CFO Magazine - 4th Edition - 2019

THE MAGAZINE FOR SOUTH AFRICAN FINANCE PROFESSIONALS 4 • 2019 CFO.CO.ZA

CFO Day Survey Your ambitions and fears revealed

Kobus Gertenbach Premier Group CFO Takes to the skies

Virtual CFOs The future of business finance?

Elisa Mkhize Clinix Group CFO A healthy outlook

Learn, unlearn, relearn

Arno Daehnke Standard Bank Group FD Moving into Africa award winner

Why finance leaders should embrace ongoing education

FROM CFO TO CEO What it takes to succeed

University of Johannesburg CFO

Nolwazi Mamorare The power of purpose

CONTENTS

THE MAGAZINE FOR SOUTH AFRICAN FINANCE PROFESSIONALS 4 • 2019 CFO.CO.ZA

CFO Day Survey Your ambitions and fears revealed

page 46

Kobus Gertenbach Premier Group CFO Takes to the skies

page 22

Elisa Mkhize Clinix Group CFO A healthy outlook

page 66

Arno Daehnke Standard Bank Group FD Moving into Africa award winner

Virtual CFOs The future of business finance?

page 28 page 54

Learn, unlearn, relearn

40

Why finance leaders should embrace ongoing education

FROM CFO TO CEO What it takes to succeed

page 72

page 34

University of Johannesburg CFO

page 16

Nolwazi Mamorare The power of purpose

CFO South Africa is the organisation for finance executives in South Africa. Our goal is to connect finance professionals online and off in order to share knowledge, exchange interests and open up business opportunities.

CFO Enterprises (Pty) Ltd 1 Wedgewood Link, Bryanston, Johannesburg, 2191, South Africa. | +27 11 083 7515 | CFO.co.za © 2019 CFO Enterprises (Pty) Ltd. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

MANAGING DIRECTOR

DESIGN

PRINTING

Joël Roerig jroerig@cfo.co.za +27 76 371 2858

Elizabeth Ferraris

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Toni Muir

Novus Print Peter Wilding peter.wilding@paarlmedia.co.za +27 11 201 3400

Georgina Guedes gguedes@cfo.co.za +27 83 651 2789

PHOTOGRAPHY

COMMUNITY & SALES MANAGER John Deane jdeane@cfo.co.za +27 82 570 9482

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CFO MAGAZINE • CFO.CO.ZA

PROOFREADING

Lizelle Furter, Patrick Furter Ter Hollmann OTHER CONTRIBUTORS Beth Amato, Andre Fourie, Caylynne Fourie, Kate Ferreira, Ray Mahlaka, Malusi Ndlovu

Community 6

From the editor-in-chief

8

New financial year, new CFOs

12

Africa’s biggest finance conference is here

78

Jo-Ann Pohl's meaningful philanthropy

82

From the managing director

Purpose

16

Nolwazi Mamorare: The power of purpose

22

Elisa Mkhize: A healthy outlook

46

Growth 26

Disruption and “adapt or die”

28

CFO Day Survey: Your insights revealed

34

Lessons from CFOs who became CEOs

42

Working wonderwomen show up for themselves

44

Invest your employees’ retirement funds wisely

46

Kobus Gertenbach’s dream of flying

Future 50

Intelligent boardroom: The insight you need

54

Virtual CFOs – the future of finance

60

Innovation in travel and expense claims

64

Future-proofing your business, yourself and your children

66

Arno Daehnke: Connecting with Africa

22

Training & Development 70

Fasset: Upskilling the future

72

Learn, unlearn, relearn

78

66 CFO MAGAZINE • CFO.CO.ZA

5

FROM THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Never stop learning

I

remember, sometime in the 80s, my mom bought a video machine. This opened up to us the extremely retro procedure of using a contract at the local video store to consume data. The video machine was deeply fascinating to me, and I spent hours of my afternoons lying in front of it, working out what all those buttons did. I even managed to master the timer recording function – without having known such a thing existed at the outset, and without looking at the manual once.

This kind of intuitive technical learning is the domain of the very young. Today, my children’s competence at connecting the laptop to the TV so we can watch Netflix far outstrips my own. However, we know that with the Fourth Industrial Revolution underway, we all need to embrace lifelong learning, and keep exhibiting the essential traits of grit, agility and adaptability.

Which adds a whole other level of pressure when you are just trying to get through an already-overfull day.

Many of the articles in this issue of CFO Magazine reflect this reality. ‘Learn, unlearn, relearn’ on page 70 looks at the state of finance executive education.

The CFO Dinner feedback on page 70 delves into the kinds of insights finance professionals who attended this exclusive event gained about future-proofing their business, themselves, and even their children.

In keeping with the education theme is our cover story (page 16) – an interview with Nolwazi Mamorare, the CFO of UJ, who reveals the efforts she has made to

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raise funds to cover student fees at the university. She is an inspirational person who is driven by a sense of purpose to make a difference wherever she works.

Learning of any kind keeps you fresh and flexible, and last year Kobus Gertenbach applied his mind to his lifelong dream of becoming a private pilot – and now takes fellow executives on site visits around the country. His friends’ wives may not let their husbands fly with him, but we at CFO South Africa had no such compunctions, and he took me and CFO South Africa's photographer Patrick Furter on an exciting flip in his Cirrus SR22 over Hartbeespoort Dam, to show us his long-dreamt-of skills. You can read all about his training on page 46. And that’s me taking to the skies in the picture above.

Flying is not the only thing that CFOs dream of, as the CFO Day survey (page 28) reveals. It turns out that the majority of CFOs hope to secure a place in the CEO seat in the not-too-distant future – and we chatted to five CEOs who moved into their position from the finance role about what it took and how they’ve had to evolve, in the article starting on page 34.

Here’s to lifelong learning – and hopefully a bit of fun along the way.

Georgina Guedes Editor-in-chief gguedes@cfo.co.za +27 83 651 2789

The C-suite is singing a new tune.

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Workday, the Workday logo, and Built for the Future are registered trademarks of Workday, Inc., registered in the United States and elsewhere. ©2018 Workday, Inc. All rights reserved.

PEOPLE MOVES

NEW FINANCIAL YEAR, NEW CFOs JSE-listed companies like Sanlam, Barloworld, Tsogo Sun, Pick n Pay and more appoint new CFOs as they head into the new financial year.

Lerena Olivier

Pick n Pay has appointed Lerena Olivier as its new CFO and executive director as of 6 September.

She will be taking over from Bakar Jakoet, who has retired after 34 years of service. Lerena has been a senior executive within Pick n Pay’s group finance division for the past eight years, where she has worked very closely with Bakar. She currently heads the group’s reporting and finance team. She is a qualified CA(SA) and has 18 years of experience with JSE-listed companies in the retail sector.

It's been a big year for The Olivier family, as Wikus Olivier was also appointed as acting CFO of Sanlam.

Wikus will be replacing Heinie Werth, who has taken over a new role as CEO of Sanlam Emerging Markets as of 1 August. Wikus will act in the position of interim CFO until the group fills the group FD role permanently.

Tsogo Sun has appointed former group corporate finance manager Laurelle McDonald as its new CFO. She has been with Tsogo Sun for 12

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years after the company acquired Gold Reef Resorts, where she served as an assistant financial manager at Silverstar Casino, then group financial manager and finally company secretary. She joined Tsogo Sun as corporate finance and treasury manager. Laurelle is also a member of Tsogo Sun’s executive committee. She has taken over from Rob Huddy, who had been the CFO of Tsogo Sun since 2011.

Alaris Holdings has appointed Elsie Muller as its new full-time group CFO and FD as of 1 July. Elsie completed her articles with Grant Thornton and qualified as a CA(SA) in 2012. After that, she joined a manufacturing concern. Elsie will be taking over from Gisela Heyman, who has been promoted to MD of Alaris Antennas and who will remain an executive director on the board.

MiX Telematics has appointed John Granara as its new CFO and executive VP as of 8 July. John has taken over from Paul Dell, who has filled the role of interim CFO since early 2017. Paul will continue at MiX

Elsie Muller

John Granara

Telematics in an alternative senior role. Most recently, John held the position of CFO at Ameresco. Prior to that, he was the VP of finance and CAO at GT Advanced Technologies About his appointment, John said: “I am thrilled to be joining MiX Telematics at this exciting stage of the business. I’m looking forward to contributing to this leading and growing technology company that is at the forefront of many global trends. Helping the company achieve its business and financial goals to drive further shareholder value is my top priority.” enX Group has appointed former Safika Holdings CFO Babalwa Ngonyama as an independent non-executive director and chair of the audit and risk committee.

Ngonyama is currently the CEO of Sinayo Securities. Previously she served as the group chief internal auditor of Nedbank. She is a qualified CA(SA) with an MBA and sits on the board and audit committee of Aspen, Hollard Life and Insurance, Vukile Property Fund and Clover.

From growing in confidence as a young CA to becoming FD of Barloworld Nopasika Lila joined Barloworld as group FD as of 1 August 2019.

decisive, deliberate and immediate in my actions.”

In an earlier interview with CFO South Africa, she said that after completing her articles, she was keen on the financial services industry, especially asset management, as it was then still just a buzzword in her experience.

She joined Old Mutual as an introduction to the industry and then moved to the Public Investment Corporation (PIC), where she served as the head of Compliance and Corporate Governance.

“Growing up, I remember being told that accounting was a difficult field and that those who were studying to become CAs were considered to be part of the elite. I would go as far as saying that the qualification was considered to be something that is not achievable and reserved only for a few. I was initially overwhelmed with the task at hand, but over time I elegantly succeeded. My confidence grew and I’ve learnt to be a lot more

Nopasika was nominated for the CFO Awards in 2017 for her work at the Eskom Pension and Provident Fund (EPPF). She later became CEO of the fund but resigned earlier this year.

Nopasika is a qualified CA(SA) with more than 20 years of experience in finance, corporate governance and the pension industry. She has served on various board and in several committee roles, including nonexecutive directorships at JSE-listed

companies such as Nampak, Basil Read and enX Group.

“I am grateful for these opportunities and they have all contributed to growing my capacity as a leader for my current role,” she says. l

served as the CFO and board member of its European Group since 2014. He joined AIG in 2013 as deputy CFO for EMEA. Prior to AIG, James served as a partner at EY from 2006. He started his career at PwC, where he qualified as a CA(SA) in 2001.

She is also a lead independent director of Implats.

Hosken Consolidated Investments has appointed Robert Nicolella as its new FD as of 1 August 2019. He has taken over from Kevin Govender, who has been CFO of Hosken for the past 17 years. Robert is a qualified CA(SA). During his 18-year tenure at Investec Bank, Robert headed the structured finance division and thereafter, Private Bank Western

Nopasika Lila

Robert Nicolella

Andrey Maruta has taken over from John Crews as Kore Potash’s CFO as of 23 September. Andrey, a fellow chartered and certified accountant,

Cape. He joined Hosken in 2011 to develop its properties portfolio. He is also a director on the boards of Impact Oil and Gas, as well as Tsogo Sun Hotels. He steps into the FD role having left the Hospital Property Fund as CEO on 1 June.

Babalwa Ngonyama

Hammerson has appointed James Lenton as its new CFO and executive director. He succeeds Timon Drakesmith. James joined Hammerson from AIG, where he

Lesibana Fosu

CFO MAGAZINE • CFO.CO.ZA

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PEOPLE MOVES

since 2014. She is a qualified CA(SA) with an MBA from IMD Business School in Switzerland. She received a Clean Audit Award from the Auditor-General for her work at the Limpopo Road Accident Fund for two consecutive years between 2012 and 2014.

Morne du Plessis

has over 16 years’ experience in the mining industry, including as CFO at Petropavlovsk. He has also worked in the audit function at Moore Stephens International in both the UK and the Russian Federation.

The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA) announced the appointment of Japhtalina Lesibana Fosu as its first permanent CFO

Minergy Limited has appointed CFO Morne du Plessis as its new CEO as of 1 August. He will be taking over from Andre Boje, who retired at the end of June. Morne is a qualified CA(SA). He has held top management positions with several coal-mining and -trading groups, including Genet SA, Umcebo Mining Group and Wescoal Holdings Limited. He has been a director on the board of Minergy since January 2017, leading into the listing of the company on the Botswana Stock Exchange, and became its CFO in February 2017.

Ayo Adepoju

Ecobank Transnational Incorporated has appointed Ayo Adepoju as its new group CFO. He has been serving as acting group CEO since April 2019. Prior to this, he worked as Ecobank’s group financial controller. Before this, he had a career at PwC in London and Lagos as an assurance manager in the financial services practice. l

Ex-Lonmin CFO Barrie van der Merwe moves on to Orico in Australia Orica has appointed former Lonmin CFO Barrie van der Merwe as its new VP of finance.

About his appointment, Barrie said: “I am looking forward to working in a new industry in a company with global reach. I know that it will result in career and personal growth. I also feel most privileged to get this opportunity as, in South Africa, opportunities for me were becoming very limited, despite my personal willingness to get involved, even though the country has big challenges with which my skills and experience could be valuable.”

The appointment sees Barrie and his family moving to Melbourne.

“We are looking forward to a new adventure in a new country,” Barrie

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said. “This will be our second expatriate posting as we had previously, between 2013 and 2015, lived in Botswana, where I was CFO of Debswana Diamond Company, a joint venture between De Beers and the Government of the Republic of Botswana. That proved to be a very enriching and satisfying experience to all of us.”

Prior to his appointment at Orica, Barrie was the CFO and an executive director at Lonmin for three years. “Lonmin had to find a long-term solution to its strategic risk of a lack of geographic and commodity diversification, which resulted in the acquisition of the company by Sibanye-Stillwater. A process in which I was instrumental.

Following the finalisation of the

Barrie van der Merwe

merger, I decided to move on to new things,” Barrie said.

“Working at Lonmin was a tremendous experience. It taught me many lessons in resilience, never giving up, making lots of plans for the company to survive and the value of diverse teams. I will miss all of that a lot.”

“Porrum as ad quassequosam fugiand uciptibe atisimus unt.

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Audit | Tax | Advisory

COMMUNITY

ARE YOU READY FOR AFRICA’S BIGGEST FINANCE CONFERENCE? 12

CFO MAGAZINE • CFO.CO.ZA

Finance Indaba Africa is the highlight of the South African finance calendar. With 4,000 qualified finance professionals in attendance, it offers two days of discovery, learning and networking with finance peers. Don't miss out!

T

he biggest finance conference of its kind in Africa will bring finance professionals and exhibitors alike to the Sandton Convention Centre for two days of learning, networking and career opportunities – and hundreds of speaking sessions to enhance your skills and prepare you for the world of tomorrow.

from women leaders shattering the glass ceiling; discover tips on exercising corporate governance and due diligence; gain personal lessons from international finance leaders; get advice on balancing work and life; and hear from your public sector servants on how they are building a better future for South Africa and South Africans.

You will have the opportunity to network with thousands of your peers from different industries; learn about the latest in analytics and automation; hear about the personal experiences of leading South African CFOs; engage with thought leaders and fintech entrepreneurs; hear

Don’t miss enlightening keynotes and great entertainment Finance Indaba Africa attracts world-class speakers from all over Africa and the world. Don’t miss South Africa’s

CFO MAGAZINE • CFO.CO.ZA

13

COMMUNITY finance, business and entrepreneurship experts.

South Africa’s favourite entrepreneur, optimist and author Marnus Broodryk will be kicking off the first day of the Finance Indaba by talking about his journey of becoming a self-made millionaire by the age of 24.

Opening the second day of the Finance Indaba is poet, strategist and UCT-GSB senior lecturer Athol Williams, who will be talking about how finance professionals can rebuild the corporate world after the lies and corruption that came with the state capture scandals.

