CFO Magazine, Issue 2, 6 October 2022

10 THINGS EVERY BUSINESS OWNER MUST KNOW BEFORE CHOOSING A RETIREMENT FUND

Given the financial challenges facing many South African employees, mixed with the country’s poor savings culture and resultant retirement savings crisis, business owners and leaders are under increasing pressure to make the right strategic decisions about their employee benefit schemes.

According to Malusi Ndlovu, Director of Large Enterprises at Old Mutual Corporate, conversations about the ability of these schemes to safeguard and grow work-based investments are a growing priority for business leaders who understand the importance of retirement savings for their staff.

“To maintain their living standards after retirement, employees will need to save at least 15% of their salary for 30 years, or more. The sad reality is that most South Africans are not adequately covered and will not be able to maintain their lifestyle after retirement,” says Ndlovu.

“The more an employee saves towards retirement, the better the retirement provision will be. Therefore, employers must strongly encourage staff to contribute more of their disposable income where possible to their retirement fund.”

From years of experience, Old Mutual advises employers to ensure that their retirement fund is the best fit for their Large Enterprises. The combination of a complex retirement fund industry, an onerous regulatory environment and time-consuming fund administration, is often beyond the time and expertise constraints of most business owners or their Human Resources (HR) departments.

Enter the umbrella fund, one of the most efficient and effective retirement savings options for employers. Also known as multi-employer funds, umbrella funds are an easy-to-use solution for the retirement contributions of employees. They also offer a host of additional features and advantages such as ease-of-use, economies of scale, among others.

1. Governance matters

A well-run fund is critical. It ensures that members’ interests are protected and avoids the possibility of members’ benefits being reduced because of bad management decisions. Here, reputation and track record of the fund provider and the management board of the fund are key.

2. Flexibility and choice matters

Once you have assessed your needs as an employer, it is important to carefully look at the ability of the umbrella fund to meet those needs. Different umbrella funds offer various levels of flexibility – and greater flexibility usually carries more cost. You need to make sure you balance the level of flexibility you want to meet members’ needs with the associated costs.

3. Investment growth matters

With household disposable income under pressure, the contributions of each member are often limited so it is imperative that the savings are invested in vehicles that can maximise growth. Employers therefore must consider an umbrella fund with an excellent investment growth record, both for its default investment portfolios and those available as choices for members

4. Risk benefit matters

Insurance cover (such as life cover, disability, dread disease and funeral) on a retirement fund is optional. Two types of risk benefits exist, approved and unapproved, which have varying tax and other implications. An approved risk benefit is a contract between the retirement fund and the insurer; an unapproved benefit is a contract between the employer and the insurer.

If you have a risk benefit structure in place you must determine if the structure can be replicated in the umbrella fund or if a similar structure will prejudice your fund members.?

Also, if you have an overly complex risk benefit arrangement, and you would like to retain it, you must conduct a full assessment of the administrative capabilities of the umbrella fund you are considering. This should focus especially on the fund’s proven ability to administer complex risk benefits.

5. Solid administration matters

To avoid administration headaches and prevent your human resources being tied up in resolving admin issues, the way in

The Solution

which your contributions need to be paid over to the fund every month should be as seamless and hassle-free as possible. Another area of potential complexity is claims administration. Your chosen umbrella fund should make this as simple as possible for you as well.

6. Conversion to a pension at retirement matters

Helping your employees retire well goes beyond offering them a retirement fund. Members need help at the point of their retirement as well, to ensure they make good decisions about investing their hard-earned savings to secure a reliable pension.

7. Costs and fees matter

The most important thing is to make sure that you and your employees receive value in relation to the fees and charges you are paying. Most umbrella funds are designed to offer various solutions. Of course, the amount of flexibility chosen directly impacts on the costs to members and employers.

8. Transformation of South Africa matters

When you offer your employees a retirement fund, you are not just preparing them for their future, you are also helping to build the entire South African economy by contributing to the growth of a strong savings culture. For this to be most effective, it is important that the fund you choose understands the vital role it plays in helping to build that future.

9. Communication matters

It really does not matter how good the fund is if the members do not know about it, or how to properly exercise their choices in the fund. Communicating to members is therefore a critical component. Understanding what and how much communication goes out to members is important as you may need to supplement the communication if it is not sufficient.

10. The Financial Services Provider matters

Consideration of the Financial Services Provider and its, products, record, reputation and results are particularly important to ensure you get the most efficient and effective retirement fund partners. Such expert support is particularly important in these volatile uncertain times.

Ndlovu says the Old Mutual SuperFund ticks all the boxes and provides employers with one holistic approach offering flexibility to structure employee retirement and risk benefits, empowering them to provide employees with the peace of mind that their financial future is being looked after and that their families are financially protected. Let us help you #PowerTheirNextBeginning and future-proof your employees retirement savings.

Old Mutual Corporate conducted a social experiment with eight families to understand how prepared they were for retirement. To view, visit: www.oldmutual.co.za/superfundpower

Ndlovu notes that when considering umbrella fund providers, there are 10 crucial factors that employers and their HR departments must consider when assessing a fund:

It’s time to become a superhero

In only one year, we have faced as much as our ancestors did in a hundred – from an ongoing pan demic, to a war, to floods, and a troubled economy. We’ve become experts at adapting, pivoting, evolv ing and surviving, but it’s time to throw away these cliches and approach things differently.

In our cover interview [see page 14], TFG CFO Bongiwe Ntuli explains that once you become a senior leader, you realise the importance of what you do and the direct impact of your decisions on your company and society.

This year, the CFO South Africa community has come together in-person on multiple occasions after two years of solitude and virtual confinement, and they all agreed that it’s time to learn from the past and be pro active in our response to change.

During the Cape Town Summit on 22 June [see page 62], CFOs revealed that the key to this lies within rela tionships. This was echoed at a dinner on 7 July [see page 12], where those around the table agreed that South Africa’s problems are solvable if business lead ers put their minds together. CFOs also explained that every sector has an important role to play in driving positive change during a Finance Indaba Online dis cussion [see page 26].

Building on this, myself and the CHRO South Africa

managing editor, Nomahlubi Sonjika, were tasked with organising the annual Women’s Dinner event this year, and we wanted to emphasise the importance of rela tionships and women supporting each other [see page 20]. We realised that in order to be proactive, we have to recognise and understand the strengths within our selves first, something which had been emphasised during the CFO Day on 11 May, during which attendees learnt how to unlock their superpowers [see page 38].

Putting together this issue of CFO Magazine, we decided to shine a light on the people who have been driving change instead of navigating it, including the nominees of the 2022 CFO Awards [see page 68].

Investec group FD Nishlan Samujh also believes that, if we keep reacting to crises instead of finding solu tions to the problems we are facing, we won't see the world returning to its full potential [see page 50]. And we heard from leading audit professionals on how accountants have a role to play in improving the future by helping to build a better world [see page 58].

hope in reading this, you find the inspiration to tap into your strengths and become the superheroes South Africa needs.

Caylynne Fourie

CHANGE

IS IN THE AIR

Finance professionals are embracing change as they take on new roles, new organisations and new industries.

so much opportunity ahead in the industry,” Averen says.

Jubilant Speckman resigned as the CFO of Salungano Group, previously known as Wescoal, for personal reasons. Jubilant joined Salungano in September 2020, when it was still Wescoal, as its acting group CFO. In February 2021, she was appointed to the role permanently.

Sasfin appointed Harriet Heymans as its new financial director. Harriet takes over from Angela Pillay, who tendered her resignation in January to pursue other endeavours. Harriet says that she is excited to join Sasfin because the company echoes her own values.

finance at Hollard Insurance. “AfroGlobalisation is at the heart of Hollard International’s brand and the new role will provide me with exposure to the African continent’s prospects and difficulties,” she says.

Kyle Paulsen stepped into the role of Takealot.com’s head of finance, after serving as a finan cial manager for the company since 2019. “The last three years in the Takealot group have been exciting, eventful and a phenomenal growth experience. I am looking forward to continuing the journey,” he says.

Sam Hopwood has been appointed as the new senior finance manager

AngloGold Ashanti appointed its senior VP of group finance Ian Kramer as interim CFO after Christine Ramon took early retirement on 30 June. Ian previ ously served as the interim CFO when Christine was serving as the interim CEO of the mine, but returned to his senior VP role when the company appointed Alberto Calderon as its new CEO.

Flight Centre Travel Group (FCTG) appointed Averen Deonanan as its new CFO. He replaces Euan McNeil, who became managing director of the group in November 2021. “I am really excited to be joining FCTG, especially at this juncture, with

Stephen Griffiths has taken up the role of interim CEO along with his current role as CFO, following the retirement of CEO Martyn Wade Stephen joined Grindrod in 2004 as group financial manager and was promoted to CFO of the shipping division in 2009.

Mustek appointed Shabana Aboo Baker Ebrahim as its new group financial director. “I am hum bled about my appointment and feel hugely fortunate to have been given this amazing opportu nity. It is a huge privilege that the board has seen in me the qualities needed to help take Mustek for ward,” she says.

Nilza Mngomezulu has been appointed as the new head of

Ian Kramer

Averen Deonanan

Going far as Capitec’s new CFO

Grant Hardy has officially taken over the role of CFO at Capitec following the retirement of André du Plessis at the end of June.

“I feel immensely privileged and grateful for the opportunity and I’m looking forward to the challenges that lie ahead,” Grant says. ”I am passionate about Capitec, what we are building and the continued positive impact we strive to make in the lives of our clients.”

