The practice and the name

In the Yoruba language, ọnà carries the sense of both path and method. Not just where you are going, but how you get there. The two are inseparable: the wrong method on the right destination produces nothing useful, and the right method on the wrong destination is just efficient failure.

The name reflects what this practice believes about ESG governance. The destination — compliance, investor readiness, certification — is rarely the hard part. What breaks is the method: frameworks designed for the wrong context, proportioned for a company three times larger, or built without any understanding of how the organisation actually works. The path has to fit the terrain.

Ọnà Strategies is built around the idea that governance infrastructure which does not reflect operational reality will not survive contact with it. Finding the right path, for the specific company, in the specific environment, is the work.

Ọnà Strategies is led by Lanre Balogun, based in Amsterdam.