Renowned comedian Nik Rabinowitz will be sharing side-splittingly funny stories about finance. His banter and humour will ensure immediate remorse for entering the profession. Be prepared for hysterical laughter as Nik delivers the best of South African humour to round off the two intense, thought-provoking days.

Be sure to check out these exciting sessions CFO South Africa editor-in-chief Georgina Guedes will be hosting a “get to know you” session with MTN CFO Ralph Mupita.

Best-selling author, entrepreneur and tech whiz Alan Knott-Craig will be addressing the topic: “Why I am optimistic about doing business in South Africa”.

Firstrand Africa’s Gideon Joubert, Masimong Group’s Nakedi Ramaphakela, DisChem’s Rui Morais and the City of Tshwane’s Umar Banda will be giving first-hand advice about fast-tracking your finance career. These four top CFOs under 40 share their personal and professional experience and explain the choices they made in their careers, answering questions like “What does it take to become a celebrated Award-winning CFO?” and “What does it take to reach the boardroom of a large corporation?”.

For a powerful Wonderwomen panel, T-Systems MD Dineo Molefe, PPC CFO Tryphosa Ramano, and Discovery Health Medical Scheme CFO Charlotte Sanqela will be talking about how you should stop empowering women and start acknowledging them.

Hatch Africa CFO Craig Sumption, Peninsula Beverages FD Andrew McMaster, Kumba Iron Ore CFO Bothwell Mazarura, Discovery Vitality CFO Senele Mbatha and Phembani Group CFO Sizwe Nkosi will leave you with new perspectives, actionable ideas and a fast-tracked approach to gaining success and navigating your finance career.

Don’t miss out on some of the finance industry’s most exciting exhibitors, including Caseware Africa (AdaptIT), SNG Grant Thornton, Oracle Netsuite and SAP Concur. l

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SANDTON CONVENTION CENTRE 14-15 OCTOBER 2020

FINANCE LEADS THE WAY

THE BIGGEST

FINANCE CONFERENCE

IN AFRICA

With the theme "Finance leads the way", the fifth annual Finance Indaba Africa will enable you and 5,000 other finance professionals to boost your knowledge, your network and your career.

In 2020, Finance Indaba Africa introduces exciting new concepts like Tech Demo Rooms, Coaches on Couches and Mentor Mania, alongside an unparalleled conference with worldclass speakers and a state-of-the-art exhibition.

Finance professionals register for FREE www.finance-indaba.co.za Do you want to exhibit at Finance Indaba Africa 2020? Contact John Deane CFO MAGAZINE • CFO.CO.ZA jdeane@cfo.co.za | +27 82 570 9482 or visit www.finance-indaba.co.za

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Photos: Patrick Furter

The

P

ower of urpose

During the 2015 #feesmustfall student campaign, the University of Johannesburg (UJ) lost only one academic day to the protests. This was because UJ was ahead of the game in financially supporting its students, owing, in large part, to the efforts of the team lead by Nolwazi Mamorare, who is today the university’s CFO. She spoke to Georgina Guedes about the kind of difference that can be made if you have the will to do so.

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PURPOSE

N

olwazi has a calm and thoughtful presence, but as soon as you start speaking to her, it becomes clear that she’ll do anything to achieve what she believes is right. It was this clarity of purpose and dogged determination that saw her raising R700 million for student fees from 2015 to 2019.

“When I joined in 2014, part of my portfolio was student finance. At the time, we weren’t actively going out to seek funding to address the needs of the students. We were solely reliant on NSFAS, which wasn’t sufficiently funded at the time. I started a campaign for the missing middle – those that weren’t poor enough or rich enough to receive funding. I am proud of the R700 million we’ve managed to raise since that time.”

She started exploring what to do next, and realised that she could follow a CA path, which she couldn’t do at Vista, so she transferred to Rhodes. “The rest is history. I haven’t looked at doing anything else. I can’t say it was an easy journey to get through my studies, but I haven’t wanted to do anything differently.”

She completed her articles at Fisher Hoffman Sithole, now PKF, in Port Elizabeth. She stayed on for one year after completing her articles, then moved on to KMMT, which, after two years, merged with KPMG. “Then, I’d had enough of auditing. I didn’t hate it, but didn’t want to be boxed into that role for the rest of my life. I wanted to see what was out there. So I joined an entity of Transnet called Protekon, which is now Transnet Rail Solutions, which works on the rail infrastructure. I joined as an accountant and got great hands-on accounting exposure. The scope was big in an interesting industry, with exposure to financial accounting and management accounting. I quite enjoyed it, but only stayed on for two years – I felt that was long enough for me.”

“I am proud to have led a team that has raised all this funding without seeking additional resources.”

This was achieved by knocking on the doors of partners and colleagues from Nolwazi’s previous life at the Auditor-General, and by turning to public sector entities with a mandate to ensure skills development. “We got a great deal from the SETAs, by taking the admin off of their hands and providing them with prequalified students with good academic results that were needy.”

Nolwazi and her team also secured additional NSFAS funding by helping students to process their applications. When she joined, 10,000 students were NSFAS funded. After the first year of providing support to applicants, that number grew by an additional 5,000.

“I am proud to have led a team that has raised all this funding without seeking additional resources. It was a project carried out with what we had, that had never been a function in the finance portfolio, and it contributed to the financial sustainability of the university,” she says.

Entering accounting Nolwazi never imaged she would end up being an accountant. When she was in high school, she and her classmates were taken to a career exhibition in Mthatha.

“That was the closest one could get to any kind of career guidance. I come from a family of teachers and nurses, and didn’t have much of a scope in terms of knowledge as to what I could do. I thought a career in librarianship sounded nice, so when the time came, I went to register at Vista University in PE, and the people at the registration desk said to me that with my marks, I should get into a B.Com degree – so that’s how I ended up in the accounting line.”

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She moved on to the Land Bank at a time when they were introducing IFRS standards, which she describes as exciting. “It wasn’t a routine financial manager, particularly the project introducing the standards, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was also a different sector, which had its challenges and was a steep learning curve for me.”

She stayed there for three years, and says she would have loved to have stayed for longer, but towards the end of her tenure there, a number of irregularities emerged. “I didn’t like the manner in which they were handled or responded to, so I started looking for different opportunities.”

She moved on to Nedbank, which seemed like a natural transition in the finance space, but she soon realised something important about herself.

“I quickly realised that I wasn’t excited about the idea of chasing profit. That on its own just didn’t excite me. I could have stayed on longer, but in three months, I decided that it just wasn’t for me, and I haven’t regretted the decision. I moved on to the Auditor-General."

There she stayed for seven years, and she says what really kept her going there, over and above the impact that she had on influencing the governance across a vast number of entities, was having a wide portfolio that included labour, agriculture and rural development, and higher education.

“There was never a dull moment. There were chal-

CFO MAGAZINE • CFO.CO.ZA

19

FUTURE lenges all the time, particularly in my role. Over and above just having the audits that I signed off on, I was responsible for all the technical training for that particular portfolio. I had to do a deep analysis and interpretation of standards, which excited the geeky part of me.”

Moving into education She was also the training officer for trainees in her portfolio – and in any given year there were about 60 trainees. “One of the most fulfilling things to see is people that have gone through your hands making a huge impact in society. A number of those trainees have gone on to make a difference in their various fields. They are still young, but it’s good to see black chartered accountants making it.”

With one of her portfolios being universities, Nolwazi was involved with a project to address the fact that universities, which are excluded from the Public Finance Management Act to guarantee their academic freedom, still needed to have some level of accountability. “From the AG side, I led the team that worked on the new reporting regulations, in collaboration with the external auditors of all 26 South African universities and 50 TVET [then FETs] to ensure that they would audit the institutions in line with the requirements of the Auditor-General."

She said that this was a large project with a lot of resistance from the universities, “but we got there.

The universities still appoint their own auditors, but they have to do so in consultation with the AuditorGeneral. The universities’ auditors have to make sure that they don’t express an opinion limited to financial statements, they also have to express opinions on compliance of the organisation with legislation and service delivery. Are the universities meeting their mandate, and spending their money in terms of what it is allocated for?”

Nolwazi didn’t want to leave the AG, but found the higher education sector fascinating, so when she was approached by UJ, she gave the idea due consideration. “I thought maybe it’s time. I’d been for seven years in one organisation and while I wasn’t itching to leave, it seemed like a natural progression for me.”

The UJ journey Nolwazi joined the University of Johannesburg in 2015 as an executive director in charge of financial governance and revenue.

“Has it been a smooth ride? Definitely not, but it’s been a very interesting and exciting journey. What makes universities special is that you are not going to find this kind of experience in the public sector or the private sector. It’s a combination of the two and

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more. It’s the kind of environment that really builds your resilience and stretches your outlook, because you have to ensure that the institution is financially sustainable. You do that by continuously pushing to generate revenue, but at the same time, ensuring that you fulfil the social imperative. We were sitting with a huge component of our student body who couldn’t afford to pay their fees. We had to find ways to address that.”

When #feesmustfall took off, UJ was largely unaffected. “Outside of the one day that the students took off to demonstrate at the Union Buildings, we didn’t lose one day of our academic calendar. A huge contributor to that was that we had started demonstrating early on to the students that we were committed to assisting them with funding. And not just by lip service, but by actively going out there to raise funding for bursaries and the meal assistance programme. If students have bursaries and accommodation, but can’t afford to eat, it’s all pointless.”

In 2017, she was appointed as acting CFO, and the position was made permanent in May 2018. She is extremely grateful for her experience in financial governance and revenue. “It allowed me to see the bigger picture, which is quite important for any CFO of any institution. If you walk in blindly from outside the sector, it’s easy to miss the important issues.”

She says that fundraising remains a part of her portfolio in the CFO role “for her sins”. “As much as we’ve captured a big chunk of the market in terms of the funds available in South Africa, we are highly dependent on the public sector to assist us with funding.

So we’re going on a huge drive to the private sector, but the timing couldn’t be worse. No one has funds to give away, and our activities in the international space haven’t been successful in generating donor funding yet.”

“I quickly realised that I wasn’t excited about the idea of chasing profit. That on its own just didn’t excite me.”

She says that the resources in the sector are stretched to breaking point. “We have no more capacity to increase tuition fees, because we can’t continue to increase fees at a rate that’s higher than the salary increase of the general community. The fiscus as we all know has huge constraints, so we have to look at different ways of ensuring sustainability, and that means we have to manage down our costs.”

XX

“One of the most fulfilling things to see is people that have gone through your hands making a huge impact in society.”

This, she says, is tough, because a large part of a university’s expenditure is on international equipment or books, which means that they are at the mercy of the rand’s performance; utility costs, which makes them subject to Eskom’s increases; and salary costs, which are highly competitive in academia. “So keeping costs down is just one of the things that keeps me awake at night,” she says.

To remain relevant in her space, Nolwazi also participates actively in sector forums, and sits on the Finance Executives’ Forum, which is a committee of Universities South Africa, which exists to lobby the interests of universities. She also sits on a number of boards outside of the university – purposefully selected for their activity in the higher education sector.

A recent highlight for Nolwazi was her nomination for the 2019 CFO Awards, along with just 17 other leading South African finance executives. She says she is enormously grateful to have been nominated, as it casts a spotlight on the work being done in a university’s finance department.

She explains that her own portfolio is a R7 billion annual budget entity. There is a combination of 8,000

staff – permanent and temporary – and 50,000 students, but on her team, there are only two chartered accountants. “Finance graduates don’t find it attractive to work in a university unless it’s in a teaching capacity. When people hear I work at UJ, they ask if I teach, and when I say I run finance, they are surprised – but there’s such a need for that. And there’s a real risk that some universities could end up in bad shape when it comes to governance without those accountancy skills.”

Finding time for family Nolwazi says that amidst all of this, she has to find the time for her two children – a 10-year-old boy and an eight-year-old girl. “But I am lucky to have a very hands-on husband, who is also an accountant but works closer to home and has less demanding hours than I do. Our domestic helper also plays a huge role.”

To relax, she reads anything that doesn’t have anything to do with work and politics. And she enjoys spending time with her family in the Eastern Cape. “I am from a huge clan there in PE, and I would love to be closer to their love and support – but I could never live there because of the wind.” l

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A healthy outlook

Clinix Health Group CFO Elisa Mkhize thinks deeply about her role and her place in the world. She shared her mantras, professional vision and personal commitments with Georgina Guedes.

E Photos: Ter Hollmann

lisa Mkhize has two mantras that she lives by. The first is: Success begins from within before it manifests on the outside. “This is why I do a lot of work on myself,” she says. The second is: Always do the right thing. “Everyone knows what the right thing is. You just have to gather the courage to do it. I live by those two mantras, and that’s how I find myself where I am today.”

Where she is today is in the role of CFO of Clinix Health Group, a private hospital group that owns and operates six private hospitals in South Africa. There are five hospitals in Gauteng, and one in Mafikeng. “We are the largest private hospital group in the market we operate in, and we pride ourselves in what we do,” Elisa says. “We run just over 1,400 beds, and we’ll be adding another 150 with a new hospital that’s going up.”

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The Clinix group’s purpose is to make affordable and quality healthcare services accessible to its market. Elisa is very proud of the company’s “rich and strong” history. “The CEO and founder is Dr Peter Matseke, who started the company just over 20 years ago, with a vision to solve for socio-economic issues in the post-apartheid era, with just R70,000 in his pocket. We’ve preserved that rich legacy. We want to continue to preserve that by continuing to provide quality and affordable healthcare services that are easily accessible to our communities.”

She is very excited about a Greenfield project – Clinix’s new and third hospital in Soweto called Dr Nthato Motlana Memorial Hospital, named after a struggle stalwart that historically fought for democracy and the provision of quality healthcare in black communities. This hospital is going to be

“Universal health coverage is a policy we advocate and support.

A healthy country with healthy people will result in a healthy economy.”

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PURPOSE the first 4-Star Green-rated hospital in South Africa, and will boost the group’s footprint to include 1,600 beds across the country.

“I see myself as a role model, impacting on the country and the world around me.

My goal is to keep developing myself.”

The hospital is close to the Protea Glen Mall and will include an adult ICU, Neo-natal ICU, maternity and paediatric wards, and state-of-the-art theatres. This hospital will be a mother-and-child specialised facility, bringing world-class care to Soweto residents. The group has also recently opened new cardiac facilities at its other hospital in Soweto, Dr SK Matseke Memorial Hospital, bringing complex cardiac healthcare services to its patients.

Of Clinix’s clients, 90 percent are medical aid patients in the middle-class income bracket – predominantly police, teachers and nurses.

The Clinix finance strategy In her role as CFO, which she took up in 2016, Elisa developed the finance strategy to support the business strategy, with the intention of driving growth. The group’s finance and admin team consists of about 500 people, working at the group’s various hospitals. She is very clear on the challenges and opportunities facing her in this role.

“With the current low growth economic climate, people are opting for lower medical aid options or opting out of medical aids altogether. That puts a lot of pressure on the medical aid schemes, who in turn push down on the hospital groups. Every year we negotiate tariffs with medical aids, and we’ve seen lower and lower tariff increases with the sluggish economic growth. This impacts on our top line directly. So our biggest challenge is to make sure that we run as efficient a business as possible so that we can generate additional profit margins to ensure sustainability.”

The opportunities, she says, are aligned to that. “We have to make sure we leverage systems and technology to aid us. We have a project at the moment to optimise the usage of our current systems and also identify processes that we can automate in the patient admin/revenue cycle, that will have the highest financial impact and returns. The aim is to empower the business in allocating those resources in such a way that every rand is invested in projects that will yield the highest return.”