Grant has been with Capitec since 2015 and worked closely with André in his previous role as head of financial management. “Being part of André’s team and reporting to him has allowed me to learn about business, leadership, Capitec and myself. I believe this puts me in a good position as I step into this role, ” he says.

He explains that his first course of action in the new role will be to ensure the bank continues to unlock the full potential of all the people and teams at Capitec. “I am a firm believer that if you want to go fast, you go alone, but if you want to go far, you go together. From what I have seen over the years the talent at Capitec can take us incredibly far.” l

of Mars Wrigley North America, bidding goodbye to his role as the company’s CFO of its South Africa region. The 2021 CFO Awards nom inee said that the move is in line with his development plan to move to a large-scale market such as North America.

Mars South Africa has appointed Bartek Szarapa as Sam’s replacement.

Bauba Resources has appointed Berrangé Nelson as its new financial director. This follows the promotion of previous CFO Jonathan Knowlden, who has been serving as acting CEO, to the com pany’s CEO role.

Mweb appointed Johan Jordaan and Lizette Loxton as acting

Shabana Aboo Baker Ebrahim

Grant Hardy

Jubilant Speckman

co-CFOs to take over from CFO Imraan Parker in June. Johan, who has been with Mweb for 19 years, started at the company in 2003 as a financial controller and was later promoted to finance manager in 2006.

Lizette joined Mweb in 2006 as a management accountant, and later progressed to the position of senior management accountant. She most recently served as the financial manager of planning and analysis.

Tyme Group promoted its CFO, David Pfaff, to the position of CEO on 1 July. David takes over from Coen Jonker, who has been appointed as TymeBank’s CEO for South Africa. In his new role, David will move to Tyme Group’s head office in Singapore, where he assumes responsibility for the group’s international growth strategy.

TymeBank has also appointed Yusuf Dockrat as its new CFO. Raluca Buzuleac, who has been serving as deputy CFO of MAS Real Estate, has officially taken on the responsibilities of CFO. Raluca

took over from CFO Irina Girgore as deputy CFO in December 2021, after Irina was appointed as dep uty CEO. Now, Irina will be stepping into the role of CEO permanently as well.

York Timber appointed its CFO Gerald Stoltz as the company’s permanent CEO. Gerald has been acting as both CFO and interim CEO of York since July 2021, follow ing the passing away of Pieter van Zyl. He will continue to serve as interim CFO until a replacement for the role has been appointed.

Cobus van der Merwe was appointed CFO of Kibo Energy on 1 June. Cobus has over 10 years’ experience in managerial and executive roles in the investment management and the energy, utili ties and resources sectors.

CIVH has appointed Byron Billett as the CFO of its new infrastructure company, which is a combination of its Dark Fibre Africa (DFA) and Vumatel assets.

Jaco Joubert was appointed as the group CFO of Fundi Capital on 1 March. “I am extremely excited

to be joining Fundi, as it is aligned to two areas that are very import ant to me and close to my heart: driving financial inclusivity and the power of education,” Jaco says.

Sandi de Souza has been appointed CFO for SAP Africa. “I am proud to be part of the team that is help ing drive transformation across our finance functions to provide the needed support as SAP transitions to its exciting new cloud-first path,” she said, adding that she is excited to play a guiding role in the compa ny's transition.

EIMS Africa project CFO Tasneem Khan has been promoted to proj ect CEO. Originally coming from a private equity background, when Tasneem joined EIMS as a finance manager for its Umoya Wind Farm and REISA projects, she had no experience in renewable energy. Soon thereafter, Cookhouse Wind Farm was added to Tasneem’s port folio. She was appointed as CFO of EIMS in 2018.

US-based Gatos Silver appointed South African André van Niekerk as its new CFO on 1 July. He joins

Sandi de Souza

Jaco Joubert

Sam Hopwood

Gatos Silver from Nevada Copper Corporation, where he has served as CFO since 2020.

Australia-based Graphene Manufacturing Group appointed South African Frederick Kotzee as its new CFO on 25 July. Frederick has served in various finance lead

ership roles in various South African and Australian min ing companies, including Anglo American, Kumba Iron Ore, Kalium Lakes and Kidman Resources.

Lumicks has appointed South African Andre Nel as its new CFO.

“I am excited to join Lumicks as

it begins to expand its operations around the world,” he says. “My expertise in working with life sci ences companies on a global basis has prepared me well to build scalable operations that enable companies to achieve successful growth.” l

Khuthadzo Mbedzi

Making a difference in the public sector

Khuthadzo Mbedzi has left the private sector to be a public servant, as the new CFO of the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA). Passionate about the future of South Africa’s youth, Khuthi says she is both excited and nervous about her appointment. “I am excited about the appointment, because it aligns my professional career with my passion and purpose. I love empowering and working with young people. I’m also nervous because, like the start of any new journey, the unknown comes with some nerves.”

However, she explains that she welcomes both feelings, as they keep

her grounded and humble, and drive her to invest in understanding the organisation.

Khuthi adds that she hopes to have an impact in her tenure as the CFO of NYDA. “I hope to enable growth within my team, to increase the NYDA’s footprint, and to ultimately better the lives of the South African youth by affording them opportunities through various programmes in line with the Presidency’s mandate, and in collaboration with partners both in public and private sector.” l

SETTING THE WORLD TO RIGHTS TOGETHER

Top CFOs gathered at the Saxon on 7 July and shared a sense of hope that South Africa’s problems are solvable, if business leaders put their minds to it.

At a time when there are many ongoing challenges in both the local and global economic, political and environmental situ ations, a group of top CFOs still managed to hit a positive note at an exclusive dinner at the Saxon Hotel in Johannesburg on 7 July.

The delectable dinner, hosted by CFO South Africa in partnership with Alteryx, saw CFOs discussing how to set the world to rights. The collective insights in the room gave the participants a sense of hope that South Africa’s problems are solvable, if business leaders put their minds to it.

Topics that came under the collective magnifying glass included whether all supplier price increases are the result of global supply chain issues, or in some cases represent opportunistic pricing by local businesses. The

CFOs agreed that in many cases, they have a responsibility to absorb some price increases rather than pass them on to their consumers – though this is not sustainable.

Power supply issues were also a hot topic of discussion, with one CFO mentioning that they were converting many sites to solar, as the cost of running diesel generators through loadshedding is becoming prohibitive. The impact of rising fuel prices on all areas of business was also discussed.

Each CFO shared the story of how their business has weathered the past two years, despite the challenges. While all the CFOs admitted to experiencing significant business impact, they were also able to share how they met the challenges, and what they learnt along the way.

The CFOs also touched on how their businesses are shaping up in the new world of work, reflecting that many employees in general are not keen to return permanently to the workplace. They agreed that while flexibility is important for workers, there is also a need to collaborate and communicate face to face. The enthusiastic discussion and story-sharing at the dinner was a true reflection of the benefits of this kind of in-person interaction.

While the topics under discussion were serious, the CFOs enjoyed the evening – the delicious food, the fine wine and definitely the exceptional company. They extended their thanks to CFO South Africa and Alteryx for an extraordinary evening, with great insights and promises of sustaining the new connections that were made l

Those in attendance were:

Boitumelo Mosako, DBSA CFO

Brian Chivere, CFO South Africa community manager

Deepa Sita, Tiger Brands group CFO

Fikile Mhlontlo, SAA interim CFO

Georgina Guedes, CFO South Africa executive community director

Georgios Bakolas, Alteryx strategic sales, MEA

Martin van der Walt, Sibanye Sillwater head of finance, SA Gold Operations

Punki Modise, Absa chief strategy and sustainability officer

Zaf Mahomed, Cell C CFO

EXPLORING NEW HORIZONS

A passionate globetrotter, CFO Bongiwe Ntuli sees opportunities in new places, and goes for them. It was no different when she saw potential in the struggling Jet brand, as well as in Tapestry, and knew TFG could deliver on this potential.

By Caylynne Fourie

Ayear after Bongiwe Ntuli joined one of South Africa’s foremost retailers, TFG, as its CFO, Covid-19 hit. Like many retailers at the time, TFG felt the impact of the pandemic across its operations since the initial lockdown in March 2020, and in just three months, the group’s con solidated retail turnover declined 43 percent.

“April was all about scenario planning, tight cash flow management and ensuring we had sufficient liquidity. So the treasury team and I worked with local banks to shore up our balance sheet, as we didn’t know how long the lockdowns would last,” Bongiwe explains.

They also embarked on a capital raising project, relying on their shareholder relationships. “The TFG strategy is robust and has received great shareholder support over the years, so the rationale for the cap ital raise was sound,” she says, adding that the investment case for the capital raise was based on the underlying business being strong.

However, there was material uncertainty at the time as a result of the pandemic with trading disruptions and risk expected to continue in all three of the group's major operating territories. “It was prudent and necessary to reduce the group’s indebtedness, which would strengthen its relative position through the recovery and insulate the balance sheet against potential future shocks,” Bongiwe explains.

Because the shareholders were supportive of TFG’s strategy and its investment case, as well as the attractively priced rights offer, the capital raise was oversubscribed by 2.3 times, and TFG raised R3.8 billion.

With a strong balance sheet and a “war chest”, the company was ready to take advantage of any oppor tunities that came from the pandemic, and look for further organic growth opportunities. “Jet and Edgars went into business administration around the same time and I knew TFG would be the best home for Jet,” she adds. “Jet was for sale for R380 million, and for a business that once made a turnover of R8 billion,

we knew that it had great potential with the right owner.”

She explains that TFG had always played into the low, middle and upper segments of the retail mar kets, and Jet allowed the group to grow their market share further into the value segment. “This is a good segment to play in when the economy isn’t doing well.”

