experience is one of superior quality. Third is by being here really strongly in our own way. So, we tend to have very high quality, high value events that are very attractive to the youth and those are the kind of things we want to continue to do.
What is the future of the platform and how are you looking at sustaining it?
The future is really becoming the top platform across Africa and Nigeria, from helping artistes live off their arts, and as a delivery mechanism for music and podcasting, promoting African, Nigerian voices is at the centre of what we do.

What do you find fascinating about Nigeria compared to other places you’ve lived?
The energy, the optimism and the resilience. Some of the things people are able to do in these conditions are just really incredible. And there’s just a lot about being a very powerful country. With the power of the population, there’s also a lot happening with the talents artistically and business wise. It’s no coincidence that the best African startups are Nigerians. Nigeria is an African powerhouse. It’s also a place with many challenges and I’m really observing and following how the country tries to overcome those challenges, and it’s just an inspiration.
Also, Nigeria is Africa’s leading musical nation. It’s the biggest exporter of culture. And what is great is that more than ever, this culture is locally entrenched. In the 90s, Nigeria was very Western focused; there was little local music. All of that disappeared in the 70s with the likes of Fela. But in the past 10 to 15 years, the love and passion for local music sang in Pidgin and other languages has 100 percent dominance. The Nigerian pride is something that’s beautiful to observe – the pride in your own culture, clothes and food. It’s contradictory in that sense because on one hand there is that, and on the other there is the Japa syndrome.

In Africa, women have constantly struggled to take the front seat, which is largely based on cultural norms. How easy was it for you to climb the career ladder and be where you are today?
Unfortunately, this isn’t an issue in Africa only; it is a global issue. Across the world, the glass ceiling for women remains a reality; whether it is the gender pay gap or participation of women in leadership positions, there is no full parity anywhere in the world although Scandinavian countries are quite close.
In my case, what has helped me overcome some of these challenges is remaining true to myself at all times. I am a very driven person but also gentle; I’m not trying to behave in any so-called ‘manly’ manner to get ahead. I’m also very focused on key attributes essential to all leaders – learning and self-improvement, emotional intelligence, resilience. There are many ways to lead. I think it is essential to understand your own style and pursue it fully. In my case, I aspire to be both a visionary and a servant leader.

As a successful career woman and mum, what advice do you have for other women struggling to get hold of family life and succeed in their careers?
Interestingly, I find that these perceptions are changing very rapidly in urban areas and among African middle classes. Women working while raising kids at the same time is more and more becoming a very socially acceptable norm. In my personal case, I was determined to demonstrate to my daughters that a mum can be an equal leader in the family, pursuing goals with the same ambition as any man. What made it work for me though is the support of my husband, who is my biggest champion and supporter. Allyship from men is essential for the empowerment of women; we cannot do this alone!

What drives you for success?
First of all, let me give you a little bit of my background and then you’ll understand. I grew up in Ethiopia. I grew up in a very pan African environment. You’ll find this strange, but really the love of Africa is what drives me. When I work for a multinational company like Spotify, for example, it is the knowledge of what we are doing for Africa that is driving me. The moment I feel that the environment I’m working in does not share the same passion or is not pushing that African agenda, I become very unhappy. So, what drives me is knowing that through these jobs, I’m contributing to the betterment of our continent.
In 10 years, I want to be able to look behind and ask the question: Is this continent being better because of my work or not? If the answer is no, then I would have failed. Everyone that knows me will tell you. Just projecting us. Driving success and excellence and nuance. When people visit here, I want them to see nuance, not just one perspective or another.