She says that the finance function has evolved from pure stewardship or “financial gatekeeping” to being

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a business partner and an enabler of business growth. “The health industry is also fast advancing with technology and automation and we cannot afford to be left behind,” she says.

She adds that getting an organisation to buy into the changes that come with automation can be tough. “Before you can even talk about robotics and automation, you need to make sure your basics are right. You’ve got to have a solid environment to work in and this is where it’s crucial to ensure a strong control environment and robust business processes, that systems are in, working well and are well-integrated. It’s also equally important to have strong governance structures so that we can make sure that there’s no revenue or cash leakage in the system. We’re making a lot of good progress in the group in this regard.”

She says that Clinix is well positioned for the National Healthcare Insurance in the market in which it operates. “Universal health coverage is a policy we advocate and support. A healthy country with healthy people will result in a healthy economy. We’re gearing up and ready for it.”

Learning and influencing When asked how she chose a career in finance, Elisa says that her parents had a lot to do with it. “They are very passionate about education. They were both teachers with honours degrees and they led by example. They made sure all their children had a degree at a minimum. To this day I am very grateful for that.

They’ve had a great impact on my life, giving me a strong foundation that I’ve built on to this day.”

Her parents saw the potential for finance leadership in her and recommended that she go into accounting – as it was not only aligned with her competencies, but also with her core values. She takes that to heart in her current role, all these years later.

“I believe that the role of the CFO can’t just be played by anybody. Strong ethics and good governance must be at the core of every single CFO. They must form the base and foundation of the value system that you operate by. My professional life is aligned and fully congruent with my personal values and who I am.”

She believes that people should never be confused about what to expect when they approach a CFO. “They must be able to anticipate what answer they are going to get when they come to you. It shows that you are consistent and truthful. The truth is hard, but it

“The health industry is also fast advancing with technology and automation and we cannot afford to be left behind.”

has the highest returns. Ultimately people will get on board with what you are doing and understand your objectives. Those are the values by which I operate.”

She believes in continuing to impart the importance of education to those around her. She has two mentees, one at Wits and the other at UCT, and she is also supporting a child through education.

“I am very passionate about young women and education. A degree is the minimum that you need to empower yourself, but you need to be constantly building on that. A CA qualification gives you the foundation, but as a CFO it’s your responsibility to keep growing yourself in line with industry developments, where the world is going, and economic developments.

I see myself as a role model, impacting on the country and the world around me. My goal is to keep developing myself. That’s how I’ve been successful thus far, and how I am going to keep reaching higher.”

Family and fitness Elisa doesn’t only challenge herself professionally, she also pushes herself physically. She says she’s inspired by her husband, who has just completed the full Iron Man. “He’s on another level,” she says. “But all of that

has rubbed off on me, and I spend a fair amount of time exercising at the gym, and I love running. I keep active because I believe that being healthy gives you a chance of performing at your highest level. So for health reasons it’s not an option, but I’ve also grown to enjoy it.”

Her husband is in the same profession and runs his own business. “We bounce off each other. There are a lot of synergies.”

She says that her family is her foundation, and they need to get taken care of at all times. “I have a 15-yearold, a seven-year-old and a six-year-old – two boys and a girl. I love spending time with them. I make sure that when it’s family time, I put away my laptop, switch off completely and turn my attention to them. I believe it’s more about priority and quality as opposed to a “work/life” balance, it’s about being present and attentive when spending time with family.

She continues to be inspired by her mother, who is still studying to this day. “Now that she’s retired, she’s exploring her passion for drama and arts. She does it with her whole heart and her go-getting spirit. She’s still fit and at her age, doing all of this is just amazing. l

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Ditebogo Modiba, CFO of SAMRO

Disruption & “Adapt or die” Over 150 leading CFOs gathered at Marble Restaurant in Rosebank for the annual CFO Day to network and learn how to adapt to new ways of doing business, or disrupt their own industries.

O

n 23 March, CFO South Africa, in partnership with Deloitte, Workday, Sage and SAP Concur, and in associate partnership with KPMG and Cushman & Wakefield | Broll, hosted the annual CFO Day at Marble Restaurant.

CFO South Africa MD Joël Roerig welcomed the 150 leading CFOs before introducing the “doyen of South African comedy” Pieter-Dirk Uys, who had guests heartily laughing about South Africa’s political leaders, from the architects of apartheid to the dawn of democracy.

After being treated to a meal of Marble Restaurant’s

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finest fresh-off-the-grill offerings, the first panel of the afternoon – The Disruption Debate – was populated by A2X CEO Kevin Brady, G4S CEO Mel Brooks, Investec Life CEO Michael Goemans, and SNG Grant Thornton CEO Victor Sekese.

They discussed what it takes to challenge the market leaders with a new offering, and their insights on agility, people and technology, or immense value to any business leader – and not just those intent on market disruption.

The second panel – Surviving to thriving: Adapt or die – featured EOH CEO Stephen van Coller, T-Systems

Kevin Brady, A2X CEO with Risto Ketola, Momentum Metropolitan Holdings CFO

Mel Brooks, G4S Africa president

Mikateko Tshetshe, VP Finance Africa, Unilever

Sipho Maseko, Telkom CEO XXX

MD Dineo Molefe and Telkom CEO Sipho Maseko. They looked at companies that have come back from the brink of business failure, with presentations from the people responsible for these turnarounds.

“People want to be dealt with fairly and in a transparent manner. The relationship between management and labour doesn’t have to be adversarial. But it has been that way for a very long time so it can take a very long time to change that dynamic,” Sipho said.

In keeping with the “Surviving to thriving” theme of the panel, stress expert and coach to professionals and athletes Richard Sutton next delivered a fascinating talk on how stress affects people, and how it can be harnessed for productivity and motivation.

He explained to the business leaders in the room how their stress affects others, and challenged them to adopt the following behaviours to reduce the workplace stress that they create:

“Firstly, reward positive behaviours. Secondly, be supportive and encourage mutual support. Competitivity destroys people, whereas rewarding people will bring out the best in them. Thirdly, give people more control and authority, let them feel that they have a voice. And finally, be fair and consistent in your treatment of and behaviour towards others, and eliminate prejudice.”

Business Results Group CEO Nicola Tyler – the “chief summarising officer” of the event – highlighted the key themes of the day’s discussions, identifying the salient points of each presentation and writing them up in a series of hand-drawn-and-illustrated slides.

Ending CFO Day on a humorous note, Pieter-Dirk Uys returned to the stage, delivering the second half of his performance. He looked the leaders South Africa has enjoyed since becoming a democratic state.

“Toast the future and your dreams and your professionalism with a glass that is always half full and never half empty,” Pieter said. l

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GROWTH

FINANCE EXECS HAVE THEIR EYES ON THE

CEO SEAT CFOs are an ambitious bunch, and the majority feel that their next career move should be into the CEO role. They also believe that the future CFO should be more like a co-pilot or deputy CEO. Other than planning their future careers, South Africa’s CFOs believe mandatory audit firm rotation is long overdue, that they need to continue to be more diligent in the wake of audit failures, and that they should be more involved in M&A activity.

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n 23 July, many of South Africa’s leading CFOs gathered at Marble Restaurant in Johannesburg to network, learn and be inspired. They were asked to fill in a survey detailing their views on the prevailing issues on the current business and finance landscape. Some 61 CFOs filled in the survey, giving an enlightening insight into the current concerns of CFOs and FDs in the South African economic climate.

61 CFOs filled in the survey – where do they work?

30%

39%

JSE-listed companies

26%

Unlisted companies

Multinationals

3%

Government

Agree completely

72%

OF CFOs HAVE THEIR EYE ON A

Neutral & no answer

An overwhelming majority of CFOs have their eyes on the CEO hot seat for their next career step, with 72 percent saying that they are aiming for that particular appointment as their next role, compared to 66 percent last year. [To find out more about CFOs who’ve made the leap, how they got there, and what they’ve learnt, turn to page 38 to hear first-hand from those who’ve done it.]

Agree somewhat

CAREER

CEO APPOINTMENT

After my current role, I hope to… …retire

...move to another company in the same role 8% 12%

8%

22%

13%

3% 53%

3%

Disagree somewhat

5%

…become a CEO

7%

43%

16% 13% Disagree completely

41%

29%

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96%

FUTURE CFOs Looking to their futures in their current roles, CFOs relish the relationship they have with their CEOs, and hope that they can be seen as making a valued contribution as co-pilots in the organisation. In the survey, 96 percent of participating CFOs said that they believe that the future CFO is the deputy CEO.

OF CFOs SAY THE FUTURE CFO SHOULD BE A

DEPUTY CEO

The future CFO I would like to be is... …chief data officer, who advises the CEO and the board at every turn about strategic risks and opportunities.

…chief process officer, who will make sure that the CEO and board can trust that governance, compliance and ethics are adhered to by people and the largely automated processes they run.

3%

2%

15%

20%

30%

2%

Disagree completely

32% 15%

6% 64%

Disagree somewhat Neutral & no answer

2% 29%

36%

41%

ETHICS Recent audit failures in the public and private sector, both within organisations and at the firms auditing them, have increased both diligence by and scrutiny of finance professionals. Interestingly, the proportion of CFOs who say that they have become more cautious and prudent as a result of these failures (92 percent) has increased since last year’s survey, when the same question yielded a 75 percent positive response.

Recent audit failures and publicity around corporate and public fraud and corruption have... ...made me more cautious ...driven me to focus more and prudent. on strong leadership in the finance team.

5% 3%

39%

Agree completely

Agree somewhat

…deputy CEO, overseeing the working and output of the finance department and being the co-pilot of the CEO in building the business.

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8%

53%

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92% OF CFOs ARE

MORE CAUTIOUS

IN THE WAKE OF RECENT AUDIT FAILURES

...increased the level of attention board members give to finance.

3%

6%

30%

36% 59%

2%

56%

75%

ROBOTS South Africa advances into the age of automation in fits and starts, sometimes leapfrogging older technologies entirely, sometimes lagging behind developed nations. Overall though, 75 percent of finance executives think that South Africa is lagging behind – a slight improvement on last year’s 78 percent.

OF CFOs FEEL THAT SA IS

LAGGING BEHIND IN AI, ROBOTICS AND IOT

The changes to finance teams through innovation in the space of AI, robotics, IoT and computer learning is... ...lagging behind the international trend in South Africa.

...prompting me to hire fewer accountants and more other specialists.

2%

5% 2%

6% 5%

3% 31%

18%

...making members of my team worried about their job security.

26%

30%

28% Agree completely

38%

39%

44%

23%

Agree somewhat

74%

TRANSFORMATION To succeed in South Africa, businesses must embrace transformation – for their own benefit and for the broader benefit of the nation. Fortunately, 74 percent of CFOs agree completely or agree somewhat that their organisations are transformed – a significant improvement on last year’s 57 percent. However, 49 percent say that they struggle to retain the talent to keep transforming.

Neutral & no answer

OF CFOs AGREE THAT THEIR ORGANISATIONS ARE

TRANSFORMED

Transformation is an imperative in South Africa... ... luckily, my organisation is well-transformed.

...but I can't hire and retain the right talent to transform.

8%

13%

3% 7%

13%

36%

15%

25%

7%

Disagree somewhat

6%

...but I am struggling to convince my fellow executives of this.

40%

38%

Disagree completely

36% 15%

33%

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DEALMAKING Businesses are increasingly growing their customer base, footprint and innovation capacity through acquisition. In many instances, the responsibility for overseeing corporate M&As lies with the CFO, but this didn’t stop the survey respondents from stating that they would like even more responsibility in this area. Of those surveyed, 93 percent said that CFOs should be more involved than they have been in the past.

93%

OF CFOS SHOULD BE MORE INVOLVED IN

M&A

M&A is often a tango between executives and advisors, and... ...CFOs should be more involved than in the past.

...I expect dealmaking to increase in importance compared to organic growth at my company.

3% 2%

12%

Disagree completely

16%

Disagree somewhat Neutral & no answer Agree somewhat

13%

3%

10%

77%

Mandatory audit firm rotation (MAFR) comes into effect on 1 April 2023, and many companies are rotating early to avoid the rush – at March 2019, 17 percent of JSE-listed firms had rotated auditors. While some CFOs expressed that they believe this is unnecessary or a burden, 77 percent of respondents said that MAFR is long overdue.

38%

7%

77% MAFR

OF CFOs BELIEVE IS LONG

Mandatory audit firm rotation… …is a burden on businesses, but the shake-up of the audit industry is positive.

3% 7% 13%

24%

36%

34%

16%

10%

15%

39%

AUDIT ROTATION

…is long overdue and is creating more diversity and independence among auditors.

...my loyalty is with the advisors, not with the companies they work for.

OVERDUE

…is an unnecessary musical chairs of audit firms, costing time and money without many benefits.

2%

20%

21%

26%

Agree completely

13%

39%

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57%

36%

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GROWTH

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CFO MAGAZINE • CFO.CO.ZA

According to fresh results from this year’s CFO Day Survey, nearly three quarters of all CFOs are eyeing the top job and aspire to be CEO after their current role. And their ambitions are not unrealistic: a third of all CEOs of the JSE Top-40 are previous finance executives. But what does it take to scale the highest summit? Which different skills are required? How do you move from numbers to people and strategy? CFO Magazine spoke to five former CFOs who were promoted to CEO – at AECOM Africa, Attacq, the FoodBev SETA, Imperial Logistics and Peregrine – to find out what it takes.

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GROWTH

A FINANCE CAPTAIN STEERING AN ENGINEERING SHIP The CFO of AECOM Africa since 2014, Joe Ndala was assigned an additional role in August 2018 as the managing director of AECOM’s South Africa business under the newly-formed Middle East & Africa (MEA) region. His leadership role therefore wasn’t one of simply stepping up but also of stepping across. By Georgina Guedes

“

I had to be agile in working with the Middle East leadership team to ensure a structured approach as one region with minimal disruption,” he says. “I had to instil a collaborative approach while demonstrating trust in a new structure. But to do so I had to be convinced first as to what benefits the changes would bring.”

confident in my abilities, learn new skills, and manage other people’s expectations. Likewise, I had to learn to be more outgoing and have stronger presence as a leader.”

He says that what helped him was the fact that he always anticipates change and remains agile, which make it possible for him to maintain a calm demeanour and help others navigate through uncertain times.

“I am expected to be an enabler, to guide the ship through storms – such as difficult market conditions – into new ventures and adjust rapidly to global shifts that economic markets create.”

In his new role, he was also tasked with improving collaboration between the finance and operations teams, so that finance could be more externally focused and support client engagement, while looking for new ways to grow the business.

He says that while it is in his nature to anticipate uncertainty, he was able to contain his own concerns so that he could inspire and motivate his team.

Joe points out that he often acted in the CEO or MD role before.

“During that period, I always liaised with my coach who guided me on how to get the most out of the different teams. His advice still rings in my ears until this day: ‘Be a good listener and ask questions’.”

In this regard, his experience as the CFO was clearly very useful. But at the same time, he had to make sure that he saw the bigger picture, while getting to grips with his expanded responsibilities. He describes the move up as “moving out of a comfort zone and into a growth zone”.

Support comes from unexpected places, and Joe confesses he was also motivated by a colleague who had a note that read, “What’s stopping you?” on his desk. “After a time, I started to feel that it was speaking directly to me. That note fuelled in me a desire to take responsibility without waiting to be asked.”

“During that transition, I had to be

However, it’s not easy to let go of

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the finance role which has come so naturally for so long, and Joe says that he’s still learning to look at broader business factors. “For example, every Monday morning, I chair a leadership meeting and when I prepare the agenda, I find myself thinking about finance KPIs more than I should.”

To make sure he’s getting the right mix, he checks in with his colleagues. “I ask them if the meeting was balanced or if it was leaning more towards finance issues, and the feedback helps me to self-check.”