Now, two years later, Jet contributes over R5 billion in turnover to TFG and has had payback of less than 12 months. “All the surprises have been positive – it's a strong brand that’s loved by the customers and has a strong management team,” Bongiwe says.

Creating potential

Along with strict cash management, one of TFG’s strategic imperatives during Covid-19 was to look after their employees. The group, which employs more than 30,000 store staff worldwide, took the decision to keep on paying their staff their basic costs throughout the lockdowns. But putting their employees first is not new for TFG, Bongiwe says. One of the company’s values is to make a meaningful difference to its people’s lives by providing training, skills and experience, which in turn drives economic growth and development.

“Over the past five years, the group has spent over R1 billion to develop local manufacturing capabil ity together with the South African government and close to R600 million on learnerships, bursaries and education related activities. The number of training interventions have been about 630,000 over the past few years,” Bongiwe says.

The company’s CSI flagship project, SEW Good, brings on board previously unemployed women and upskills and trains them. At TFG’s Prestige factory, these women manufacture the iconic purple blanket, which is donated to disaster-affected communities.

Another one of the retailer’s CSI projects is Mhinga Village in Limpopo, where they run learnerships. At

“It excited me to be part of an acquisition that not only brought turnover for TFG... but also assisted in saving thousands of jobs.”

the end of the 12-month program, about 80 percent of the students manage to finish and graduate, and 70 percent of those are put in long term employment within the group.

TFG also offers hundreds of internships a year to bring people up to the right level of skill and expe rience. These interns are then absorbed into the company’s store environments worldwide.

Uniquely positioned for good

Passionate about M&A, Bongiwe says that what makes her most proud of the Jet acquisition is the fact that it saved the jobs of over 5,000 store work ers, as well as the jobs in supplier companies. “Job creation and the retention of jobs are critical and is one of TFG’s strategic ESG pillars. South Africa’s unemployment rate is one of the highest in the world and we have taken it upon ourselves to work with the government to create better lives for South African people.”

She explains that, aside from the obvious economic consequences the unemployment rate has for the country, it also has a devastating social impact. “We saw this during the civil unrest that occurred in July 2021.”

During this period, 199 of TFG’s stores were looted across KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng. “For precaution ary measures, we closed about 1,000 stores during that week to avoid further looting, and in just that week alone our turnover was impacted by up to R700 million,” Bongiwe says.

However, about 180 of the 199 stores that were looted are back in commission again and making a healthy turnover and profits. She explains that TFG is in the fortunate position to create meaningful job opportunities and this demon strates just how strongly the company believes in playing its part in realising the potential of South Africa and its people. “It excited me to be part of an

acquisition that not only brought turnover for TFG, fitted with our strategy of growing the value seg ment, but also assisted in saving thousands of jobs.”

During the pandemic, TFG’s unique position as one of South Africa’s only local manufacturers also worked in its favour. “TFG’s investment in its own manufacturing facilities and local sourcing initia tives helped us to reduce our reliance on imports and thereby insulated us to a certain extent from the global supply chain disruptions,” Bongiwe says.

Over and above this, local quick-response man ufacturing allowed the retailer to respond to the best-selling commodities on relatively short lead times, resulting in less markdowns and improved gross margins.

Seeking new potential

TFG also recently acquired Tapestry, which owns Coricraft, Volpes and Dial-a-Bed. “We’ve always had @Home, but it only made up two to three percent of the furniture and home retail industry,” Bongiwe says. “By acquiring Tapestry, which is almost the same size as our @Home business, we were able to grow our market share in this segment and play a meaningful role in the mid to upper consumer home sector.”

Tapestry also shares the TFG values of manufac turing and sourcing local products, which Bongiwe explains was one of the biggest drawcards for her when considering the acquisition. “As a leading retailer in local quick response manufacturing in South Africa, the Tapestry business model resonated with TFG’s ESG purpose, and bolstered our social upliftment ambitions.”

Bongiwe and TFG management are always on the lookout for good M&A opportunities, and explains that, even now, in the midst of the economic turmoil, TFG continues to grow its market share and will open approximately 500 outlets in its 2023 financial year alone.

“The acquisition of the Jet business is an example of finding and executing on an attractive opportunity in what was a very difficult economic climate at the time.”

“We continue to assess acquisition opportunities on a regular basis and will only pursue these if they are in line with our strategy and meet our stringent investment criteria,” she says. “The opportunis tic acquisition of the jet business is an example of finding and executing on an attractive acquisition opportunity in what was a very difficult economic climate at the time.”

Global focus

TFG is a global retailer with strong successful brands in the UK and Australia as well. “We have strong, capable management teams in place in both these regions and they are responsible for implementing and executing on their strategies with the full sup port of our group supervisory board, as well as South African resources as and when required,” Bongiwe says.

She explains that these businesses also emerged strongly from the Covid-19 pandemic, and are well positioned for growth. “Both businesses delivered record levels of profitability in the 2022 financial year, and they continued to perform strongly in the

first quarter of the 2023 financial year.”

She adds that all TFG’s brands are thriving in the current environment, with some of their mid to upper segment brands seeing double digit growth.

Globetrotter

Apart from weekly Teams meetings with the global teams to review performance, set budgets, do fore casts and offer any other support they require, Bongiwe visits the UK and Australia operations at least four times a year.

However, as a self-declared globetrotter, she enjoys travelling to these countries, and takes holidays overseas when she has time.

She explains that the highlight of her travels this year was the opportunity to go to Wimbledon and watch the men’s final. “It was a thrilling experience.”

When she isn’t working, which she says is not often, she likes to curl up on her couch at home , read a nice book or watch documentaries and movies on Netflix. She also enjoys visiting her parents and sib lings in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng. l

CELEBRATING EXCELLENT WOMEN

An inspired – and inspiring – group of women CFOs and CHROs and their mentees gathered at the annual CFO South Africa Women’s Dinner to reflect on using their own success to pave the way for the next generation of women to go even further.

The 2022 CFO and CHRO South Africa Women’s Dinner was held at the Radisson Blu Hotel in Sandton, on 3 August, with the theme, “Women of Excellence”. All the women in attendance celebrated the ethos that women lift as they rise.

Welcoming the chance to come together and network after the restrictions of the Covid-19 pandemic, attend ees were greeted by CHRO South Africa managing editor Nomahlubi Sonjica, who expressed the privilege that came with having so many strong women in one room.

Speaking on “Finding your Womentum”, Qhawekazi Mdikane, CMO of Momentum – one of the evening’s prin cipal partners – spoke of the importance of ensuring that women own their strength. That strength, she said, often comes with owning one’s vulnerability. “I want to see more vulnerability in our leaders because it is a source of strength; it humanises and makes leaders accessible.”

The audience was then treated to pioneering female leaders’ stories of the “firsts” they’ve achieved in the past year. Bongi Ngoma, national head of audit at the Auditor-General of South Africa, said that the task of uplifting women is generational – the theme we need to be empowering women to find and reach their potential, rather than feeling threatened by their potential suc cess. “We will raise women that are greater than us,” she said. “To me that is the pinnacle and reflection of our leadership.”

Avanthee Maharaj, Google South Africa CHRO, shared a personal story of how she learned the value of self-care.

“We need to stop glamourising burnout and seeing it as a badge of honour. My biggest achievement is recognising that I matter,” she said.

Her message that, as we rise, we don’t just need to lift others, but also ourselves, was one that resonated with everyone.

Ruwayda Redfearn, recently appointed as the first female CEO of Deloitte Africa, reflected on her humble begin nings helping out at her parents’ Durban-based clothing factory, where she learnt to bring a sense of purpose to all that she does.

She said that while all women have a different journey in finding their unique purpose, all are worth celebrating. “We need to embrace our success in all its diversity and make it work for us all,” she said.

Ruwayda added that while she’s proud of her new posi tion, she looks forward to a time “when it is no longer remarkable to be appointed as the first female”.

In a panel discussion facilitated by CFO South Africa managing editor, Caylynne Fourie, the topic, “From sup port to excellence and celebration”, yielded powerful insights.

Ownership and self-awareness

Andisa Liba, chief people officer of Floatpays, reflected on the need to be authentic in tearing down the artifi cial barriers that still exist in a workplace that was not

created with women in mind. “How I show up in the workplace is how I show up in life,” she said.

Deepa Sita, the CFO of Tiger Brands, said that while women often have to fight harder to get the recognition that they deserve, they need to back themselves – and their colleagues – more. “We don’t need to feel we have to prove ourselves,” she said.

Elanie Kruger, CHRO of the Tsebo Group, said that tak ing ownership of one’s career starts with self-awareness. “Not everyone wants to be a CEO, they want to be the best they can be, and that’s enough,” she stressed. “Your opportunity will come.”

Women still struggle with the internalised feeling of inequality that many have grown up with, added Portia Mkhabela, head of ACCA Southern Africa. Yet, she emphasised the power of embracing feminine leadership skills like vulnerability in overcoming such feelings and empowering other women. “It’s important for women to

share their honest stories and real experiences to inspire women who are not in their position.”

Facilitating another engaging discussion on women cel ebrating one another, leadership coach Inge Walters encouraged attendees to consider their “biological advan tages” – innate strengths that they often don’t even know they have.

“On average, women are far less likely to speak about their achievements,” she said. “Yet it’s easier when they do it with a sense of authenticity, speaking rather about their learnings and what they’re excited about explor ing. We can help one another to do this.” Attendees did just that through an enriching collaborative exercise that ended the evening’s proceedings.

