COVER STORY

BDO South Africa – shifting from being

traditional auditors to being tech and digital savvy

BDO South Africa is a company of audit professionals dealing with accounting and assurance matters, information technology, tax matters and complex valuations. Bonga Mokoena joined BDO as CEO in May 2022. He has extensive experience in both the public and private sector, including in transport, financial services, investment and the energy sector. SA BUSINESS INTEGRATOR spoke to him about challenges and opportunities facing the profession.

What made you want to return to the accounting profession?

Based on the challenges our profession is currently facing, I want to be able to contribute.

One of the reasons I returned is to assist in restoring trust. Restoring trust, will contribute to our economy and the wellbeing of our country.

What are some of the key challenges facing the sector?

As I indicated above there are a number of issues, one of the issues is rebuilding trust. There is an expectation within the ecosystem that the audit profession will show up to the expectations of many, by lending credibility through assurance provided to business and the economy. We give assurance to a number of issues that give people confidence and trust in our economy, which is critical from both a local and foreign investment perspective.

The other challenge, is how we attract and retain talent within our accounting and audit profession, in light of what is now commonly referred to as the ‘great resignation and immigration’? All players in the profession face the same challenge to attract and retain talent. I believe the challenges can be overcome by more investment in learning and skills development, including retention through a comprehensive and compelling employee value proposition (EVP).

Challenge number three is how we react to changes and developments related to digital and tech. These areas call upon us to innovate, modify and produce new auditing processes, procedures and tools. We need to adapt to new ways of how we audit with and through tech and digital systems, structures like the metaverse, crypto assets and investments.

Lastly, how do we keep up with the developments that talk to the broader society as encapsulated in ESG? How do we show up as a profession, in terms of our knowledge, technical and professional skills in relation to the matters that pertain to ESG? How can we contribute directly and/or indirectly on all matters pertaining to ESG that elevate our profession, our clients, our communities and society at large? How do we ensure sustainability broadly and not limit to the "G", which represents the governance aspect of ESG? How do we go beyond governance and contribute to the "E" and "S", which talks to environmental and social aspects respectively?

Those are the four main challenges we are facing as a profession, and we need to respond in a manner that makes a demonstrable impact to show that we are contributing holistically and effectively.

Over the years the accounting and auditing industry has taken a reputational knock. How has BDO fared?

I think we have done exceptionally well, in the sense that up to this point our reputation remains untarnished as we were not caught up in any “eyebrow raising” events, incidences or scandals professionally, ethically and otherwise. We want to keep it that way, hence in terms of our Clarity Charter we want to hold ourselves to the highest standards of independence, ethics, and being quality driven.

What are some of the key strategic interventions you have planned?

As far as transformation goes, I am going to be using every opportunity and avenue to fast track our contribution across the spectrum. This includes a number of aspects in terms of women empowerment, enterprise development, skills development; and especially ensuring appropriate training and exposure for our trainee accountants.

I want more black trainee accountants to have exposure, even in complex areas such as banking and financial services across the spectrum. There is no need to be ‘just’ a chartered accountant; you don’t just need to be a registered auditor, but you need certain accreditations such as those provided by the IRBA, JSE and Prudential Authority based on practical training and exposure.

In those areas we have very few black people especially at the mid-level upwards. The bottom level is overpopulated, and many companies will announce these numbers, but when you start looking closer you see a different picture. This needs to be changed as it would benefit our profession, our economy and the country at large.

To reinvigorate trust, we developed our Clarity Charter at BDO, which represents our peg on the ground on who we are and who we are not. It is the basis and principles upon which we will continue to hold ourselves to a high standard of ethics, independence and integrity. Just knowing who we are and who we are not, and being uncompromising on that position.

How do you envision the company under your leadership impacting progressive and proactive change?

I honestly believe if we do those four things we have touched on, the issue of trust, and authentically addressing issues of transformation – if we authentically work to address all these issues, it will put us on a significant growth trajectory. I would like BDO to grow significantly in being a trusted partner/ adviser in the market whilst still maintaining our independence and professional scepticism.

How do you see the future of the profession unfolding in terms of technological transformation, culture, skills development, legislation?

When I talk about digital tech, that’s the transformation we need. We need to shift from being traditional auditors to being tech and digital savvy, in terms of using the tools but also auditing through tech.