Another simple step he took was to alter his physical environment. “I moved my desk. Every morning when I get to the office, the desk’s new position subconsciously reminds me of my new responsibilities.”

He also schedules time to walk all the floors to gain an understanding of what people are involved in so that he can offer them support or motivation.

All of this, he says, will support him in driving his vision for the Africa business’ future in the MEA region, which is to increase the brand recognition and reputation, expand its footprint and inspire innovation.

UNDERSTANDING HUMAN BEHAVIOUR IS CRUCIAL Attacq’s Melt Hamman says being a CEO is like conducting an orchestra: you have to make sure that everyone is playing in tune. By Georgina Guedes

M

elt Hamman, the CEO of Attacq, was appointed as acting CEO on 1 December 2017 after the resignation of Morne Wilken. In June 2018 he was officially appointed to the CEO role. Likening the CEO role to that of a conductor, he says: “As CFO, you are one of the players, like the drums. So it is a bit of a leap to becoming a CEO. It’s less complicated to be a drummer than a conductor.”

He said it was particularly rough when he was playing the dual role – wearing one hat in one meeting and another in the next. “Being a CEO is a mindset. You have to take a leap out of the detail and start to manage the business and the team – be the conductor. If one of your players isn’t in tune, you need to help him – show him how to play the drums, or the violin.”

The biggest benefit from coming to the role from the CFO position was that he had a deep understanding of the business. “I joined the company six months prior to the listing in 2013. It was a small company with only 40 people. Now there are

142. So when I joined I was a Jack of all trades – I did HR, IT, risk – and gained a deep understanding of the business.”

He adds that another significant focus of the CFO of today is governance, and having been in the finance head role in a post-Steinhoff business environment helped him to be very analytical and structured about the way that the business operates.

Melt says he’s lucky to have always been a people person, so he’s risen to the challenge of understanding human behaviour as CEO. “A big focus for us at Attacq is looking at what creates positive energy for us as individuals, and then as a company, and then, on the flip side, looking at what zaps our energy, so that we can do more of what creates energy and address what zaps it.”

Some of the energy-zapping things that have been identified are toolong meetings, or too many emails, so he tries to put processes in place to help address these.

He says that right now, South Africans in general are suffering

from a sense of “gatvolheid”, being overwhelmed by negative news.

“Gatvolheid is a mental state that leads to disengagement.” So we have to address it in Attacq and also in South Africa more broadly. I gave a talk about it in which I said to my colleagues, most of you are in a relationship or have kids, so you must be extremely careful that you address your negativity, so that you create positive energy in your homes.”

Melt says that positivity can come from going back to basics – simple things like greeting each other and saying goodbye every day. He also encourages people to be engaged and to collaborate. “If the tea lady has an idea on how to save milk, I want to hear that idea.”

To any other CFO hoping to become a CEO, he recommends understanding the business and understanding human behaviour.

“In the process of developing yourself, you need to build relationships within the company and gain a deep understanding of what is happening in your market globally, then in your sector, and finally, in your company.”

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GROWTH

BEING A CEO WAS ALWAYS A PART OF THE PLAN From acting CEO, back to CFO, to acting CEO and then finally being permanently appointed to the role, Nokuthula Selamolela’s journey may not have been exactly the one she planned, but now that she’s reached her destination, she’s exactly where she always wanted to be. By Beth Amato

C

EOs, with their overfull schedules and multitude of responsibilities, don’t always find the time to be friendly or engaging.

But when Nokuthula Selamolela is with you she’s all ears and present, with a charm that makes conversation flow. Nokuthula is the CEO of the Food and Beverage Manufacturing (FoodBev) SETA, with a hectic schedule that often sees her working late into the night. Perhaps it’s her convivial nature, but there wasn’t a hint of resentment when describing her day, often filled with urgent meetings and last-minute activities.

Nokuthula, prior to being officially appointed in 2019 as the CEO of the FoodBev SETA, acted in the position for four years. Her journey to this position has been interesting.

In 2013, she joined the company as the CFO, and very soon after this, was appointed the acting CEO – a job she took on for six months

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before a replacement was found.

But the person appointed as CEO didn’t stay in the position for long, so Nokuthula swiftly stepped in.

In these five years, Nokuthula continued to perform the duties of the CFO. Perhaps it’s this kind of pressure that made it necessary for her to cultivate a calm and friendly attitude.

“Interestingly, I had always wanted to be a CEO – it was part of my bigger plan – even though I didn’t quite see the journey play out as it has at the FoodBev SETA. I became the CEO in a rather roundabout fashion,” she says.

Nokuthula says that her experience as a CFO is invaluable in her current role, because it helps her to see the business from all angles.

“CEOs have their MBAs and they’re good at operational tasks, but the CFO is analytical, excellent with numbers and decisive. The two usually make a formidable team.

I’m glad I have both skillsets.”

Now that she’s officially the CEO and needn’t perform the duties of the CFO (she appointed a very capable person to the position), her time is freed up to take the FoodBev SETA to new heights.

In particular, Nokuthula spends a lot of time thinking about and preparing for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, through which artificial intelligence and mass digitisation will become realities in South Africa. “Our role is in training and skills development, when we foresee that automation will erase many manufacturing jobs. We are finding ways to make our training more relevant, and that’s often about preparing students for change,” she says.

Nokuthula says that all CEOs should be on top of the trends in the industry. “You need to be reading as much as you can and have an appetite for lifelong learning,” she says.

OVERSEEING AN UNBUNDLING AS CFO, THEN TAKING THE REINS AS CEO The biggest leap in transitioning from CFO to CEO was thinking more about strategy and people than numbers, says Mohammed Akoojee, Imperial Logistics CEO. “If you get those two things right, financial performance will follow.” By Georgina Guedes

I

n June 2018 it was announced that the long-planned unbundling of listed transport and mobility group Imperial Holdings into a logistics business, Imperial Logistics, and Motus, a vehicle value-chain business, was a reality. It was believed that the separation would enhance the two units’ longterm fortunes and strategic focus.

Mohammed Akoojee was the CEO of the Logistics African Regions business at Imperial Holdings when the Imperial Holdings executive and board asked him to assist with the unbundling in the capacity of the group CFO for Imperial Holdings. “I am an ex-investment banker and was head of M&A for the group. I had wanted to get operational experiences, so that’s why I had taken on the Africa region role in 2015,” he says.

After the conclusion of the unbundling, he was appointed as CEO designate of Imperial Logistics, but when CEO Marius Swanepoel tendered his resignation, Mohammed took up the role. “My path to the role of CEO of Imperial Logistics was planned – I was to implement the unbundling of Motus and when Marius retired, I would take over.”

He was prepared for the position by his various roles in the company over 10 years. “I was a functional

specialist, doing all the M&A for the group, and working in investor relations. Then I went into an operational role as CEO of the African Regions business, which I knew well because I had been part of the process of acquiring them.”

He says that there was a big shift in focus, going from being a functional specialist to running a business with 3,000 people across 12 different countries. “You can’t be in the same mode, so you have to change your style. But you still have the same core strength in terms of what makes you successful, so you can lean on that.”

One of the things he’s had to do is work on his EQ, which he says is a lot more important than IQ for leaders. “It’s how you engage and motivate people and get them to buy into your ideas. Sometimes you have to convince people, which is something I’ve learnt is very important over time. As I’ve moved through my career at Imperial, I’ve had to sharpen those skills to get the best out of and lead through people.”

He says that while his initial strength lay in the finance side, he’s had to become more strategically focused since he became a CEO. “A CEO can’t spend all his time worrying about the numbers. You have to change gear and think about strat-

egy and people development. I believe that if the business and people strategies are right, then the financial performance will reflect that. My job is to get those first two right, so that the numbers will follow.”

He says that the mark he’d like to leave behind is for Imperial Logistics to be immediately recognised as one of the benchmarks in the industry. “When you think logistics, you think of a large global logistics firm – I want us to be there. We don’t have a global brand position and people don’t immediately think of joining Imperial when they graduate. So I’d like to build a legacy of becoming a brand and employer of choice. I am focused on that.”

Mohammed says that because he spends a lot of time away from home, he spends any free time he can with his family – his children are 10 and five. They don’t compromise on spending holidays together as a family, and he says that they particularly enjoy beach and action vacations.

“I’ve seen the value of travelling. I’ve seen how it’s helped me to develop and grow as a person and I’d like my kids to have that – an opening up of perspective on life.”

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LESSONS FROM HISTORY AND A PASSION FOR PEOPLE Understanding people is crucial to the CEO role, says Peregrine Holdings CEO Robert Katz. He’s so passionate about this aspect of leadership that he says if he had his time over, he would have studied psychology. By Beth Amato

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efore Robert Katz was appointed the CEO of Peregrine Holdings in 2017, he’d held the CFO position at the company for seven years. But the transition into the CEO role wasn’t a difficult one.

“The CEO’s job and the CFO’s job are not all that different. You attend the same meetings. You have a detailed feel for the numbers. You’re at one with the business and its subsidiaries,” says Katz.

Katz was never the kind of CFO that closed himself off behind a desk and a wall of numbers. He chose to be involved at the highest level and to know all aspects of the business intricately. “If you were the CFO that focused purely on the financials, then yes, the changeover would be hard,” he notes.

When considering the key characteristics of a CFO, being a dynamic people person is not among the top three on the list. But if one steps into the shoes of the CEO, possessing emotional intelligence and dealing with the complexities of the human condition are essential. Katz’s passion for understanding the human heart and mind is intrinsic. He valued people in his CFO days and continues to aspire to near-perfect people management.

“As a CEO, I can’t tell you how important it is to have knowledge

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about people – their drives and motivations. To understand their ebbs and flows. In fact, if I had my time over, I would definitely have studied psychology,” says Katz.

Genghis Khan, the ruthless and bloodthirsty leader of the Mongol Empire, would beg to differ. His autocratic leadership style may have advanced the expansion of the empire and he may have gotten things done, but Katz believes this kind of management style is outdated and inefficient.

“Long gone are the days where it’s the CEO’s way or the highway. To be an efficient leader, you need to collaborate, listen and be truly inclusive. I don’t want to be a dictator; I’d rather lead by example and facilitate the process by those who work with me can be the best that they can be,” says Katz.

For people to be genial and productive, he says that “the three legs of the work happiness tripod” must be strong. The first leg of the tripod is salary and fair remuneration; the second is the people one works with and; the third is meaningful and fulfilling work. “In my 30 years of experience, if one of those legs becomes wobbly, everything else falls apart and the person is sure to leave the company. You can earn a fortune but have a tyrannical manager, and you’ll be miserable.”

Katz says that being a CFO taught him how to hold it all together.

“It’s all very relentless – budgets, half-year revised estimates, yearend financials, quarterly reviews, monthly board meetings…As a listed company, you’re heavily scrutinised and there’s not a lot of margin for error.”

But Katz says that he was born with high energy levels. He has always been restless and ambitious and easily exists on five and a half hours of sleep each night. He has a passion for Russian history, and is currently reading the works of little-known Russian author Vasily Grossman, whose literary tome Life and Fate is what Katz believes to be the twentieth-century equivalent of Tolstoy’s War and Peace.

“While I am fascinated by the Russians, I certainly don’t follow the Stalin five-year plan in business. I don’t even think we can make threeyear plans with the rate of change we are experiencing,” says Katz.

Before joining Peregrine Holdings in 2010, Katz was Standard Bank’s finance director of Retail Banking for eight years. He had previously been the CEO of Educor, and then the director of Microsoft SA. His seamless switch between CFO and CEO is historically rooted.

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Photos: Patrick and Lizelle Furter

Phemelo Matlou, financial analyst at Afgri Group Holdings,

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with Rivasha Maharaj, her CFO

Lourandi Kriel, CFO of InQuba

orking onderwomen show up for themselves

At the Working Wonderwomen’s dinner at the start of Women’s Month, leading businesswomen shared and solved the most challenging aspects of being a working woman in a discriminatory world.

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n 1 August, CFO South Africa in partnership with Workday hosted the Working Wonderwomen’s dinner at the Radisson Blu Sandton, where leading businesswomen and their mentees shared their own experiences of sexism and discrimination in the workplace, as well as how they moved on or overcame the barriers on their paths to success.

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CFO South Africa editor-in-chief Georgina Guedes started the dinner off by welcoming the women guests and invited Beyond the Dress founder Lori Milner onto the stage.

In her talk entitled ‘Showing up to yourself: In business and in life’, Lori said that although women excel at holding it together for everyone else, at work and in the family, “we are not making self-care a priority.”

Debbie Ransby, Connected Coaching executive Elisa Mkhize, CFO of the Clinix Health Group

coach, and Elmarie Naude, HR manager at Takeda

Palesa Letsoko, human capital graduate at Ster-Kinekor

Komatsu, and Fila Zondeki, HR executive of Wesbank

Annemarie Vijoen, head of talent and development,

The top takeaways from Lori’s presentation were that self-care is not selfish and that time is not the enemy – we are. She explained that often when we struggle to fit in time for ourselves, it is because we are putting other people’s agendas before our own.

After Lori had inspired the guests to add 15 minutes into their schedule for themselves, Georgina facilitated a panel of high-powered HR and finance executives that consisted of Clinix Health Group CFO Elisa Mkhize, Afgri Group CFO Rivasha Maharaj, Mondelēz International HR director of South and Central East Africa Cebile Xulu, and Connected Coaching executive coach Debbie Ransby.

Elisa shared how, despite immense pressure at work, she had made time for her annual family Christmas, and when she returned to the office she felt rejuvenated and focused.

Both Rivasha and Elisa emphasised how important it is to be utterly present, whether they are at home or at work.

Debbie reiterated the need for self-knowledge, saying that you need to figure out when you are most productive – in the morning or at night. She explained how she, as an introvert, has learnt that she needs to take time out alone to re-energise. “That’s who I am,” she said.

Cebile left many women aghast when she described being told she wasn’t soft and motherly enough for a role. Several months later, Cebile received an apology from the MD after his preferred appointee failed, was offered the role and held it successfully for years.

The panelists all agreed that workplaces should focus on outputs rather than worked hours, as this allows for employees – both men and women – the flexibility that they need in life, while making them accountable for their own performance.

Rivasha echoed what Lori had said about being your own worst enemy. She explained how she viewed herself as her own competition, rather than taking criticism from others. When it comes to everyone else, she says: “If I wanted your opinion, I would have given it to you.”

The evening concluded with a delicious dinner and interactive exercise in which each table of executive women and their mentees shared and tried to find collaborative solutions to a challenge that one of the women faces. l

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INVEST WISELY YO U R E M P L OY E E S ’ R E T I R E M E N T F U N D S

Many employers neglect to focus on their employees’ retirement fund, because it simply isn’t the core focus of the business. These are some of the key considerations in making sure you are investing to give your staff the future security they need. By Malusi Ndlovu

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esearch has proven that successful longterm investing requires investors to stay invested for the long haul and to ignore the noise in the market. At times like the present, this can be easier said than done. When you are investing people’s retirement money as part of an employee benefits scheme, the responsibility is on the board (be it a board of trustees or a management board in an umbrella fund) to make investment decisions that will result in the best outcomes for these employees. For many employees their retirement savings are their biggest financial asset and the fund’s board must ensure that the investment decisions they make are appropriate and responsible.

The ever-changing economic and investment environment, together with literally hundreds of different portfolios to choose from, can be very daunting for the board, many of whom are not investment experts. It is essential to partner with the right consultant who has the appropriate experience, skills and resources to guide the board – understanding their fund and its membership and setting clear objectives, designing an appropriate investment strategy that complies with the various regulations, researching and selecting asset managers and then monitoring and reporting on the strategy.