The evening was made possible by principal partners ACCA and Momentum Corporate, executive partners Sanlam, ServiceNow and Mercer, and associate partners GIBS and SoluGrowth. l

Bongi Ngoma

Elanie Kruger

Ruwayda Redfearn

Qhawekazi Mdikane

THE PEOPLE, PROFIT, PLANET NEXUS

Social sustainability as well as environmental and governance issues are increasingly being linked to company purpose – and the finance function has a critical role to play.

By Reabetswe Rabaji

Once considered a passing trend, ESG is now squarely on the agenda of finance execu tives, but there is still a lot of work to be done in these areas – with every sector having an important role to play. The reality is that ESG is not a one-man show, but a team effort directly linked to profit and people.

At the recent Finance Indaba Online, Arno Daehnke, chief finance and value management officer at Standard Bank, told attendees that more often than not, organisations who are motivated by sustainability will most likely succeed compared to those that are not.

“Social sustainability and environmental issues are actually our purpose. If we don’t have those matters at the forefront, we will fail to deliver on our purpose,” he added.

Arno highlighted that companies that are driven by purpose tend to attract much better talent and ultimately a broader pool of investors as well. “I see investors really bringing up ESG-related matters on the roadshows that I go on, and how they are thinking about ESG and holding companies accountable,” Arno explained.

Arno Daehnke Devrani Moonsamy

He added that investors overseas are very vocal about the fact that companies need to make ESG a core criterion to attract investment.

According to Devrani Moonsamy, head of finance, the Competition Tribunal of South Africa, as more and more companies start to adopt ESG strategies, which are ultimately to the benefit of the country from an environmental perspective, they also need to consider ESG strategies geared towards addressing the socio-economic issues of the country.

“ESG is not just about driving profits, but to see what impact you’re having on society. ESG is also a risk management tool that involves or focuses on non-financial objectives even more,” she said.

She highlighted that the private sector needs to be more purposeful about its ESG strategy, as the public sector has far fewer resources, and this will be very beneficial for the country in the long run.

Purposeful

Raj Nana, CFO and executive director, Attacq Group, agreed that ESG must be purposeful and not just a talk shop.

“Organisations should understand their purpose and mission and try to incorporate it into their ESG at that level as fundamentals. Once you’ve done that, the decision-making and the monitoring follows from there

seamlessly,” he said. “This way, ESG doesn’t become a side hustle or an ad hoc project and you’ll see it prosper.”

According to Rebecca Pole, FD, NEXTEC (a division of EOH), while companies are concerned about their reporting, they are also made up of people – employees and stakeholders – who are all increasingly focused and interested in a company’s purpose over and above the financial goals companies set for themselves.

There’s been an increase in leaving society in a better place from the side of organisations as well. “We are trying to create sustainable solutions for our generation and future generations, as an organisation,” she said.

Rebecca believes that environmental impact assessments should be informed or aided by digitisation.

“Digitisation allows professionals to get a full appreciation of what it will take to keep the environment safe, and we, as finance professionals, need to be at the forefront of that,” she said. l

Raj Nana Rebecca Pole

“Organisations should understand their purpose and mission and try to incorporate it into their ESG at that level as fundamentals.”

THE MAKING OF A GREAT CFO

Becoming a CFO can be a daunting task in the face of intimidating economic prospects, disrupted supply chains, a world of work that has evolved rapidly over the past few years, and even more change on the horizon. Nicola Mawson spoke with Deloitte South Africa’s finance and performance leader Siliziwe Mafika about how CFOs can transition into their roles to take on these challenges.

Between August last year and this year, Deloitte facilitated 10 Transition Labs, working with top South African CFOs to understand what keeps them up at night and what is expected of them from their most important stakeholders, such as staff, the exec utive committee, shareholders, and the board. Since inception in 2012, more than 100 Labs have been facilitated, Deloitte South Africa finance and perfor mance leader Siliziwe Mafika notes.

Siliziwe explains that, when a CFO enters his or her office for the first time, they need to go through a pro cess to understand what the job entails, and how to plan for it, which is where the Labs assist.

During the past year, Deloitte helped shape CFOs from the consumer and retail sector, the financial services industry, as well as telecommunications, media, and technology, aiding each in grappling with their role in the changing environment and how they need to help steer the ship by shaping strategy.

“We have had at times, instances in which CFOs arrived at their desk with a list of things they think they need to do, while what is actually expected of them are activ ities that are miles away.”

During the Transition Labs, Deloitte unpacks aspects such as where CFOs should be spending their time, and on what tasks. CFOs also need to understand whether their team includes capable people who will align with

priorities, he says.

CFOs’ roles include supporting decision-making through using effective financial reporting to have insight-based conversations that speak to business per formance drivers. They also need to set meaningful and impactful goals for finance staff, balance growth, mar gins, and investment focus. Talent retention, upliftment, and building the right team is also a main concern, as is assessing M&A transactions as a focus on acquisi tions presents multiple strategic opportunities such as expanding geographic locations, diversifying operations, or capturing market share.

The Labs unpack the CFOs’ current environment, and then help them succeed in contributing towards busi ness strategy and goals. A CFO’s role, says Siliziwe, is much like that of a pit boss in a formula one race, tell ing the race car driver (CEO) when to change tires, come in for fuel, or take the corner to get into the lead.

This involves forward-thinking and planning: what is coming next, what trend needs to be followed, what businesses should be on the radar for possible M&A activity for expansion, he explains. He adds that the CFO needs to map out the financial implications of all of this, as well as help companies pivot during crises times such as the recent pandemic, which saw an entire shift in the way business is done – from bank loans to those who lost salaries, doors having to close, and the advent of remote work.

To do this, he says, a CFO needs the right team as they cannot take all this burden upon themselves, else they will burnout, which is no good to anybody. “You can all work together and this requires focus on team members to make sure that everybody drives in the right direction to fulfil activities.”

In every team, Siliziwe says, there will be pockets of excellence among the average worker, and this excel lence needs to be spread across all staff members in the unit. CFOs need self-starters who can make decisions and not have to get their permission for everyday tasks such as compiling a set of numbers, he adds. “Upskilling people and ensuring that you've got the right base for them is something that's really important.”

A CFO’s four faces

CFOs need to take on four roles: operator, steward, cata lyst, and strategist. These imperatives have not changed since 2010, says Siliziwe. “The last CFO of the Year, Bongi Ngoma, who is now national head of audit at the AuditorGeneral, implemented all these aspects during her time as finance head.”

Being an operator involves basics such as transaction processing, Siliziwe explains. “It's really rolling the gears and doing the best you can with the resources you have.”

Steward is when the CFO preserves the business’ assets through compliance, and internal and external reporting, he says. “This is where you find a lot of internal audit, a lot of typical accounting when it comes to Treasury, hedging, compliance, key controls, and so on.”

The strategist and catalyst role is where CFOs imple ment strategies that not only look at their exit plan, but also, as the pit boss, identify growth opportuni ties and their impact on the business, as well as driving everybody towards the same outcome, says Siliziwe. An example is when the pandemic hit, and CFOs had to immediately understand the effect this would have on the company’s operations, including driving plans and allocating financial resources to the right areas. This was followed by last year’s riots in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, flooding in KwaZulu-Natal, and then the Russian/Ukraine war with a myriad of supply chain and other business impacts.

A global workplace

Another aspect that Siliziwe highlights is that the bound aryless world in which everyone can work anywhere has led to staff leaving companies, across all job positions, because they can take up global positions. “Talent devel opment and retention are currently a big challenge.”

“CFOs need to have retention strategies for their team

members, because, for significantly higher salaries, and, probably, better lifestyles, people can relocate anywhere, or they can still stay here and still work for other entities globally, as well.”

The question then becomes how one combats that. Talent retention strategies need to go beyond compensa tion, says Siliziwe, and look at the culture of the team as well as giving them a purpose.

At the same time, CFOs need to understand that they are human, he says, and have fears while also needing to leave behind a legacy, stamping their mark on an organ isation and building a team up so that, when they leave, someone can step into their shoes.

Key for CFOs is needing to build a dynamic finance team, one that is world-class. They need to consider whether this team has embraced the current digital transforma tion as well as work with digital disruptors, says Siliziwe. There is also a need to look at whether the team is empowered. “Can I work myself out of a job, as a CFO? And you'll see that, we’ve seen examples in the retail space where CFOs have become CEOs. What we nor mally ask them as well is, what was your succession plan?”

Yet, says Siliziwe, many CFOs struggle with imposter syndrome, wondering if they are right for the job and have the necessary skills. “This is where the relationship between the CFO and the CEO comes in, with the CEO assuring the financial head that they have been installed in that position because they are a safe pair of hands and have knowledge that can really aid the business’ growth ambitions.”

However, the buck stops with the CFO, he says. “When the company is doing well, the CEO will probably take credit. But when the company does badly or something happens with compliance, you're probably going to fire the CFO first, questioning where they were when the auditors found issues.

“When you ask CFOs what impact they would like to make, it's around having really contributed to the growth of a company and to performance targets,” Siliziwe concludes.l

Deloitte’s CFO Programme offers CFOs bold initiatives and insights for one of the toughest jobs in the world by bringing together a multidisciplinary team of leaders and subject matter specialists to help CFOs stay ahead in the face of growing challenges and demands. To find out more about this programme, contact Siliziwe Mafika at smafika@deloitte.co.za

Tech Trends

BACK IN ACTION

Deon Fredericks took a hiatus after successfully creating high-performance teams at Telkom and SAA, but was called out of semi-retirement when Famous Brands wanted him to do it again. By Puseletso Mompei

Deon Fredericks was called out of semi-re tirement in August 2021 by Famous Brands’ CEO Darren Helen and chairman Santie Botha. The company was experi encing challenges in publishing their 2021 financial results on time, and their group FD had resigned on 30 November of that year. Darren and Santie requested that Deon step in as group FD on a two-year contract with a mandate to estab lish a high-performing finance team and enable the placement of a new FD.