As for the culture, we need to be aware, sensitive and attuned to generational nuances. Number one is market dynamics; two is social-cultural issues; three is the various developmental phenomena; and the fourth is industrial revolution and digitisation.

We need to be attuned to diversity across the spectrum, on all the points I raised – diversity in an untraditional, unconventional manner.

I think skills development falls into my previous points, we need to keep learning. Our skills will be measured by our ability to learn and re-learn. We need to want to learn new skills, un-learn old skills and to be adaptive and agile.

In respect to legislation, policy makers and legislatures are not going to stop evolving and producing new legislation based on the changes. We need to adapt, remain agile and create new tools, processes and procedures that will speak to new legislation. Similarly, to my point above, we need to understand new legislation and adjust to it.

It was reported that a goal you have set for BDO is to emerge as one of the top auditing firms within the next three to five years. Would you say the profession is conservative, or is it ready for change?

Historically, the profession has been seen as conservative and may not have been ready for change, but the change we want to see will be determined by us.

What are some of the key elements required to achieve this goal?

It goes back to what I mentioned previously, to embrace diversity, to be open minded, to be aware of the intangibles. There are also tangible issues and developments but also intangible developments, which need people to adapt to look at things with a different set of eyes and have different perspectives of how to respond to things/developments.

How does BDO’s service offerings differ, and how can this be advantageous?

We are at the forefront of having developed some digital and audit tech tools. We will be the leaders of the pack in that I would like for us as BDO to continue being game changers and leaders with

these kind of developments. I am a firm believer of driving holistic organisational development and growth through innovation supported by people skills and tech development.

You previously said, “auditing is about people”. Can you explain this?

At the core of auditing are people, the professionals. Our clients are people. The CEO and the CFO, the chairperson of the audit sub-committee – these are all people meeting in the marketplace to do business. Confidence is embedded in people, and trust is something you can only get from people and once you trust someone, you can do business with them.

What would you say are the top three characteristics of a leader?

Humility, being able to listen, and emotional intelligence – a quiet sense of wisdom. For me wisdom is being able to express your views while also having the ability to listen. It takes wisdom and humility to be able to sit and listen.

For example, if I sit in a meeting and there is someone there who is quiet, it doesn’t mean that person doesn’t have something to say – in fact the people who are quiet might be the people who potentially have a solution to whatever issue we are discussing.

Your ability to be on the ball, be alert and attentive, and also empathetic is important. Humility goes hand-in-hand with empathy; it comes with a quiet sense of confidence. Giving people a sense of comfort so they can open up is also important. Impactful leaders are leaders who demonstrate a deep sense of showing trust, respect, and empathy.

What would you most want to be remembered for?

How I touched lives and made a difference and an impact. There are many ways you can touch people’s lives, even if it is just with a conversation.  BDO South Africa specialises in Auditing, Tax, and Advisory services. It has a global footprint in 164 countries and territories and seven offices in South Africa servicing more than 40 JSE-listed companies. With a highly customer-centric focus, BDO is committed to being ethical, independent and quality-driven. www.bdo.co.za

Bonga Mokoena joined BDO as CEO in May 2022 taking over from Mark Stewart at the end of his term. He is a member of the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA), Advancement of Black Accountants of Southern Africa (ABASA), Institute of Directors of South Africa (IODSA) and the Black Management Forum (BMF).

Prior to joining BDO, he held various senior executive and leadership roles at AlexForbes for almost 13 years, which includes Head of Institutional Cluster Businesses, Managing Director/Executive of Actuarial Consulting Solutions & AF Group Public Sector Divisions, CEO of Alex Forbes Emerging Markets (Pty) Ltd and recently, AF Group Executive of Market Development Division.

As a qualified CA(SA), Mokoena spent much of his career as an internal auditor at Nedcor Bank Limited, Metrorail and Transnet before moving on to Old Mutual as an Industry leader in 2005 within Old Mutual Corporate Division. He then joined and worked at Eskom Pension and Provident Fund (EPPF) as its Chief Executive and Principal Officer for almost 2 years during 2008 and the better part of 2009.

He has extensive experience in both the public and private sector, his sector experience also includes transport, financial services and investments.