Delivering what members need A successful long-term investment strategy requires clear goals to anchor the strategy and prevent emotions from driving decisions. Before even thinking about what asset manager or portfolio to use it’s critical to have an in-depth understanding of the members and what they need from the strategy to grow their contributions and ultimately provide a decent pension. In our view a decent pension means that it needs to be about 70 to 75

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percent of the salary the member was earning before they retired (based on before-tax salary). Clear goals entail having a good understanding of what members require in terms of returns above inflation, which translates into an investment strategy constructed with the highest probability of achieving these inflationbeating returns.

We believe in helping clients to understand the risks they need to accept in order to reach their goals, rather than seeking protection, which can be costly, and is not necessary if they focus on their long-term goals. Throughout the process, the focus is always to empower funds and their trustees, through meaningful information, knowledge and skills. This will enable them to confidently make important investment decisions on an ongoing basis.

Investment training Training on investments is a valuable service to boards as this assists directly in building financial confidence and awareness. The more the board knows about markets, asset classes, investment strategies, asset managers, investment styles, pooling vehicles and platforms, types of fees and charges and the inherent risks, the better they are positioned to quiz their providers, ask the right questions, resist the behavioural pitfalls and consistently make good investment decisions.

Member engagement and communication A retirement fund exists to deliver retirement benefits for the members. The investment strategy needs to be simple and well-understood by the members. We encounter two types of members in the retirement schemes we advise – 1) those who are unsure of

investments and would prefer to leave decisions to the fund’s board or other experts, and 2) those members who have an interest in investments and wish to make active choices to suit their needs. It’s important to cater for both of these members.

The first group is addressed by putting in place a solid default strategy (compliant with Regulation 37).

Allowance for the second group is made by introducing investment choice – we usually advise that the choices be limited to a handful of suitable long-term strategies that aren’t too conservative. Regular and simple communication and individualised projection letters to members showing expected monthly pension amount, are all essential features of a member-centric retirement fund.

can analyse and track the success rate and then use this information to tweak the investment strategy for better results.

A superior employee benefits package for staff doesn’t happen by accident. Yet, many employers are focused on running their business and the retirement fund can be neglected. Partnering with an experienced and knowledgeable consultant who you trust to provide member-centric advice can have a dramatic impact on the benefits that your staff and their families will enjoy, while they are working or when they leave either on resignation, death or retirement.l Malusi Ndlovu is the general manager of Old Mutual Corporate Consultants

The formulation of an investment policy statement A well-written investment policy statement (IPS) is an essential governance document for any board as it outlines the process and the decisions reached in developing the investment strategy. The IPS can include your investment goals and the strategies that will be implemented to achieve those goals.

An IPS can also include information such as risk tolerance and asset allocation. Members or other stakeholders have access to the IPS to help them understand the investment strategy. It’s also useful for new board members to get to grips with the board’s thinking and decisions. Although it’s possible to get a basic template of an IPS and cut and paste from other similar documents, a wellconsidered IPS requires careful thought, so an asset consultant can play a valuable role here.

Advice on asset manager selection and appointment Asset managers all have their own philosophies and personal belief systems. It takes years of experience in the industry to get to know and understand the different asset managers and their styles and reputations. It also requires having one’s finger on the pulse to know when to stick with a manager and when to consider a change.

Targeted retirement outcomes For employers who don’t have the time, capacity or skill to actively manage and monitor the fund’s investment strategy, implemented consulting is an end-to-end solution that empowers fund decisionmakers to implement an appropriate investment strategy and communication framework, which increases members’ chances of a comfortable retirement. This is an outcomes-based service that

At Old Mutual Corporate Consultants, we are not just consultants – we are connected partners to our clients. To connect with us, please contact: Rodney Msimango RMsimango@oldmutual.com +27 11 217 1420

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KOBUS GERTENBACH’S DREAM OF FLYING Need to fly a couple of executives into Lesotho to visit one of Premier’s bakery operations? No need to book a commercial flight – CFO Kobus Gertenbach has achieved his lifelong dream of getting his pilot’s licence and is more than equal to the task. By Georgina Guedes

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Photos: Patrick Furter

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“Some of my friends’ wives have forbidden them to fly with me.”

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remier CFO Kobus Gertenbach’s father was a civil engineer. A colleague of his had a plane, and during the school holidays, Kobus would fly with them on site inspections and meetings. While the meetings themselves weren’t that exciting, the means of getting there were all the motivation that young Kobus needed to tag along.

These early, school-holiday flight experiences planted the seed of a lifelong dream, and finally, in May last year, Kobus qualified as a private pilot.

He met CFO South Africa at Lanseria Airport to explain what this involved, and have photos taken of his plane.

Kobus holds a Private Pilot’s Licence, which involves nine examinations, at least 45 hours of flying instruction, and annual recertification.

“You have to recertify annually because you don’t often use your emergency procedures, so it’s important that you don’t become complacent,” Kobus explains, standing outside the hangar at the airport where the private Cirrus airplanes are kept. His is a Cirrus SR22 five seater in white and blue – an elegant and attractive small aircraft with a sufficiently spacious interior to make passengers feel comfortable.

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With their propellers and gleaming fuselages, the planes look like something out of a glossy catalogue.

The hangar floor is spotless, and the fleet of Cirruses are reflected in shimmering brilliance. In their midst, Kobus is right at home. In this space, after all, he can do something he’s longed to do since he was a child.

“Achieving a lifelong dream is of course extremely satisfying, and it also brings a certain sense of contentment that the hard work and dedication was all worth the effort,” says Kobus.

Take to the skies After a few shots with his plane, Kobus asks, “Would you like to go for a flight?”

Without a second thought, Patrick, our photographer, and I agreed. Kobus prepped the plane with confidence and efficiency. It didn’t even occur to me to question his competence. “But some of my friends’ wives have forbidden them to fly with me,” he says with an amused twinkle in his eye.

The plane thus prepared for a quick flip over Hartebeespoort, it taxied down the runway and effortlessly lifted us skywards. The desolate beauty of the

GROWTH sparse winter highveld unfurled beneath us, with farms, fields and wilderness making up a patchwork of browns and greens. Small planes generally offer a bumpier experience than their large commercial counterparts, but the gentle dips and lifts all contribute to the experience of being in the air.

Kobus chatted to us through our headsets, updating us on the route, and informing us that we were in the Magaliesberg General training airspace. He kept up conversation with air traffic control and other planes in the air, adjusting our altitude and explaining the flight considerations. It’s surprising just how many small aircraft are skyborne on a random weekday morning over Hartebeespoort.

Any anxiety I might have felt was allayed by Kobus’s calm proficiency – and the full-plane parachute that Cirrus planes have, which can be activated from the cockpit with the pull of a handle.

Our flip over the dam and countryside complete, we made our way back to Lanseria.

Flying hours and beyond Other than entertaining editors and photographers, Kobus gets in his flying hours by taking his family on holiday – they have a home in Nature’s Valley, flying his daughters to and from tennis tournaments, and by flying other Premier executives to various sites and locations around the country – and even into other countries such as Mozambique and Eswatini. Only one or two refuse to fly with him.

His next goal is an instrument flight rating, which will allow him to fly in all weather conditions, giving him greater flexibility and range as he flies colleagues, family and those friends who have permission from their wives, around the country.

As dreams go, Kobus’s ambition of becoming a private pilot is a compelling one. The freedom, the technical competence, and the sheer joy of taking to the sky are all made manifest in his love of flying. l

“Achieving a lifelong dream is of course extremely satisfying, and it also brings a certain sense of contentment that hard work and dedication was all worth the effort.”

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INTELLIGENT BOARDROOM

The insight you need The responsibilities and influences of chief executives are not confined to their own companies and industries.

Executives need the right kind of board to support them in all of the strategic decisions they need to make.

By Kate Ferreira

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ntil relatively recently, the role of the corporate board had, arguably, remained largely unchanged for a century or more, but this is fundamentally no longer the case. Just as business has been experiencing increased volatility and uncertainty, and grappling with new markets, new modes of doing business, and the immense changes that digitisation and technology have introduced, the boards that oversee our organisations are being rocked by the same tectonic – or tech-tonic – shifts.

Dr Jacek Guzek is an associate director at Deloitte Consulting, responsible for strategic sensing and insight, part of the strategy area that is looking into trends and directions of markets in our changing world.

A nuclear physicist by training, Jacek spent much of his career in R&D for mining companies before making a shift into business with an MBA some two decades ago. He joined Deloitte and never looked back. Today, digital in mining is part of his wheelhouse, as are companies in the energy, resources and industrial sectors. Within this lies one of Deloitte’s newest and most exciting capabilities: the intelligent boardroom.

This, he says, is about equipping executives and boards with the insights required from a strategic perspective, to help them make decisions about the

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present and future. “The logic is informed by the relationship between the CEO and the board,” he says. “If you look at what a CEO needs from a board today, the rationale for strategic boards and intelligent boardrooms becomes very clear.”

The plight of the CEO “Being a CEO is an exposed position today. It is a prominent role, an active one, and people look up to you, meaning it is also sometimes a lonely position.

The buck stops with you,” says Jacek.

This is also why we are increasingly seeing a strong partnership forming between CEOs and CFOs, a relationship built on balance and trust. Similarly the C-suite needs a new relationship with their board.

The responsibilities and influences of chief executives are not only confined to their own operation and industry. They impact on multiple levels, including societal, cultural, environmental, and often even political. That is all happening in an increasingly complex, unpredictable, and disruptive world of today. In this context, Deloitte believes, the executives would appreciate having the right sounding board – pun intended – in all of the strategic decisions they need to take.

Jacek says: “We believe that the strategic board is not a ‘nice to have’. It's not enough to have the board

of the past to ‘just’ check the regulatory and fiduciary boxes. It should help the CEO in a great way to take those strategic decisions. If it is properly constituted, and if there is a proper relationship between the chief executives and board, then the board will really become a strategic asset, representing a wealth of strategic and leadership experience.”

The challenges at hand There are several needs, and dos and don’ts to consider, says Jacek, all of which are part of how Deloitte arrived at the concepts of the strategic board and intelligent boardroom: 1. The CEO needs to take an active role in shaping the board’s new strategic role, and their strategic impact. “We think it is the CEO's job to ensure that they have the right board for their needs. This is because most boards are not naturally positioned to drive change initiatives in behaviour or in mandate. There is a huge asymmetry of information between C-suite and board. This can deprive the chief executives of the board's true strategic value.”

2. The chief executives must be fearlessly open and transparent with the board, and they should have an expectation of that being reciprocated. “That is easier said than done. Most of the time the directors on the board want the CEO to be successful.

There is a great amount of goodwill which can be

used for his or her advantage. But CEOs need to openly solicit feedback, and demonstrate that they are open to it, that they listen, analyse and take heed of the input, empowering and encouraging the board to provide this input.”

3. The CEO should embrace tension and diversity of opinion within the board. This leads to options and different views which might be enriching. We think it is a great idea that the CEO brings some unfinished or even half-baked ideas to the board, something that can still take shape with the proper feedback and guidance, something that can benefit from diversity of views. Disagreements mean pitting ideas against each other, and may be inviting tension in the room, but constructive tension can be for the greater good. For this to be constructive, there needs to be trust, respect and support, as well as a degree of emotional maturity that means understanding that not every conflict can be resolved with immediate answers.”

4. Traditionally the board duty is equal to participating in a few discreet meetings throughout the year.

Deloitte believes that there is a lot to gain from facilitating the ‘board experience’, rather than a series of meetings, and that the CEO should facilitate this. “The board experience – as opposed to ‘just’ hosting board meetings – means that views take shape between meetings. Leaving that time ‘uninfluenced’ can be a waste,” he says.

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5. The CEO must not be shy to signal to the board what capabilities he or she expects the board to have. “Sometimes we see boards that are stale.

People get comfortable and there is very little movement, little fresh blood or new perspectives.

This was largely fine in the past, but it won’t work in the workplace of today and the future. Of course, it is not the role of the CEO to assume the nomination prerogative of board appointments, but there is nothing wrong with the CEO expressing their views on what calibre of people are needed, what kind of capacity, expertise, and capability they are looking for in order to have the board as a strategic advisor.”

6. Finally and most critically, the chief executives must provide the board with the right information, the right perspective, right quantum of information, through the right presentation. “This means not too much, not too little,” he says. “This is an ‘ought’ on its own, and this is where our intelligent boardroom helps. The board will only be as good to the CEO, to the company, as the information they possess and understand. So it is critical that we give the board the information they need to be helpful.”

The Goldilocks of insight Getting the balance of information provided is top priority. “It is so easy now with electronic communication to attach whatever information and distribute without thinking,” cautions Jacek. “But this also means we can send too much information. Someone needs to spend time on collating the right information, analysing it, and pointing out exceptions. Being guided by exceptions frees up the board from going systematically through everything which has already been agreed. Here we can very quickly and clearly focus the discussion on what is important.”

Deloitte’s position is that chief executives should be asking the board what is working, whether they are getting the right information, and in the right volume.

A few interactions like that will result in the information being tailored as required.

“This is an exciting thing that we have conceived here, and have been developing for a while,” says Jacek. “The intelligent boardroom we create for our clients focuses on integrating information, leveraging,technologies and digited assets to analyse – through machine learning, artificial intelligence and so on – to arrive at a situation where business performance is managed by exception, focusing on deviations from the plan, where they arise, understanding external risks, and if could they be avoided and how to avoid them in future.”

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In this way, the intelligent boardroom is a business tool that enhances strategic decision-making. “We are using technology to enable integration of data across our organisations, and also using data to understand what is happening in the market, what competitors are doing, and what factors are shaping the industry.

This allows us to have the right perspective to facilitate conversation around strategy.”

Diamonds in the rough Jacek says: “When we collaborate with clients it is at two levels: Firstly, there is a digital nerve centre level, then the intelligent boardroom on top.” At the first level, there is a data and analytics layer containing the right leading metrics and predictive analytics which draw information from various systems in the organisations, such as ERPs and sensors.

“This layer is designed to drive operational excellence, through full visibility of the operations in real time, and across the entire value chain,” he explains.

On top of this, as stated, sits the intelligent boardroom, which is the space between the operations and the corporate structure. “It is, importantly, based on information that is consistent across organisation, one version of the truth that the digital nerve centre provides. Once you have that, you can enable the strategic decision-making, and management of shareholder and stakeholder objectives.”

With an intelligent boardroom in place, Deloitte says clients are better positioned to measure organisational performance against strategy, and interrogate whether their actions are really driving the outcomes they want to see. This lets companies and boards see if they are off-track and how decide how to get back on track, through scenario modelling or planning.

“Then there is the external view,” Jacek adds. “Drivers from outside of your organisation like political, social, technological, economics and environmental factors interact and create ‘mega-trends’ that affect sectors and companies. Having insight on both levels is part of being future-proof. With advanced insight into these metrics, you can assess the health of your strategy for now and the future.”

He continues: “Say that the data is the commodity of the now, but we say data is a dime a dozen. Data is all around us. Without thinking you can measure something that is not driving the strategy. Rather, we need the ‘so what’; that insight that lets us decide what to do and how to position the company.” And that is like the difference between raw diamonds you wouldn’t even recognise as diamonds, and the sparkling cut jewels that are so prized the world over. l

Committed to the success of your business Regulatory change, increased transparency, technology advancements—everything about the way tax departments operate is in flux. At the same time, tax leaders are still held to traditional expectations of planning and reporting tax, managing controversy and risk—and doing it all for “less”.

By focusing on process, technology, resources and governance, Deloitte helps you build a strong foundation for, and lead, an effective tax operating model. Our goal is improvement and insight.

We help you achieve the control and confidence you need to lead through uncertainty.

Confidence to lead through uncertainty www.deloitte.com/za/tax

© 2019. For information, contact Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited.