“I have always been a workaholic and can’t be idle for long periods of time. It would be a new and exciting challenge for me as it was in a different industry from what I had been used to, and I knew I could add value and make a difference,” Deon says.

Having taken all of this into account, he accepted. Now, Deon is rolling out a strategy which he has dubbed “Back to basics”, which is about making finance much easier, specifically in the current difficult operating and regulatory environments, ensuring that finance embraces the change. He explains that, “We are implementing a consolidation tool, which will make year-end reporting, management accounting, cashflows and projections easier. We are currently very excel driven, but that lack of automation creates significant risks and complexity. Our goal is to have an ecosystem that people can easily download

reports and information from and where all our financial records, with all the businesses and subsidiaries, are integrated in one place.”

Famous Brands grew from a family business into a listed corporate entity, and Deon’s team is busy upgrading internal controls. “Everyone was used to operating in a certain way that brought them success.”

When transitioning to a bigger, listed entity, however, he says it is critical to improve controls and systems, and people need to buy into the journey. “We are refining and mapping the critical controls taking into account the rapidly changing operating and regulatory environments and making sure that risk control metrics are right.”

Deon explains that it’s important that employees understand their overall role, the process and procedures put in place to support them, and they need to be on board about doing business differently, as a listed company.

Deon’s background

Deon grew up in Kuils River just outside Cape Town, and attended high school in the disadvantaged community of Elsies Rivier, where examples of professional success weren’t many and mentoring and career-grooming opportunities were few.

However, Deon knew he wanted to be a CA, because any activity in an organisation has a financial

“It would be a new and exciting challenge for me as it was a different industry from what I had been used to, and I knew I could add value and make a difference.”

impact. “We say ‘Cash is King’ because the numbers are so integral to business success,” he says.

Deon became the youngest senior manager at Telkom in 1993, an experience he says was daunting, but was also a springboard for his future success.

He explains that a big opportunity was participating in Telkom’s huge transformation, which was set in motion to establish the financial stability and sustainability of the company. Under the leadership of Sipho Maseko, he was part of the finance team that helped Telkom transform from being a monopoly into being a company that can successfully compete against formidable rivals.

“It was very challenging,” he recalls, adding that the experience came with many successes and learnings.

“One of the key takeaways is that culture change is critical, because if you keep doing the same thing, you

get the same result. It was important to make sure everyone is on board, aligned and working towards the same goal.”

He says that a paradigm shift is key to being successful and that at Telkom it started off with changes such as being cost conscious and prudent about all cost efficiencies (even the small ones), before scaling into bigger shifts and changes. “In addition to this, managing your greatest resource, people, is important as success is achieved through people. A company is only as good as the cohesive management and support team it creates to drive the strategy.”

He says when embarking on a major business change, leaders need to establish clarity from the start and set the example. Tone at the top is critical especially in relation to ethics. “We had push back from management and employees but made a case

until people bought in and understood the reality of the company’s situation, the benefits and the nonnegotiables. It was fulfilling to be able to reinvent the company and, in the process, yourself, to achieve something special.”

The good work was recognised by the industry in Telkom’s 2016 Annual report, which was rated most improved and moved from Good to Excellent and in 2017 the school of accounting part of SAICA development rated them number one for creating best opportunities for young talent, all of which confirmed the investments were right.

Having helped Telkom become lean enough to compete with fast growing phone operators such as MTN and Vodacom, he was seconded to SAA to step in as interim CFO for a 12-month period. “I saw it as an opportunity to give back to the country. It was fulfilling and I had to understand how business works in the public sector and adapt accordingly to achieve our objectives. Furthermore, to attract talent was very difficult and you had to bring the best available resources under the circumstances to assist the entity.”

Recipe for a high-performing team

Deon notes that, in building high-performing teams, leaders often find silos in businesses. He, however, is committed to creating links between areas such as operations – allowing them flexibility to do business and at the same time align with finance so that they understand and appreciate each other’s roles.

In his experience, he adds, it’s essential to create an environment where people can make mistakes and learn from them. “However, you need to be clear about certain non-negotiables, such as timelines and delivery.”

He also points out that it’s important to reflect on the learnings of Covid-19 and be sure that your organisation is fit for purpose. “You want to make sure you have the right in-house skills and, looking forward, proper succession planning for the different skill sets including the appropriate training. If you don’t pay attention to that it can, in the long term, be expensive in today’s world where people are flexible and move between employment quite easily”.

“Make sure you have the right people in the right seats, align expectations with requirements and support it with the required investment,” he advises. “Make the difficult decisions upfront, including moving people into right positions, providing relevant training, and exiting people where required.” l

“It was fulfilling to be able to reinvent the company and, in the process, yourself, to achieve something special.”

PROVIDING HOMEGROWN QUALITY

There are significant advantages to choosing a local company for business process

outsourcing, not least of which is job creation. SoluGrowth business executive Pierre

Botha explains why choosing a home-grown solution beats low-cost offshore BPO destinations every time. By Puseletso Mompei

In the wake of the great resignation and global economic uncertainty, SoluGrowth – a business process solution provider – is positioning itself as a top choice for companies looking to outsource.

The latest statistics put South Africa’s unemployment rate at 35 percent, and SoluGrowth business executive Pierre Botha asserts that the BPO sector could provide a lot of jobs for youth in South Africa: “We have an alarming unemployment rate, yet have so many skills and so much talent in this country. We need to match the shortage of skills in the UK, Europe, Australia and the US with the unemployment that we have in South Africa.”

Agility, flexibility and scalability

Pierre says there are numerous significant advantages to choosing a South African-based operation like SoluGrowth versus firms in other low-cost destinations such as India and the Philippines. “The time zone is definitely in our favour for clients in the UK and Europe. While this is not necessarily so for the US or Australia, we are extremely flexible, with some of our team members starting as early as 6am and some as late as 12pm. We have proven that we have the flexibility and agility to service clients regardless of where they are; for instance, we have a US-based client who has been with us for 19 years.”

He says another massive advantage South African firms have is cultural affinity. He explains that, “We offer a distinct advantage in that our business culture is similar to the culture of our clients. This allows us to communicate without difficulty, which keeps the quality of our work high and prevents errors from occurring.

“Finally, our niche expertise is appreciated by our clients. We are not a high volume, high turnaround business. The resources we provide are highly skilled and provide the personal touch even to clients that are abroad.”

Continuity in business

“A lot of what we do is an extension of a workforce located in another country,” says Pierre. “Our business depends on our ability to maintain a stable workforce. If that workforce changes too frequently, business continuity is out the door and relationships with customers, clients and suppliers will need to be rebuilt, causing delays and disruption.

“In some of the popular outsourcing destinations such as India, where there is high inflation and high job turnover, some positions like call centres currently have a 100 percent depletion, while our attrition is minimal at about 10 percent.”

He says growing quality skills is a priority for SoluGrowth and he points to a programme that was started in October 2014. “We recruit individuals from previously disadvantaged communities and provide hands-on experience for 18 months, alongside a government grant for the first 18 months to study towards a finance diploma. We started the programme with roughly three individuals in October 2014, and now more than 25 percent of our staff currently working on a project come from this initiative.”

Many of the programme participants are now team leaders and supervisors and he says it is one of the best sourcing initiatives that the company has had over the last few years.

“One of our greatest assets is that we have a team that’s cross-trained across all of the different projects we have worked on over the years. If an employee is off sick, or has to take paternity or maternity leave, or if labour laws change in the US like they did when paternity leave increased from one week to three months, it means you have a back-up plan.”

SoluGrowth’s approach to service delivery is collaborative. Pierre says they offer a range of services to help clients achieve their goals by streamlining

the process and eliminating unnecessary obstacles. “We work collaboratively with our clients, providing guidance on the best ways to achieve those goals, rather than simply meeting preset standards. Every quarter, we hold a business review with both the client and our own staff to discuss progress made towards these goals and how we can improve upon them for future projects or assignments.”

He says SoluGrowth always focuses on delivering value to its clients: “We review the value we’ve added for them in the last quarter and think about what they’ll want from us in the next quarter. We also offer a highly customisable service. This means we do not offer cookie-cutter solutions. Instead, we create a plan that is specifically designed to meet the needs of each client. We also have the flexibility to work on your hardware or ours if need be. I think this is one of the key reasons we have experienced so much growth in recent years.”

As a highly agile and adaptive operation, the company is able to meet challenges like load shedding and power disruption head-on. It all comes down to being responsive and having contingencies in place.

“We have issued all our people with 3G cards for all the networks because connectivity can differ according to location. We have our head office located in Pretoria,

with satellite offices in all other major cities in South Africa available through a flexible booking system. Some dedicated space in Cape Town is also being used every week, that has fully operational UPSes and generators, and people can come in to work from those.”

Being a reliable data provider

Pierre recognises that data is more crucial than ever for finance leaders to meet reporting requirements on time and respond to burgeoning obligations such as ESG, and says SoluGrowth is in a position to effectively support its clients with digital transformation and data analytics.

“Having timely and accurate data is essential for most projects,” he says. “We have live dashboards where information gets automatically populated. The right data strategy depends on the size of your company and the purpose of your project. Our team leaders must be able to keep track of the status of their projects, and the only way they can do that is by having quality data available.”