Tax

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VIRTUAL CFOs

– JUST TECH-SAVVY ACCOUNTANTS OR THE FUTURE OF BUSINESS FINANCE? Virtual or remote CFOs are using specialist software and cloud solutions to deliver services to small businesses and entrepreneurs. But as their automated solutions free up the business to focus on strategy and growth, could they be creating a model for the CFO of the future – regardless of organisational size? Beth Amato spoke to three virtual CFOs to learn how they are shaping the future of finance.

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f robots can raise children as the fourth industrial revolution rolls in, there’s no reason why a fairly conservative role – the chief financial officer – won’t be changed by significant workplace digitisation. While South Africa has always been behind the Silicon Valley curve, Louw Barnardt, co-founder of Outsourced CFO, says that we are an emerging market with high cloud technology adoption and that “cloud accounting” is rapidly replacing desktop versions of the same software.

“Instead of technology replacing the role of the chief

financial officer, their time will be freed up to focus on strategy and not colonised by mundane tasks,” says Louw. With this level of freedom from the mundane, senior finance professionals will have the time to work on more than one concept or company simultaneously, and a new kind of CFO will emerge – a virtual CFO. According to an article published in In the Black, as much as 10 percent of all accounting revenue in the US derives from virtual CFO services. The virtual CFO is well suited to small and medium-sized businesses that need to keep their overheads low, but where

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Graham Shapiro, owner of Myccountant

information is a click away. The relationship between the virtual CFO and the client is wholly dependent on the correct software being in place.

The virtual CFO – a definition “A virtual CFO fulfils the position of a full-time CFO at a small to medium-sized company but works on this client on a part-time basis. The technology we use – cloud accounting, integrated software and artificial intelligence – enables this,” explains Louw.

Xero, the provider of cloud-based accounting software, notes in a blog post that a virtual CFO plays the CFO role for a fraction of the cost, acts as a sounding board, provides financial sanity and is essentially a financial advisor. The commoditisation of compliance work, increased competition, increased fee compression and the rise of technology in automating basic functions have laid the groundwork for the virtual CFO to operate.

At the Outsourced CFO, 80 percent of client bookkeeping is done automatically. Cloud accounting software links to a company’s bank feed, and transactions are placed directly in the accounting software. Time is saved and real-time access to financial information is possible. In addition, debtor and supplier invoices are captured in the cloud, and so financial information is always up to date.

Louw says that the cloud services have strong reporting tools that can generate graphs, variance reports and key metrics to form a financial dashboard for Outsourced CFO’s clients.

Graham Shapiro, owner of Myccountant, offers virtual CFO and accounting services through his clients’ cloud

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“Technology helps entrepreneurs focus on business, instead of merely recording it.” accounting platforms. “Technology is fundamentally changing the finance profession,” he says, “and it helps entrepreneurs focus on business, instead of merely recording it, and it helps accountants focus on strategy instead of wasting time manually capturing transactions.”

Graham works with small to medium-sized companies, adding value through advanced reporting software.

This software includes live dashboards and cash flow forecasts. “With these tools we give our clients a view on the impact of their decisions and what decisions they could be making,” he says.

Bots and bookkeeping Louw believes that the most exciting area of cloud accounting software is auto allocations. This software has built-in machine learning and can look at millions of accounts being processed all over the world and allocates transactions into their correct accounts. “Manual allocations will soon be a thing of the past,” he says.

However, artificial intelligence won’t replace all aspects of bookkeeping. An article published on Botkeeper points out the irony that in an industry involving service alongside financial and regulatory expertise, artificial intelligence and automation actually “increases the human interaction with clients while reducing human error. It represents a shift that includes a mutually beneficial relationship between software and the

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Louw Barnardt, co-founder of Outsourced CFO

services of an accountant.”

Louw is excited about how business is going to be done in the future, even considering the challenging economic times. “The bookkeeping function will run itself and business owners can focus on profitability and business strategy,” he says.

Overcoming client scepticism Some of Graham’s clients were initially sceptical about virtual CFO and accounting services, notably because cloud-based technology is often associated with security risks.

“I asked them whether they do internet banking, which most of them do. The security issues with cloud-based accounting software are no different. It takes a while to convince people of the benefits of virtual services and advanced technology – we’re quite a conservative country in that respect,” he says.

Many of his clients were working on desktop software, with an accountant coming in once a month to work on the accounts. “Business owners, using outdated software, are therefore not involved in the accounts and are presented information on an Excel spreadsheet.

A virtual CFO or accountant on the other hand ensures a lot more transparency because you’re working on the same cloud-based system as them. You are collaborating and always in the loop,” he adds.

Marnus Broodryk, owner of The Beancounter, notes that while accounting services have always been outsourced, the adoption of advanced technology makes a few business owners nervous. “They think cloud-based accounting software is expensive and complex. But many smaller companies are not

making the best financial decisions because they’re using outdated software. Newer software enables the accountant to do more than compliance and tax. Now, the accountant can guide and inform strategy,” he says.

The Beancounter has 500 clients on its books. Marnus believes that a good (virtual, outsourced) finance professional is an entrepreneur’s best friend. In his book, 90 Rules for Entrepreneurs, Marnus notes that once the right person is on board, “the magic happens: all your red tape is automatically taken care of and you can use the technology to grow your business and create an amazing experience for your customers, as well as having a professional who can guide you with numbers, business plans and the best tax advice.”

Disrupting a conservative market Louw and his Outsourced CFO cofounders spotted a gap in the market a few years ago – providing bookkeeping services and financial management to startups and disrupters. After a few mishaps, Outsourced CFO is now “cooking”. The company’s 26 “world-class” finance professionals are the virtual CFOs for 80 local and international companies (many of them technology and innovation firms).

The 31-year old Louw won the 2018 Sanlam/Business Partners Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year, and a Top 35 Under-35 Chartered Accountant. The judges, he believes, were impressed with how Outsourced CFO reinvented accounting, and that the company is focused on facilitating entrepreneurs and scaling startups. Louw and his team have helped clients tap about R500 million in seed and growth funding.

A report by PwC: Financial Services Technology 2020 and

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Marnus Broodryk, owner of The Beancounter

“All your red tape is automatically taken care of and you can use the technology to grow your business.”

Beyond – Embracing Disruption notes that fintech startups are encroaching on established markets, “leading with customer-friendly solutions…unencumbered by legacy systems. Customers have had their experiences set by other industries; they are now demanding better services, seamless experiences regardless of channel, and more value for money… And the pace of change shows no signs of slowing. It is clear that technology is affecting finance in a multitude of ways.”

Marnus says the cloud isn’t going anywhere. This is confirmed by the PwC report, which states that in 2020, hardware, software and data could reside anywhere. The advice is: “Prepare your architecture to connect to anything, anywhere.” Unfortunately, companies have systems that are far from future-proof.

A virtual CFO already works with the cloud, managing a lot of different types of data. Furthermore, their approach significantly reduces capital and operating expenditures.

Of course, virtual CFOs can’t rest on their laurels. The PwC report notes that many aspects of digitisation are currently “beyond our control, in forms and locations that “haven’t been anticipated.”

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AI and the big-company CFO While the virtual CFO is currently an asset in small and medium-sized businesses, there’s no reason why CFOs in larger organisations can’t push for significant digitisation in a disruptive spirit. CFOs in big companies have this power. But the concern is the exact return on investment and the time frame for this. Marnus notes however that automation is assisting CFOs to reduce and even prevent error because they have broken free of manual processes. “Technology improves forecast accuracy and reduces compliance and auditing costs,” he says.

Perhaps in the near future, organisations will have most, if not all, of their employees working remotely. Graham says that “the larger trend is moving towards remote working with clients scattered all over the world.” He doesn’t have an office, doesn’t really use any paper and has clients all over South Africa and the world. Face-toface meetings are a rarity. As soon as 2030, a CFO in a large organisation may not be distinguishable from the role a virtual CFO currently plays. l

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AN ECOSYSTEM OF INNOVATION IN TRAVEL & EXPENSE CLAIM MANAGEMENT SAP Concur collaborates with powerful partners and constantly drives innovation with the intention of maintaining their position as the number-one travel and expense management provider to global organisations. By Andre Fourie

D

uring challenging economic times, CFOs often bear the brunt of the pressure of optimising cost management while still delivering competitive business advantage. In this environment of cost pressure, increasing competition and evolving technology, CFOs should focus on gaining visibility, increase process efficiency, and building greater trust with internal and external stakeholders.

“Business decision-makers need access to an ecosystem of innovative technology tools that can automate laborious manual processes while driving efficiencies and providing a granular view over all aspects impacting profitability, cash flow and compliance,” says Angelique Montalto, regional sales director at SAP Concur. “The sheer size and complexity of modern enterprises makes manual management of cash flow and compliance completely impossible.”

She adds that organisations are increasingly utilising spend management tools to ensure they can gain a clear and accurate view over the total expenses of the business and at a granular level within individual business units and jurisdictions.

“Our business was founded in response to a simple question: Is there not a better way? Today, our ecosystem of partners on the SAP Concur platform has introduced hugely innovative solutions that remove some of the pressure from CFOs and provides them with powerful tools to save money, optimise expenses and achieve 100 percent compliance to prevailing regulations.”

SAP Concur is a cloud-based travel and expense claim

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platform for global businesses that eases the process of compliance and realises cost-optimisation opportunities. The platform is designed to simplify employee spend and ensure compliance and transparency in travel and expense claims.

“The nightmare scenario of finance teams sifting through boxes of envelopes stuffed with paper receipts to manually enter expenses into a spreadsheet can now become a long-distant memory,” says Montalto.

“Through powerful cloud-based automation of the expense management process, SAP Concur eases reporting requirements and provides visibility over spending before, during and after a trip is completed.

Most importantly, our ecosystem of partners are constantly introducing game-changing innovations that provide a step-change in productivity and cost-savings over traditional manual processes.”

Driving innovation in travel expense management One of the most successful partnerships on the SAP Concur platform is Uber for Business. The app and the integration are free to SAP Concur customers, and provides organisations with company-wide automated digital receipts and a clear view to overall ground transportation spend.

According to Mohamed Swidan, head of Uber for Business for Middle East & Africa, at Uber for Business, the integration removes the need for employees to manually record and submit expense claims for their Uber trips. “Organisations can also easily onboard employees with a few clicks and get a clear view of all

trip details from a single dashboard. As a value-add, Uber for Business is also integrated to Concur Locate, which gives organisations real-time location awareness of employees.”

Uber is available in more than 600 cities across more than 65 countries worldwide with more than 15 million trips a day across the world, meaning that business travellers do not have to worry about carrying cash or trying to navigate local taxi prices to their hotel or airport, as they can use the same app they use at home.

Swidan adds that ensuring a consistent and positive customer experience is a key part of Uber’s success. “By automating the expense claim process and limiting the effort required for business riders to comply with company travel policies, not only is the traveller experience simplified and made easier, but it has clear bottom-line benefits for organisations by keeping travellers compliant.”

Montalto says ground travel expenses can be time-consuming for employees to claim, keeping them away from important work and often leading to them using less cost-effective travel solutions. “Uber is the number-one most-claimed expense worldwide. With the integration to SAP Concur, organisations can encourage their employees to opt for Uber in a hassle-free way and do away with the need for manual expense claim submissions. What’s more, decision-makers gain access to clear, consistent and accurate data across the organisation, enabling better financial decision-making and cost-optimisation opportunities."

An example of this can be found with Constellation Brands, one of the world’s largest drinks companies. Constellation Brands introduced the SAP Concur Uber for Business integration to employees in August 2017, and has since added 6,000 employees, automating 8,000 Uber expenses.

“By automating the expense claim process and easing the administrative burden on their employees, Constellation Brands has

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created an easy and simple reason for all employees to choose Uber as their mobility solution,” says Swidan.

“With Uber’s global footprint, Constellation Brands also has a clear roadmap to automating the ground transportation expense claims across multiple countries and regions, giving finance managers a full view over their global travel expenses and enabling more accurate decision-making.”

Simplifying and streamlining VAT reclamation and compliance The power of the SAP Concur platform also extends beyond travel and expense claim management. VAT IT, the world’s largest value-added tax reclaim firm, leverages the SAP Concur platform to drive a highly complex and innovative global business.

According to Brendin Cohen, SAP Concur partner manager at VAT IT, the partnership with Concur has helped the company rapidly evolve through an extensive automation process that has delivered immense business results.

“Our business was traditionally heavily reliant on timeconsuming manual processes, but our business and billing model relies on successful outcomes for our customers. Since our partnership with SAP Concur commenced six years ago, we have unlocked huge value by getting a more granular view over expenses and speeding up the VAT reclamation process through innovative automation functionality," Cohen says.

VAT IT has 40 international hubs servicing more than 10,000 customers, including half of the Fortune 500 companies. The company was started in 1999 in Johannesburg, South Africa. “In the past, our teams would have to spend days on-site at our customers’ offices, manually retrieving physical invoices stored in files and boxes. This was obviously very time consuming and, due to the sheer volume of invoices, often prone to errors. Some invoices would be lost or missing, and there was often a lack of overall enforceable policy guiding expense claims.”

Cohen says the company partnered with SAP Concur to develop VAT Cloud, an app integrated to the SAP Concur platform that utilises various algorithms and rules to automate much of the data capture and ensure 100 percent compliance while realising the greatest possible VAT reclaim.

"Clients of SAP Concur can access the VAT Cloud app via the SAP Concur App Centre and easily integrate it, enabling quick automated data capture of up

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to 200,000 images per hour. Organisations can then quickly see what the potential recoverable VAT amount is, and then move forward to ensure compliance before submitting to the relevant tax authorities.”

VAT IT’s business model was designed to be low-touch and success-based, with the company taking a portion of recovered VAT funds as payment for services. “This is great for our customers who get all the benefits of optimal VAT reclamation without having to incur additional overhead costs,” says Cohen. "However, it does mean we have to be as efficient, accurate and streamlined as possible – and that’s where Concur really shines.”

Through the integration with SAP Concur, VAT IT provides granular detail to its customers, with the ability to see top expense types, vendors and compliance according to each business entity. “The system can also help organisations identify employees that are not complying to policies, opening the door to additional training or educational material to ensure compliance,” adds Cohen. “What’s more, our discoveries team can manage reissues of spoilt or missing invoices on their clients’ behalf, saving them huge amounts of time and energy. This level of personal attention and value-add would be completely impossible if our data capturing and analysis processes were not automated.”

A growing ecosystem of value and innovation Montalto believes that improved travel and expense claim management is often an untapped source of value for many businesses. “Organisations can sometimes underestimate the impact that improved travel and expense management can have on their bottom line.

But considering that seven to 10 percent of an average company’s budget relates to travel and expenses, there is a clear cost benefit to using technology tools and specialised apps to better manage and enforce expense claim policies and procedures.”

She adds that there is still great scope for further innovation by the company’s more than 200 app development partners. “As a business, we pride ourselves on offering a positive and consistent customer experience. Our app development partners play a crucial role in ensuring the platform delivers increasing amounts of value to businesses across a range of applications. As the complexity of doing business increases and the pace of change accelerates, having a healthy, thriving ecosystem of innovative partners is one of our best ways to ensure we remain the number-one travel and expense management provider to global organisations.” l

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Bongi Ntuli, CFO, TFG, with Lucas Verwey, CFO, Distell

Future-proofing your business, yourself & your children A CFO Dinner, held on 20 August at The Stack in Cape Town, had eight business executives reflecting on the uplifting initiatives they are involved in, and how they are making themselves future-ready. n 20 August, eight high-calibre finance executives gathered at The Stack in Cape Town for a lively CFO Dinner. The evening, hosted by CFO South Africa in partnership with Standard Bank, was punctured by laughs, common ground and sharp insights.