For more information, please contact SoluGrowth's business executive of client acquisition Manqoba Zungu at mazungu@solugrowth.com l

“One of our greatest assets is that we have a team that’s cross-trained across all of the different projects we have worked on over the years.”

PRISONERS, PROVOCATIONS & THE SUPERCFO

Leading finance professionals gathered at Marble restaurant overlooking the bustling streets of Rosebank, Johannesburg, for CFO Day, where they shared unique insights, frank discussions and words of inspiration.

Global speaker Stephen McGown kicked off CFO Day on 11 May by sharing his story of being kid napped from Timbuktu in 2011 and held as an Al Qaeda prisoner for over six years in the Sahara desert.

Attendees were brought to tears as he recounted his journey and related how he had to do his best to be pos itive in the face of great adversity during his six years of captivity.

Guests were then encouraged to change their seats and mingle with new peers – a CFO Day tradition – while poetry band Puns ‘n Things sang about superheroes with capes made of spreadsheets, encouraging the audience to have hope.

Next up was Jordaan Burger, vice president: finance, Sage AMEAP, who stressed that hiring the right people is vital.

“The hiring aspect [in an automated world] is important. We need a technologically savvy workforce. We need to

get away from crunching the numbers all the time and focus on telling the story. People have this fear that auto mation will take a lot of things away from us,” he said.

Sayuri Govender, reporting and analytics group head at Standard Bank, noted that the Covid-19 pandemic had accelerated the company’s automation strategy.

“The point is to take the manually intensive nature of the work we have to do to give us back the time that we need to tell the right story. We encourage our people to be future ready by creating learning as key magic,” she said.

Dineo Molefe, CFO at MTN, said it was important for companies to identify the drivers and understand the context of the business.

“We need to continue to challenge ourselves on how we are creating value and empower our teams to drive the right conversations. We have to wear the hat of the CEO even though the hat is not with us,” she concluded.

STRATEGY

Do good

During the insightful session on ESG, Nedbank CFO Mike Davis said, “Most of us think of ESG as climate change, but there’s a reason why there are three letters in the acronym.”

He explained that, for finance professionals, the easiest of the three letters to understand is governance. “This talks to the board and exco compositions, frameworks, policies, practices, transformation, and remuneration, all of which is how you structure the organisation to effectively manage not only the business, but the envi ronmental and social aspects of ESG as well.”

Ascendis Health CFO and interim CEO CJ Kujenga added, “Often, problems that manifest themselves as numbers come from much deeper than that and root down to the decisions we make.”

Hulisani CFO and interim CEO Masibulele Dem, added, ““We talk about ESG in the context of business, that it is a commercial imperative. But we need to look at it from a much higher level – as a life imperative. We live on this beautiful earth, and the extent at which we are able to sustain it is the extent to which we as humanity are able to survive and exist.”

Mike noted that ESG was not just “a nice to have” but has to be a long-term sustainable goal, “part of the cul ture and purpose of the organisation”. Masibulele further stated that CFOs hold powerful and influential positions in businesses, and this gives them a golden opportunity to contribute to something that is truly meaningful.

Digital innovation

Lafarge's former CFO Clarissa Appana gave attend ees insight into the strides being made in digital innovation.

“The pace of digital innovation and the speed of execu tion are some of the key challenges we are facing. One of the solutions we are trying to implement at Lafarge is to break down these bigger projects to get them within a shorter turnaround time. The way we would approach this is to lower the threshold, breaking it into many projects and somehow lower the approval levels,” she said.

The company has moved to a contactless, paperless way of work on its construction sites, to address miss ing paperwork and keep track of delivery notes, and is also trying to get transporters to buy into the real-time online tracking of trucks, loads and raw materials com ing in.

Clarissa added, “We are not moving fast enough in terms of innovation, but we are getting there. The cul ture we want to see is that it’s not just easy to succeed all the time. It’s okay to fail because you can have some lessons from that. We want to ensure that we are creat ing this environment that feels safe for people.”

Saving sinking ships

Eskom CFO Calib Cassim and Starbucks South Africa CFO Adrian Maizey provided attendees with unique insight on turning around their companies.

THE TOP FOUR THINGS CEOs LOOK FOR IN A CFO

BCX founder and Randvest chairman Isaac Mophatlane, Telkom CEO Serame Taukobong, as well as ACCA South Africa and remote markets head Portia Mkhabela gave their four personal leadership lessons from the top during CFO Day.

1. A strategic business driver: Serame explained that he looks for a partner to help him drive the strategic direction of the business. “The CFO is like the heart of the organisation. His job is to pump blood across the entire body. The CEO is the brain of the body, and needs to inform the heart where to pump the blood. So it's important for the CEO and CFO to figure out how they can work together for the body to perform at its best.”

2. Don’t be a “yes man”: Isaac believes that the CFO should be the conscience of the business. “Once you have a CFO that’s a yes man and just gives you the numbers that you are looking for, it becomes a problem.”

3. Be vulnerable: Portia said that, as a woman leader, you need

to always make sure you don’t neglect your feminine touch. “At the same time, however, you need to make sure that your teams and other leaders don’t take advantage of it. So we need to be strong when we make decisions, but drive them with compassion.”

Serame agreed, and believes that the same should apply to men. “Allow yourself to be vulnerable and open. The one thing we forget as leaders is that we are also human. It’s okay to be vulnerable and say I don’t know, or to ask for help. It allows people to engage with you on a much more honest and personal level.”

4. Be inclusive: Isaac believes that CFOs need to surround themselves with a diverse finance team. “It’s important to have different points of view when you are making decisions. Just as much as you lead your team, they need to be able to lead you towards making the right decisions.”

CFO Day was held in partnership with Momentum Corporate, Workday, ACCA, Coupa, Ince, Kyriba, SoluGrowth & Transparent.

Calib said his first decision in the CFO role was not to compromise his values or morals, and to do the right thing. In the first week, one of the then-executives of Eskom came to Calib and said they had a solution for the power utility’s liquidity. “There was no paper trail and it would have cost us R400 billion. So I said no way, despite the severe pressure from everyone to sign,” he said.

Calib explained that from August 2017 to January 2018 Eskom didn’t raise a single cent in either the domestic or international markets. “We needed to start by developing new credibility with our lenders, but to gain trust isn’t easy. You can’t buy it, you have to earn it,” he said.

At the beginning of February 2018, Calib looked at the balance sheet and realised that Eskom would run out of cash and go into default within 30 days. Because of the credibility the new chairman and Calib had cre ated in preceding months, the banks gave them the funds they needed. And, through the continued develop ment of Eskom’s credibility, the power utility currently has enough cash flow for three to four months. However, Calib explained that they are certainly not out of the woods yet.

Driving a speedboat

His first course of action, after buying 13 Starbucks, was to reduce the corporate overhead and move to smaller

store formats in lower rental areas outside of malls. Just over two years later, having ploughed through macro interruptions including the Covid-19 pandemic, looting, metal worker strikes, as well as rolling electricity and water blackouts, 42 new Starbucks were opened, bringing its total of stores to 55.

“I don’t think we would have expanded at this rate were it not for Covid-19, as the landscape would not have been as opportunistic as it was,” he says. “The markets imploded, and we went out there looking for new retail space while the rest of the market was retreating and anchoring down in preparation of the storm that was coming. While our growth has been out of necessity, our rate of growth has been out of opportunity. We moved early and fast.”

After these insightful panel discussions, strategist and disruptor Abdullah Verachia’s took the stage to lay some provocations on the table.

He said that, as the canvas of business environments have changed, so too have the colours of decision mak ing and the skills of the finance painters.

Abdullah said, “When you’re at a senior level, some times you have to look at the society that you live in and ask the hard question: ‘how do we in some way have a deeper impact beyond our organisation?’.”l

Serame Taukobong

Adrian Maizey

Calib Cassim

Clarissa Appana

Mike Davis

CFO s RECOGNISE THE IMPORTANCE OF ESG, ROBOTICS & EMPLOYEE BENEFITS

According to this year's CFO Day Survey results, many CFOs believe new ESG reporting requirements are resulting in real change and that employee benefits are providing a competitive advantage for their organisations. However, in a changing world, most CFOs’ sentiments have remained similar to what they were in 2019.

On 11 May 2022, many of South Africa’s lead ing 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 financial landscape follow ing the disruptive Covid-19 pandemic. Some 62 CFOs filled in the survey, giving an enlightening insight into the current concerns of CFOs and FDs in the South African economic climate.

connection between a company’s social and environmental impact and its financial performance continues to grow, and investors are on the lookout for accountability on both these fronts within organisations. 78 percent of CFOs indicated that new ESG reporting requirements have resulted in real change. However, 71 percent of CFOs say that this has resulted in more admin. Only 12 percent are concerned that the increased capital spend in meeting these requirements

resulting in less profit.

CFOs BELIEVE ESG REPORTING HAS RESULTED IN REAL CHANGE

is not about making a business look good. It should be embedded within the business culture as it is the right thing to do, and the right way to do business.”

ROBOTS

asked CFOs the same question in

75 percent of CFOs felt that South Africa was lagging behind in AI, robotics and IoT. Despite the Covid-19 pandemic forcing organisations worldwide to rapidly adopt new technologies and automate, 71 percent still believe this is the case. However, CFOs have recognised the need to upskill their teams and

percent are

Aneshree Naidoo,

71%

OF CFOs FEEL THAT SA IS STILL LAGGING BEHIND

AND

AUDIT ROTATION

firm

audit firm rotation…

long overdue

The more things change…

OF CFOS BELIEVE MAFR

LONG OVERDUE

unnecessary musical chairs of audit firms, costing time and money without many

EMPLOYEE BENEFITS

The Covid-19 pandemic

placed new urgency and importance on the care of employees’ wellbeing. This, combined with the move towards flexible working arrangements, has resulted in many organisations having to relook their benefits policies.

percent of CFOs believe that the new focus on employee benefits is an important competitive advantage for their organisations, and 58 percent believe it translates directly into measurable financial benefits.