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The executives determined that the immediate economic future prospects of South Africa are at the top of CFOs’ ‘worry lists’. The dinner guests then listed the uplifting initiatives each of them are involved in, both from a corporate perspective and on a very personal and individual level.

After a jovial half an hour of networking and drinks, CFO South Africa’s managing director Joël Roerig introduced the theme of the evening: Future-ready CFOs, where the eight executives were asked questions like “How do CFOs prepare themselves, their company and their country for the future?”.’

All the positive and transformational initiatives that happen to make South Africa a better place proved incredibly uplifting when compared to the stark truth of South Africa’s economic crisis. It showed that each executive at the dinner was not only future-ready, but ready to change the future.

“What excites CFOs most about the future is the endless opportunities of technological progress,” Joël said, adding that this has a shadow side as well. “What if competitors outsmart us? What does the tech revolution mean for our people?”

Special guest Graeme Codrington, one of Africa’s best-informed futurists, shared some of his valuable insights; a fascinating breakdown of the first, second, third and fourth industrial revolutions; and an overview of his recently released book (co-written with

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Wendy Parsons, CEO, Kouga

Mark Daly, Cipla CFO, with futurist Graham Codrington

Justin Crowhurst, CFO, Woolworths, with XXX

Elton Bosch, CFO, Oceana Group

Nikki Bush) called Future-proof your child, which contains lessons for adults, business and CFOs in particular. He cited five X-factors for future-proofing children and the Cape Town attendees agreed this applied to them just as much: • Creativity, breaking conventions and thinking outside the box • Resilience • A love for learning • Knowing yourself • Relating to others.

Graeme’s insights ignited many passionate conversations among the CFOs, ranging from the ever-changing accounting standards, the power of simplicity and raising children to the best ways to allow for innovation and experimentation in a corporate setting. By the time dessert arrived, the debate was so warm and lively that the CFOs – who barely knew each other before – could have easily been mistaken for a group of close friends. l

Bernardt van der Linde, CFO, Curro

XXX

The CFO Dinner at the Stack in Cape Town was attended by: •

Bernardt van der Linde, CFO, Curro

•

Bongiwe Ntulie, CFO, TFG

•

Elton Bosch, CFO, Oceana

•

Graeme Codrington, CEO, TomorrowToday

•

Jason Wright, CFO, HomeChoice

•

Joël Roerig, MD, CFO South Africa

•

John Deane, Community manager, CFO South Africa

•

Justin Crowhurst, CFO, Woolworths

•

Lucas Verwey, CFO, Distell

•

Mark Daly, CFO, Cipla South Africa

• Rato de Mendonca, Head of Client Coverage CIB Cape Region, Standard Bank • Stephan Van Der Merwe, Head of Commercial Banking Cape Region, Standard Bank •

Wendy Parsons, CEO, Kouga Wind Farm

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MOVING INTO – and connecting with –

AFRICA

Standard Bank FD Arno Daehnke discusses African countries’ buzz, innovation and work ethic, along with the benefits of a broad interest in reading and outdoor sports.

By Kate Ferreira

A

s Standard Bank financial director, and part of the core C-suite at the African banking giant, Dr Arno Daehnke is a well-known figure in South African and regional financial circles. In May this year, he took home the “Moving into Africa” prize at the annual CFO Awards event. From his days in the group’s Treasury and Capital Management function, to his now three years in the FD role, Arno has built up a reputation as a “finance guy” who brings a rigorous scientific approach to both the books and strategy; he is, after all, a doctorate-holding seismologist by training.

Photos: Patrick Furter

Arno sees plenty of parallels between the scientific and finance fields. “Critical thinking is important for both. It forms the basis of how we analyse problems.

And both require smart use of data too.

In finance, we use data to analyse all our decision-making. We are transitioning from descriptive (i.e. ‘what happened’) and diagnostic (i.e. ‘why did it happen’) analytics, to predictive (‘what will happen’) and prescriptive (‘how can we make it happen’) analytics. As we have access to more and more computing power, and we can use technology like machine learning or artificial intelligence, there is more and more opportunity to get that rigour of data and analysis

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well established, and to use that to drive the strategy of the company on that basis.”

When pressed, Arno has said his colleagues would describe him as fair, forward-thinking, meticulous, and scrupulous.

Into Africa “In 2019 Sim [CEO Sim Tshabalala] and I are going to nearly all of the countries in which Standard Bank group operates. That’s 21 countries. We are on the road basically every two weeks.”

But rather than a chore, Arno speaks fondly and energetically about this time with the regional operations.

“I was recently in Malawi. Last week I was in Botswana and eSwatini, and before that Kenya, Ghana, Uganda, Mozambique and Nigeria.”

He won’t be drawn into naming a favourite, saying: “All the cities and countries are very special and all are completely unique. One cannot make the mistake of assuming they will be similar. They are all their own spaces.”

Arno draws a little different learning from each region.

“The buzz and energy in Nigeria is unbelievable. The

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“Our young people must have a mindset to try things, to experiment. If it doesn't work, move on. But without that curious mindset, one cannot innovate.”

pace of how things move, and how hard-working people in Nigeria are. I have also really enjoyed seeing the innovation that is happening in Kenya. It is very apparent how innovative the Kenya fintech and mobile operators are. That’s why it is called Silicon Savannah. I think that is quite apt.”

Compare that with Zimbabwe, he says. “That country and its people are really suffering at the moment, living in tremendous hardship with limited electricity, fuel shortages, currency shortages, a hyper-inflation environment, so you realise how well we actually have it in South Africa. We do tend to complain a lot as South Africans about our various challenges that we are facing in our own country, but if you see what some of our neighbours are going through, we should be very grateful.”

Cultivating a culture of innovation Although he doesn’t like to compare the countries, Arno admits that he thinks South Africans would do well to heed the example of Kenya when it comes to innovation and entrepreneurship.

“Sometimes I think South Africans can learn a lot from the approach to innovation in Kenya and other African countries. Safaricom completely changed the mobile payment game, for the whole of the country.”

Conversely, M-pesa-like services have never managed to gain olid g-round and critical mass in South Africa.

He also thinks we need to open up to innovation in terms of things like power provision.

“In Kenya, they have something called M-kopa, which is a solution for providing green energy. It is very cost efficient, and through this, even those totally offgrid can enjoy access to electricity in an affordable manner.”

What’s holding back South Africans? Arno thinks the stakes are high and we are risk averse. “Innovation is premised on the fact that you must fail fast and cheap, right? Our young people must have a mindset to try things, to experiment. If it doesn't work, move on. But without that curious mindset, one cannot innovate.”

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It’s a mindset he wants to see embraced in the group too. “Yes, in banking it is a different thing to think about failing or making mistakes, because sometimes the financial consequences are very severe. You can imagine if you have lent to someone and you haven't done all of your due diligence, or if you put in a new IT system which isn't thoroughly tested and you make no payments or the wrong payments. You can imagine what the impact on our clients would be. But at the same time, we must have an environment where people can try things. That's a key factor for innovation.”

In terms of the regulator's role, Arno is positive but offers constructive guidance. He believes our regulator is progressive, pointing to the work the Reserve Bank has been enabling in terms of testing blockchain technology. “The SARB does encourage innovation. For example, with blockchain they are on the forefront of the regulators globally. I must congratulate them on that. They also have a fintech innovation unit.”

The benefits of being bookish Finally, we asked him, what reading is on his bedside table right now? Like Arno himself, his reading choices are broad and challenging.

“I don’t favour a specific genre. I will read whatever comes my way, and piques my interest. I do like history, though, so I read about historical conflict, especially the first and second world wars. I also read a lot on business transformation and digital transformation. I find that the Economist is a great source, as are research articles from the top consulting firms – specifically focusing on the impact of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.”

He enjoys fiction too, though. “I think it is important to read fiction in order to understand humanity, how people think, and how people live their lives. After all, as Archbishop Desmond Tutu said: ‘All of our humanity is dependent upon recognising the humanity in others’.”

Arno doesn’t limit himself to intellectual pursuits, however, and also enjoys kiteboarding, mountain biking and skiing – activities that stimulate all the senses and help him to de-stress. l

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TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT

FASSET

UPSKILLING THE FUTURE OF THE FINANCIAL AND ACCOUNTING SERVICES SECTOR The Financial and Accounting Services Seta has a message for the industry: It is ready to fulfil their sectoral training needs and has been conducting research to ensure that it has the capability to do so. By Georgina Guedes

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he Financial and Accounting Services Sector Education Training Authority (Fasset) is a training partner to businesses in the financial, management consulting and accounting industry, with the aim to address skills gaps. This is the message that Fasset Chairman Njabulo Ngwenya wants to share with the financial services industry.

“We are a professional organisation delivering high-level skills for the sector, and we’re available and willing to help,” he says.

Fasset’s mandate is to influence the effective operation of the labour market, through the supply of scarce and critical skills, so as to ensure the competence of labour necessary to compare in the global economy.”

The finance and accounting sector is a significant contributor to the economy, being the largest employer of people with financial management, accounting and auditing skills. In the Seta’s Sector Skills Plan report concluded in 2018, it has confirmed that more than 163,000 people worked in that sector.

Njabulo says that Fasset is actively tracking the evolution of the

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accounting and financial services industry considering the impact made by the Fourth Industrial Revolution and is investing money in aligning with the skills that are required for the future of the sector.

Fasset adopts a skills pipeline approach, providing support to learners at school level, throughout their university or professional body studies, and current employees, through grants and Lifelong Learning events. From career awareness initiatives to the development of new graduates, Fasset strives to create an employable future for the learners and graduates entering its industry.

With a focus on the continuous professional development of learners, and a passion for ensuring soft skills and work readiness, the Seta drives various skills development programmes to fulfil its objectives.

To assist learners with placement into employment, Fasset runs the following programmes: TVET Workplace-Based Experience (WBE) programme, the Learner Employment Grant (LEG), and the Non-PIVOTAL Learner Employment

Grant (NLEG). As the placement of learners is cited as essential in the National Skills Development Plan, this is an area of great focus.

In addition to placement, Fasset backs learners through academic support. This is achieved through various bridging programmes, linked to the top 10 scarce skills in our sector, and includes: Qualification/Designation Bridging Programmes; the Fasset Bursary Scheme; Bursary Grant (BG); NSFAS Loan Repayment Grant (NLRG); and NSFAS Bursaries.

R330 million has been earmarked by Fasset for Professional, Vocational, Technical and Academic Learning (PIVOTAL) projects, of which two thirds will be invested in academic support for the completion of an academic qualification or designation. Njabulo explains that this will benefit 3,035 individuals.

Of these, the Bursary Scheme will take the lion’s share of academic support, assisting 2,162 students.

“It’s a big game changer.

Beneficiaries can register with professional bodies such as SAIPA, SAICA or ACCA, among others.

Once candidates register with these bodies, their chances of employment are significantly improved. This is quite important in contributing to solving the unemployment crisis in the country and fulfilling our mandate as Fasset,” says Njabulo. The Fasset Bursary Scheme awarded 872 unemployed learners as reported in the 2018/2019 annual report.

Fasset may adjust its strategy in line with current trends, an everevolving sector, or alterations in the legislative framework, but at its heart the aim to drive transformation, promote workplace readiness and support learners in the sector remains steadfast.

With the announcement made by the President to support the YES programme, with the aim of creating one million jobs for South Africa’s youth, Fasset will seek out groundbreaking ways through innovation and technological best practice to support the programme.

converting strategy into numbers – all prepared Ngwenya for his next role, that of being the chairperson of the Fasset Board.

“I am basically in charge of our strategy, working with our CEO on the execution, and looking after governance within the entity. Because Fasset is a public entity, governance is even more important than it was in any of my other roles and takes up quite a lot of my time.” He is pleased to report that last year, Fasset’s organisational performance and governance turned around under his watch. l

Njabulo’s own skills background Njabulo is a CA(SA) by profession, who started off his career at Deloitte in the financial services team 13 years ago. After completing articles, he worked for large multinational financial institutions in the banking, wealth management, asset management and payments industries.

His exposure with these multinational organisations in South Africa and the rest of Africa has sharpened his leadership style focused on people development and organisational performance.

These roles – running finance teams, overseeing governance,

For more information Further information on how to apply for these benefits is available on Fasset’s website www.fasset.org.za.

The suite of Academic Support programmes may be applied for directly through the institution of higher learning that is offering them.

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Learn, unlearn, relearn

Why finance leaders should embrace ongoing education Forget chasing the points or beefing up your CV. Lifelong learning is now a requirement for executives and thinking professionals marching confidently into the Fourth Industrial Revolution. By Kate Ferreira

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I

t can be lonely and exposed at the top. The C-suite can – and should – band together to keep the company on track, but in an increasingly volatile world, they will also have to take on new skills and capabilities.

Thankfully, most finance professionals have heard the call, and are incorporating continuous and broad learning and personal development into their lives – new skills, new requirements, new characteristics.

At the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA), they are wholly committed to this idea.

SAICA senior executive for professional development Mandi Olivier explains: “Alvin Toffler said in his book ‘Future Shock’, written in 1972: ‘The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.’

“This insightful comment from over 40 years ago is spot on for where the accounting profession finds itself today – in a world which is volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous, or ‘VUCA’ – a term coined by the US Navy.”

Additionally, with our continued focus on the Fourth Industrial Revolution, Mandi argues, “accountants almost certainly start to feel like dinosaurs” if they have not committed to “undertaking relevant lifelong learning applicable to their specific role”.

Mandi Olivier, SAICA senior executive for professional development

They know that the profession as it is today is facing a significant challenge, and accountants are “in dire need of reskilling themselves for current and future roles”. Mandi says there is also the need to prepare “prospective accountants for jobs that don’t yet exist.”

With this in mind, SAICA, she tells us, has recently completed a significant research project (called the CA2025 project), under the leadership of Professor Karin Barac from the University of Pretoria. Through this they took the opportunity to reconsider the competencies (including knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviours) for entry-level chartered accountants.

Accountants of the future will need critical thinking

“Change is at its greatest right now and we need to be part of this ongoing evolution that is taking place.” – Mandi Olivier skills and the ability to collaborate and communicate.

They will need to be comfortable with new technology that takes on some of their work more efficiently and more accurately. It led to the development of a new framework which “embraces the following [five] key changes” for accountants:

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approach to an output-based one “where members are required to become ‘professionally competent’ for their specific role”.

“Change is at its greatest right now and we need to be part of this ongoing evolution that is taking place,” she adds. Organisations and employers must support their accountants in making the necessary shifts.

A new world order As we all should know by now, digital transformation is completely altering the world of work. Sharmla Chetty is the president of global markets for Duke Corporate Education. They have done extensive research into how technology has shifted the landscape.

For example, Professor John Graham at Duke University's Fuqua School of Business has been doing a fascinating quarterly survey of global CFOs for many years – 93 consecutive quarters, in fact.

Sharmla is optimistic about the future tech-enabled workplace, saying “the future of work is going to be informed in large part by the number of jobs gained, not lost”. Yes, she Sharmla Chetty, president of global says, technology “will assume certain markets for Duke Corporate Education types of roles performed by humans” but those tend to be the rote ones.

With this in mind, she says, business leaders must help people “prepare for 1. Understanding and integrating digital disruption change in a constructive and engaging 2. Focusing on creating sustainable value for way, and not through fear”. organisations “We need to enable human beings to work with 3. Creating a deeper understanding and renewed technological developments to achieve great things. focus and interrogation of ethics and citizenship As Dr Hanson, the creator of Sophia the Robot, noted 4. Becoming integrated thinkers at our Davos of Human Capital conference, humans 5. Balancing learning and development of technical created robots, not vice versa. We humans control the and non-technical competencies (enabling narrative.” competencies and professional values and skills).