Abigail

OF CFOS BELIEVE EMPLOYEE BENEFITS PROVIDE A COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE

A BREAK IN THE CHAIN

Since the beginning of Covid-19, companies around the world have been facing supplychain disruptions. In South Africa this has been exacerbated by civil unrest, floods, and the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Ang Lloyd chatted to a few CFOs to find out how they’re navigating these extraordinary challenges.

According to the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF’s) global economic growth forecast for July 2022, supply-demand imbalances continue to play a role in high inflation and low trade output.

Somewhat alarmingly titled ‘Gloomy and more uncer tain’, the report says that if renewed Covid-19 lockdowns affect China, inflation rises even higher, and the RussiaUkraine conflict further constricts international trade and European gas supplies, global growth could poten tially decline to a dismal 2.0 percent in 2023 – putting it in the bottom 10 percent of outcomes since 1970.

South Africa is, of course, not insulated from these economic shocks; the IMF predicts that by 2023, the country’s growth will have fallen from 4.9 percent in 2021 to 1.4 percent. However, things are picking up.

According to a June Statistics South Africa report, the volume of goods produced in factories increased by 4.7 percent quarter-on-quarter during the first quar ter, export orders remained positive, and GDP growth seen during the same period returned the economy to its pre-pandemic size.

Yet supply-chain issues remain a persistent thorn in the side of many South African companies. While demand has increased for several sectors, supply shortages con tinue to be a problem. Doing business has become incredibly expensive, too, with a 500 percent increase in the cost of using a 12m freight container to send goods by sea from China to South Africa.

Not only must CFOs contend with supply-chain disrup tions and stockouts at a global scale, but South Africa has faced its own challenges in the form of the July 2021 civil unrest, a cyberattack on Transnet soon after, April 2022’s KwaZulu-Natal floods, and, for good measure, stage 6 load-shedding. When all of this is combined, it makes a South African CFO’s job increasingly difficult.

“In the current climate, conditions are so volatile that while CFOs plan for certain scenarios, we have seen over the last two years that anything is possible,” says Laila Razack, Equites Property Fund CFO. “There are the black swan events, too – the events we haven’t even contem plated yet.”

Just-in-time to just-in-case

Along with the cost of shipping and poor infrastructure, Africa continues to experience higher logistics costs than its global peers, which exacerbates long-standing issues like supply-chain bottlenecks, shortages, and lead times at borders. “Throughout the continent, the largest part of product-to-market costs is the cost of logistics, not the cost of manufacturing,” explains George de Beer, Imperial Logistics CFO.

George adds that Imperial has had to juggle interna tional challenges, like Brexit creating a driver shortage in its European operations, and the worldwide semicon ductor shortage, which has severely impacted the global automotive industry. “These are all out of our control,” he says. “But we can make sure that our financial metrics remain sound and having a diverse portfolio gives you headroom if things go a bit pear-shaped.”

Economists predict that a return to normal for the global supply chain is “unlikely” for the rest of 2022 and possi bly longer. The days of cost-effective shipping, or even reliable road and rail transportation in South Africa’s case, are no longer a given, and supply chains need to be fortified.

According to Laila, a CFO in the logistics property space, supply chains are being bolstered to mitigate issues. “There is a paradigm shift from ‘lean and low-cost sup ply chains’ to ‘resilient and diversified supply chains’, which includes nearshoring manufacturing operations and using more suppliers locally. We are also witnessing a trend of retailers increasing inventory levels globally, as the strategy is evolving from a just-in-time to a just-incase model.”

As technology improves and supply chains become smarter and more efficient, logistics companies and retailers are consolidating multiple facilities into “cam puses”. This, Laila explains, results in operational cost-savings from warehouse management to security. “We are also seeing massive investment in IT infrastruc ture to ensure robust and resilient supply chains.”

Laila adds that retailers are rethinking their distribution models, and many are adopting omnichannel distri bution. This means that customers can purchase and receive orders from several sales channels. For example,

“The work we are doing to optimise our supply chain has gone a long way in contributing to how we mitigate any risk.”

they can purchase online and collect at a brick-andmortar store or purchase online and have the products delivered to their homes. “In this evolution of customer expectations, retailers have to re-evaluate their supply chains to provide a seamless offering to consumers,” she says.

Strategic supply chains and alternative solutions

When a factory is flooded, a warehouse looted, or a ship ment pushed out, businesses and their CFOs need to act quickly. According to Tiger Brands CFO, Deepa Sita, this also means looking at the big picture.

“As CFO, you need to have a good handle on market dynamics and the impact of your decisions on the busi ness while balancing outputs,” says Deepa. “You can’t achieve this by just staying in your head office. You need to get out and network with customers and vendors to learn from them and see what other organisations are doing so that you remain relevant to your customers and consumers. This helps you source alternative solutions to challenges.”

Tiger Brands – South Africa’s largest food company – has felt the full impact of the global supply-chain squeeze and the knock-on inflationary pressures, including soar ing energy, packaging, and commodity costs. All of this has been exacerbated by the Russia-Ukraine conflict. More recently, the company’s suppliers – still recover ing from the July 2021 unrest – were hit by flooding in KwaZulu-Natal.

“As a company, we have intensified our efforts to reduce costs and drive efficiencies to minimise the need for sell ing price increases,” says Deepa. “But significant price

increases across most of the portfolio are inevitable.”

For Deepa, fortifying and optimising supply chains is now crucial. Last year, Tiger Brands focused on stabi lising supply-chain operational performance and put in place processes to boost productivity and efficien cies. The wheat price volatility due to the Ukraine crisis hasn’t helped matters, but the company is also taking steps to deliver organisational, process, and technology improvements.

“Events such as the civil unrest and the KwaZulu-Natal floods highlight the importance of CFOs needing to con tinuously look for opportunities to reduce costs, drive efficiencies, engage in strategic sourcing instead of reac tive and, importantly, invest smartly in activities that will drive top-line growth.”

The lubricants industry has also seen a huge impact on its supply chains due to input costs of base oils, demanddriven pricing of containers and freight services, delays in shipping, and more. “The result has been erratic prices as various companies try to find ways to deal with the crisis,” explains Petrocam CFO Ridwan Gany.

Petrocam Lubricants has a tactical approach to dealing with the disruption. “In times where the supply chain is erratic and unpredictable, chasing margin on its own is a recipe for disaster. Instead, we’ve taken the strategic approach of zoning in and focusing on market segments that we think provide the best possibility for future mar ket share growth,” Ridwan says.

He adds that, while these segments are not necessarily the most attractive in terms of margins at the moment, they do afford Petrocam the opportunity to provide the right product to the right people at the right time.

“We have seen over the last two years that anything is possible.”

“The logic is built on customer acquisition in an innovative, marketable and scalable manner, which we can leverage for growth when market conditions shift.”

Thinking on your feet

Pramy Moodley, Sappi’s Southern Africa CFO, knows all too well what it’s like to experience a major disruption –from both a supply-chain and personal perspective. She was in KwaZulu-Natal during the July 2021 civil unrest, and as CFO for a global paper and pulp provider, she had to navigate the fallout on multiple fronts.

According to Pramy, the civil unrest brought Sappi’s oper ations in KwaZulu-Natal to a standstill, and the supply chain was negatively impacted. “Fortunately, we didn’t suffer physical damage to our property or forests, but we lost a substantial amount of money due to our three mills having to shut down for employee safety; from a personal experience, it’s something I don’t want to re-live.”

As Sappi’s Southern Africa CFO, Pramy had to think on her feet – not only from a profitability perspective but also from a working capital and cash flow aspect. She had to model the impact through collaboration with pro curement, supply chain, manufacturing, and forestry teams. “The fact that we had various teams manag ing the process meant that we had sufficient stock in the pipeline for our customers, and we sourced raw materials from various suppliers to ensure that our man

ufacturing plants continued to operate,” says Pramy.

To throw a spanner in the proverbial works, the Durban Port was subsequently hit by a cyber-attack, and only refrigerated stock was allowed through – not paper or dissolving pulp, as it wasn't considered critical stock.

According to Sappi’s FY22 Q2 results for the period ended March 2022, the flooding in KwaZulu-Natal caused another temporary halt in production. The results cau tion that although Durban’s port officially resumed operations, export deliveries could be negatively impacted for some time due to damaged access roads, congestion, and limited availability of vessel space.

“We anticipate that there will be no material impact on EBITDA for the year. However, after external insurance proceeds, the estimated net loss of approximately US$28 million will be reflected as a special item expense in the third quarter,” reads the Q2 results.

After the floods, Pramy notes that Sappi reviewed the supply-chain process and optimised the existing ship ping options to ensure the continuous supply of product to its customers.

According to the FY22 Q2 results, demand for a Sappi product, Sappi Verve, remained robust, and along with improved conditions at the Durban port and the use of the regular breakbulk vessel, resulted in a nine percent quarter-on-quarter increase in sales volumes. l

Laila Razack

“Being a CFO is no longer numbercrunching; it’s about how you adapt to change.”

WHAT CAN CFOs DO TO MITIGATE SUPPLY-CHAIN RISK?

According to data from risk consulting firm Verisk Maplecroft’s Civil Unrest Index Projections, 75 countries may experience an increase in protests by late 2022 – and South Africa has a medium-to-high level index score.