“These changes are equally, if not more, applicable to chartered accountants who have already qualified,” Mandi says.

Another change that this has driven is that SAICA has transformed its CPD policy from an hours-based

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An ethical imperative Sharmla believes that personal development and training should support leaders in developing their emotional intelligence (EQ) in conjunction with their IQ. But there is a third element that Duke calls DQ – which

stands for decency quotient. “It means that a leader has the genuine desire to do the right thing for employees, colleagues and society at large.”

This ethical leadership would apply to your workspaces, but also the larger environment. “If we don’t take care of our environment, our workplaces will look completely differently, if they exist at all,” she cautions.

From job displacements, to income disparities, and environmental concerns: “We all need to be proactive and debate these issues at every level in our society, from government to business. We are the only species that can imagine structures to control how we interact among ourselves. We have the power to determine how we wish to operate in this new future.” Any executive learning and development must be centred around this.

Adding a quiver to your bow CIMA is another well-known educator and professional body. They recently “upgraded” their qualifications to reflect the real needs and changes that management accountants must deal with in modern finance, and the modern workplace.

Tim Simba, CIMA Africa Regional VP

According to Tim Simba, CIMA Africa Regional VP, the CIMA Professional Qualification is suitable and recommended for C-suite executives “as it complements their existing skillset and capability”, and in equipping them with “the technical, people, leadership and digital skills they need to successfully lead an organisation”.

“The qualification will help them stay at the top of their field, develop broader leadership skillsets to influence and inspire their teams, and enhance their decisionmaking skills to create sustainable value for their organisation,” says Tim. Senior executives can earn the qualification through CIMA’s exclusive CFO Programme offered only to CFOs, CEOs, and senior management. The in-take requirement is of a fittingly high standard: qualifying

candidates will need 10 years of strategic experience in finance and business functions, hold membership with a recognised professional accounting body, and have a finance-related degree or an MBA/Master in Accounting.

“They need to take the Strategic Case Study exam and upon successful completion of the exam will earn CIMA membership and be awarded the Chartered Global Management Accountant (CGMA) designation,” Tim adds.

This is one of the ways that CIMA keeps their designation aspirational, and ensure their alumni remain on top of their game.

“CFOs should undertake continuous professional development,” says Tim. “We offer a suite of CPD

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go beyond facilitating disruption or gaining a competitive edge.”

To his mind, the key is “in ensuring long-term resilience, through both hard skills – like finance, innovation and marketing – and softer skills, like talent management, client relationships, negotiation, executive wellness and self-leadership. And for long-term growth, nurturing the inclusive nature of innovation.”

But that also means considerable selfreflection – something that comes up time and again when speaking to the business schools. Paul believes that “breaking bad habits, changing leadership styles and approaches, and unlearning unhelpful strategies” are equally instrumental to maximising your impact as a business leader. Plus, he says, “building personal resilience is key. Burnout is a very real factor at the top.”

Strike a rock

Liz de Wet, course coordinator for the UCT GSB Executive Women in Leadership course

opportunities to choose from.” All CIMA members and CGMA designation holders are required to undertake CPD and keep a record of their development activities.

Re-balance your portfolio It’s not just your investment portfolio that requires regular rebalancing. Paul Maughan, Executive Development Programme course convenor at the University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business (UCT GSB), cautions that often, executives develop a preference over time for either technical or relationship skills. “During challenging economic times, however, both of these are required,” he says. “In these times, the issues that most concern senior executives should

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UCT GSB offers a number of courses designed with just this kind of professional in mind, including – notably – a course aimed especially at women leaders. Liz de Wet is the course coordinator for the UCT GSB Executive Women in Leadership (EWIL) course.

This is great for the women on the course, sure, but it is also a boon for business. “Despite ample evidence that having more women in senior roles is good for business, women continue to face challenges in the workplace. The only leverage a leader really has is herself,” says Liz. “This is something that strong women leaders demonstrate very strongly. So this is what we look at in the EWIL programme – how to assist women transform the self to amplify impact both for themselves and their organisation.”

Liz says it is a unique programme that builds leadership capability and gives supportive coaching to participants to increase personal and professional impact.

“There are myriad reasons why women still struggle

to move from middle to senior management: partly because women may have more family obligations, lack confidence to pursue more senior positions, or fear coming across as unlikable if they are ambitious,” says Kumeshnee West, director of Executive Education at UCT GBS. “Having a greater appreciation of the difficulties women face and overcome in different sectors can help build better strategies to support them in meaningful ways. Leadership is a practice, and this will be influenced by the environment in which women find themselves.

“The UCT GSB has relationships with many different sectors through its work in the customised education space and this knowledge translates into its leadership short courses, including the EWIL programme that is specifically constructed to give women the tools to increase their leadership impact and visibility wherever they find themselves,” she says.

What the professionals say Cheryl Molefe is an alumna of the course. She is an engineer at Kumeshnee West, director of AngloAmerican who currently works Executive Education at UCT GSB in business intelligence for the group.

“To be impactful in my new role of supporting a new structured way of working in the organisation (which depends highly on people making CEO for Kouga Wind Farms. She says the decision to paradigm shifts), I realised I needed more than the take on further studies was informed by her feeling technical know hows,” she says. The EWIL course met like she was “struggling to transition” from a previous those needs, she adds. role in management to that of an executive. “I would get frustrated with colleagues that didn’t seem to have “The programme is all about building leadership my drive and urgency, and I was keen to learn fresh practices for increased visibility, impact and leadership ideas and approaches. I needed help to contribution, with great focus on all the intangible slow down in order to achieve more and prioritise,” she leadership for which I was looking. I had no idea explains. that the programme cut so deep into me as a person, starting with a personal foundation and then Through the course, she says she realised that she was translating my personal practices into organisational in fact doing other people’s work and taking on too value.” much responsibility. “ I learnt how to give the person with the problem the power to solve it themselves.” l Another graduate of UCT GBS is Wendy Parsons, the

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Photos: Patrick Furter

“If you take the time to invest in someone else’s education, you can change the world.”

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Connecting the corporate world to meaningful philanthropy Bowmans CFO Jo-Ann Pohl supports the non-profit organisation Charities Aid Foundation Southern Africa in her personal capacity. She believes in using her technical finance, strategy execution, and reporting skills to not only build her career but also to uplift disadvantaged people. By Ray Mahlaka

F

ollowing months of extremely negative sentiment about South Africa, Jo-Ann Pohl, the Group CFO of law firm Bowmans, rises above the negativity by injecting a dose of optimism about the country.

thropy and civil society via the non-profit sector. We facilitate the flow of funding from philanthropy into civil society. It is also about doing the right amount of good and ensuring that we have the right kind of impact on society.”

“I am proudly South African. We have an incredible country; whether you look at business opportunities or the weather. We have the most beautiful sunsets. The sun sets, and it rises again differently the next day. But we don’t necessarily tell our good news story well,” the highly energetic Jo-Ann tells CFO South Africa.

CAFSA is a member of the Charities Aid Foundation Global Alliance, which has offices in nine jurisdictions, among them, South Africa, the UK, Australia, and Brazil. In addition to facilitating the flow of funding to charities, CAFSA advises companies on how to execute their corporate social investment (CSI) activities, meaningfully align CSI activities to their Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) profile and verifying the authenticity of charities/ non-profit organisations.

Jo-Ann’s initial support of CAFSA

“CSI and charity work are not the core business of companies. They want to make sure that they leverage their contributions and that’s when we step in to help them,” says Gill. CAFSA has clocked up the biggest names in business as clients, such as Deloitte, Nedbank, Sasol, Absa, AngloGold Ashanti, Shell and others.

Jo-Ann has had a high-flying finance career that spans 18 years in the financial services industry, working for Barclays Africa and Middle East, Ubank, Standard Chartered Bank Telesure Investment Holdings, and various board roles. She made the move to legal services in 2017 at Bowmans, where she is the Group CFO.

Jo-Ann strives to be part of the solution to South Africa’s problems. One of the many ways she does this is through her unwavering support of Charities Aid Foundation Southern Africa (CAFSA), a non-profit organisation that connects companies to charities to drive effective philanthropy and make it part of daily life.

Describing the work that CAFSA has been doing since 1997, its CEO Gill Bates says: “We function as an intermediary. We play in the space of the corporate world, philan-

Through her more than 10 years of involvement with CAFSA, Jo-Ann’s contribution has helped CAFSA support many corporates to refine and improve their CSI activities in areas such as advocacy, giving opportunities that make a sustainable difference, skills-based volunteering programmes, education and early childhood development. Education, especially at the foundation phase, is Jo-Ann’s biggest passion.

“If you take the time to invest in someone else’s education, you can change the world. If you can change an eight-year-old’s view of the world, you will change an entire generation,” she says.

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“CSI and charity work are not the core business of companies. They want to make sure that they leverage their contributions and that’s when we step in to help them.”

In two decades, Jo-Ann has acquired technical skills in finance, reporting, executing strategy and regulatory compliance, which she offers (pro bono) at CAFSA as its board chairperson. Jo-Ann started working with CAFSA in 2007 when she was the CFO of Ubank, which operates in the microfinance sector targeting mostly mineworkers and lower-income workers. While at Ubank, Jo-Ann realised that she could increase the impact and how she helped disadvantaged people.

“There were moments where I would work as a bank teller at Ubank to understand how our clients (lower-income workers) felt when interacting with our staff and operations. When you are sitting across from someone who cannot withdraw money because they don’t have it or they cannot afford to pay bank charges, it makes you want to reinvent financial services and help them. Adversity fuels innovation and I realised that there was so much more that I can do to use my technical finance skills – not just in the workplace – but in a broader charitable way.”

Jo-Ann then reached out to CAFSA, asking to work with the organisation. She was appointed on the board’s audit committee, working on transforming CAFSA into a financially sustainable non-profit organisation.

“We set up a sustainable accounting function at CAFSA. When I started working with CAFSA, there was a limited accounting and reporting process in place. We put in account-

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ing infrastructure and processes, and relevant governance structures such as the governance, remuneration and strategic committees (tasked with growing its pipeline of clients).”

These initiatives with her and her CAFSA colleagues, have paid off.

CAFSA now owns the building from which it operates at the Maboneng Precinct, located at the heart of Johannesburg CBD. CAFSA’s financial statements regularly receive an unqualified audit opinion because the organisation is self-sustaining, with enough working capital for the next 18 months. This is a big accomplishment considering that non-profit organisations frequently fail to survive because they run out of money or donor funding even if their passion resonates.

Jo-Ann also plugs into her wide finance industry contacts to help CAFSA. She helps mobilise her industry peers to offer their support and skills.

About Jo-Ann’s contributions to CAFSA, Gill says: "She is notoriously shy about her contributions. She is extremely humble, and we are so lucky to have her. She chairs our board even though her Bowmans work diary is impossible. But she makes time for CAFSA.”

Proud CAFSA moments Asked what she is proud of regarding her involvement with CAFSA, Jo-Ann pointed to the Beyond Painting Classrooms initiative, which was established by FirstRand in 2012 with the sup-

port of CAFSA. Beyond Painting Classrooms (BPC) is an employee volunteering initiatives, and as the name implies, is about doing sustainable philanthropic work; beyond painting classrooms at disadvantaged school for one day and neglecting the school thereafter. Jo-Ann says: “This goes beyond 67 minutes on 18 July to a more strategic approach to employee volunteering. In fact, if we are capable of doing something and able to do it … doing nothing is unethical as good corporate citizens and good people.”

It’s also about focusing on longterm philanthropic work such as mentoring high school pupils, university students, new entrants in the job market and entrepreneurs, which Jo-Ann still manages to do despite her day job at Bowmans.

Jo-Ann says she is always inspired by the feedback she gets from people or organisations she has helped through BPC. “After the one BPC event, The Teddy Bear Clinic for abused children came back to us and said they felt empowered around what they can collectively do to rescue more children or give more children dignity. They left the event with solutions and potential access to donor funders.” l

Do you have a CFO Cares story to share with us?

Contact CFO community manager John Deane on jdeane@cfo.co.za with the details.

Giving in her DNA Giving back is in Jo-Ann’s DNA. She credits her father, who lectures students in Tanzania about the mining industry, and mother, a former teacher who now runs a soccer academy for underprivileged children, for instilling the value of uplifting less fortunate people. Jo-Ann’s parents also counsel cancer patients and their families and work with children, fostering in their younger days and adopting their two eldest sons, which she says was an awesome, life-changing decision.

“They taught us [Jo-Ann and her younger brother and sister] to be kind and to make someone’s life easier. If you make it easier and believe in them, you create an opportunity for them. And if you create an opportunity for someone, you help them realise their potential.”

These are lessons that Jo-Ann and her husband are passing down to their four children. Their two youngest children – Michaela (eight years old) and Ethan (seven) recently agreed to donate their birthday gifts to various charities.

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&

AN UNASHAMED DRIVE TO

CONNECT SHARE The morning after a fantastic CFO Dinner in Cape Town in August, my colleagues asked me – after they had seen some photos – why everyone seemed to be laughing so much. What could we possibly have been talking about that was so uplifting and entertaining to CFOs of such serious businesses as TFG, Distell, Oceana, Woolworths, Curro and others? Surely, times are tough?

It made me reflect again on the power of community, with its well-documented benefits including knowledge, connections, inspiration, resources and support.

There is also a direct pressure/stress release that comes with the discovery, over a good glass of wine, that fellow CFOs battle with similarly stubborn colleagues, corporate conundrums and great unknowns.

For people who make it their business to be in control, a shared sense of vulnerability can make all the difference for their mental wellbeing.

Still, it was a bit of a miracle that the dinner was such an upbeat affair, given the negative picture the CFOs had painted in our prep calls: colleagues and consumers are leaving for Australia, economic prospects are poor and tech is killing jobs. The penny dropped when one of the CFOs said to me: I wonder what my colleagues are doing, personally and with their businesses, to make this country a better place?

So that, I told my colleagues of the fantastic CFO SA team, is what we were talking and smiling about (and about a few other things, see page 64). We heard how

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real people in real businesses are contributing to real change – and many professed to double their efforts outside work hours as well.

Under the banner CFO Cares, this magazine has started to highlight some of those stories. Discovery Health CFO Brett Tromp and his wife Candice kicked off in Q1 with their support for the Orient Hills Day Care, Capitec’s André du Plessis spoke about his Community Keepers project and PPC’s Tryphosa Ramano took us to Hillbrow with the NPO Time for Change that she supports.

For many reasons, I am very grateful and excited that this issue features the CFO Cares story of Bowmans CFO Jo-Ann Pohl (page 78), in which she explains why and how she supports the Charities Aid Foundation Southern Africa. Through her career, which took her from Ubank to Standard Chartered to Telesure to Bowmans, I have always considered Jo as the number-one fan of – and contributor to – the CFO community, with an unashamed drive to connect and share. If this article hasn’t convinced you of the power of community, please arrange a coffee with Jo and she’ll happily explain – much better than I ever could.

Joël Roerig CFO South Africa managing director +27 76 371 2856 jroerig@cfo.co.za

2020 - Save the dates 11 FEBRUARY 2020 Finance meets HR Summit - Johannesburg

2 APRIL 2020 CFO SA Summit - Cape Town

14 MAY 2020 CFO Awards - Johannesburg

5 AUGUST 2020 CFO and CHRO Women’s Dinner - Johannesburg

14 - 15 OCTOBER 2020 Finance Indaba Africa - Johannesburg

10 NOVEMBER 2020 CFO Day - Johannesburg

Learn, network & build your career CFO.co.za | John Deane, CFO South Africa Community Manager jdeane@cfo.co.za | +27 82 570 9482

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