Many supply-chain issues are indeed out of the CFO’s hands, but for Laila, bolstering resources for security is a good place to start, especially when it comes to strategic facilities and those deemed essential for the provision of food, medication, and basic goods. “Equites Property Fund is engaging with many tenants looking for innovative ways to improve security in the short-term,” she says.

But, she adds, in the long term, society, businesses, and government need to understand the root cause of civil unrest and take active steps to remedy this. “We have a highly unequal society, with structural economic challenges. Unless we remediate some of these challenges, the strikes will remain a concern for us.”

Premy believes that CFOs and big business need to pressurise the government to improve infrastructure, which is not up to standard. “Sappi is often forced to use road instead of rail, and with that comes significant cost. Government must ensure that our ports are operating at the levels they should be, too. Despite being sub-Saharan Africa’s biggest container hub, Durban is a very poor-performing port by global standards."

According to a 2021 World Bank container port performance index, Durban was ranked 364 out of 370 (last place goes to Los Angeles Port, which in 2022 has seen ships having to float offshore for weeks before they can unload due to the container backlog).

Deepa adds that Tiger Brands remains concerned about the potential for social upheaval to reignite, which is why CFOs must have contingency plans to mitigate risks. “The July 2021 civil unrest and looting placed that risk high on the agenda,” says Deepa. “The work we are doing to optimise our supply chain has gone a long way in contributing to how we mitigate any risks.”

For George, creating public-private partnerships will go a long way to increase investment into Africa’s logistics infrastructure, and boosting local manufacturing to enhance cross-border trade across the continent is critical. “For CFOs, a digital supply-chain strategy is key to enable growth by providing coherent processes and systems that support core business and strategic delivery, and by facilitating access to new value propositions and revenue streams.”

Chief financial officer or chief resilience officer?

For Pramy, the volatility in the markets makes it very difficult to forecast impacts on profitability, managing work capital, and ensuring you have sufficient cash flow to operate – and forecasting is key to what CFOs do. But this also means that CFOs need to be resilient and agile.

“I've been in my position for almost six years, and three out of the six have just been continuous change. It's no longer number-crunching; it's more about how you adapt to change and overcome this swiftly. Covid-19, riots, flooding – you must think on your feet all the time and find the best solution as quickly as you can, otherwise it impacts your operations, and your competitors will take bigger leaps than you.”

Pramy Moodley

Ridwan Gany

LOOKING TO THE

Future thinking, stargazing, business focused. Investec CFO Nishlan Samujh sees the bigger picture and delivers results. By Caylynne Fourie

Investec CFO Nishlan Samujh uses a telescope to look at the stars, to try to understand more about what’s out there in the universe. His amateur stargazing opens his mind and expands his thinking – and gives him the opportunity to experience oncein-a-lifetime celestial events.

“We were recently able to see four planets through the telescope with a beautiful alignment that comes around again in 2040," he says.

To make the most of his hobby, Nishlan always tries to stay up to date with technological and scientific advancements.

“We’re in an exciting decade with the developments that are happening worldwide,” he says. “The James Webb Space telescope is now operational, and we will soon be able to see the deepest elements of space that we’ve never seen before.”

This expansive approach to thinking about his place in the universe applies at work as well. CFOs today are tasked with looking forward and keeping the bigger picture in mind when they are driving decision-making in their business, and Nishlan’s approach to his career and big-picture thinking at Investec are no exception.

Freedom of mind

When he was growing up, Nishlan’s mother gave him

a lot of freedom to choose who he wanted to be, and from standard seven (grade nine), he knew he wanted to become a CA.

He explains that while there wasn’t wealth in the house, there was freedom of mind, and he always tried to focus on the bigger picture. “I knew that if I achieved good grades in school, my first year of university would be free. If I achieved good grades in my first year, my second year would be substantially covered, and by the third year I was lucky to get a bursary.”

After graduating from university, Nishlan found the same freedom to take ownership of his actions at Investec. “Often when you work in other places it’s about executing on the task at hand. But at Investec, whether I was junior or senior, it has never felt like a task. It has always felt like something exciting you had to try – with the freedom to do just that.”

Twenty-two years later, this still rings true for Nishlan. “The culture here continuously pushes you to bring out the best in yourself and your role. Investec allows you to have a significant level of ownership in whatever you do, and gives you the freedom to operate, influence and be part of the outcome.”

He explains that his tenure with the group has been fascinating as it went through various growth phases – from Investec’s listing in 2002, to navigating the consequences of the financial crisis in 2008, through

the leadership transition and its separation into two businesses in 2020, to navigating Covid-19 and the subsequent economic environment.

Now, Nishlan is excited to take on the next phase at Investec, which is to target growth in its two operating markets: South Africa and the United Kingdom.

“Being the CFO at Investec has really been an amazing place, especially over the last six years. With the company only being 45 years old now, there’s still significant growth ahead of us, and I couldn’t think of a better place to be than in this role at this stage of Investec’s lifecycle.”

Growing in uncertain times

Nishlan explains that the key focus area of this next phase is around disciplined growth. “We aim to spend a fair amount of time on our capabilities as an organisation, driving those deeper into the respective markets we operate in, and expanding Investec to a wider client base.”

Investec currently has just over £2.3 billion (around R45 billion) of capital deployed in each of the two geographies it operates in, totalling £4.6 billion (around R91 billion). “In South Africa, we have a good challenge on return on equity with a high level of excess capital, and in the UK, while we have strong business and a wealth business that has been around for a long time, we are still relatively small in a significant market. So there's still a lot of work to be done to grow the business.”

Llike every other organisation, Investec had to navigate the Covid-19 pandemic. “The most material impact for us is economic activity, and Covid-19 completely changed the economic environment,” Nishlan says. “Some of the objectives we had set out around the growth phase were postponed because of the weaker economic environment.”

He explains that Investec did a lot of work in both countries to make sure that the business was

positioned to be both defensive and proactive in assisting clients who were trying to navigate the crisis.

“We also had to be very disciplined around risk and have taken a lot of steps to effectively ensure our balance sheet is well positioned and that we measure capital efficiently. Through that, we have reduced some of our investment portfolio exposure in a way that realises value.”

The Russia-Ukraine war has also impacted economic activity, resulting in higher inflation and subsequently higher interest rates. “If the world continues in the way it does, we won’t see the same level of economic momentum, which will affect many companies going forward.”

Keeping the bigger picture in mind, however, Nishlan adds that the business is well positioned to navigate and seek growth.

The way of the future

As the pandemic subsides, Investec has turned its attention back to its growth phase and Nishlan is excited about the technological opportunities that lie ahead. “We’re evolving to a world where internal and external technologies have an easier way to interlink with each other.”

Investec has introduced an open application programming interface (API), which allows some of its corporate clients to access its systems and design how they want to extract information, and Nishlan’s finance team has implemented new reporting tools that have changed the entire process and put time back into the hands of his teams.

He is also excited for new blockchain technologies. “When you move out the smoke and mirrors around crypto, there’s very exciting technology behind it. As we move forward, it will redefine how we interact.”

He adds that, as an Investec client himself, he has been able to become a more global citizen by being able to interact with his wealth accounts and banking facilities in both South Africa and the UK through one single platform.

Nishlan’s passion for technology also extends to his home, which is fully automated and can be controlled from his phone. “I was sitting in New York one day while my wife was at home and I was switching the TV and lights on and off, creating great annoyance.”

He has even solved for load shedding by installing solar technology in his home.

Nishlan’s future thinking and stargazing strike the perfect balance with his business focus as a CFO. l

“I couldn’t think of a better place to be than in this role at this stage of Investec’s lifecycle.”

“If the world continues in the way it does, we won’t see the same level of economic momentum.”

5 FOR THE NEW LIBERTY CFO

QUESTIONS

At the beginning of 2022, Willa van den Berg was presented with the opportunity to take up the CFO role at Liberty. After rising through the ranks within the group for 21 years, this was the natural next step in his career. Caylynne Fourie met with Willa to find out about his vision for the role.

1Was a career in finance your first choice?

When I applied for my first year of university I didn’t know what I wanted to do yet and I was directed into medicine. However, after a full year of studying biology and physiology, I realised I didn’t enjoy it.

One of my best friends at the time was studying actuarial science and it looked a lot more interesting to me. I loved working with numbers and trying to solve problems, so I changed courses in the second year and went into actuarial science.

After I completed my BCom honours degree, I joined Liberty, where I found a bigger interest in the wider fields of finance.

2 How does it feel stepping into Yuresh Maharaj’s shoes?

When Yuresh (now Liberty CEO) was CFO, I reported directly to him, so our existing working relationship has made the transition to the CFO role much easier. I’m

walking into familiar territory with someone I know I can work with and get along with.

Yuresh has been instrumental in navigating Liberty through the pandemic and the Standard Bank transaction. He leaves a great legacy behind for the role.

While it’s daunting to live up to that legacy, I hope to bring a different flavour to the role and to make a difference to the people in the finance teams by creating a culture of inclusivity and freedom of expression. I want to help the team see that finance is not just one dimensional by giving them opportunities to learn new skills that they can combine with their finance skills to make valuable contributions to the organisation.

3 What will your new responsibilities be as CFO?

I was part of the team that worked on Liberty’s acquisition by Standard Bank and will remain involved in the integration of the company into the bank. We’re at a very exciting time for the group as the acquisition has brought so many opportunities with it.

My first priority is to ensure that the value that Liberty brings to the bank is unlocked. We’re currently focusing on integrating with the bank, adapting to their working environment, and extracting the synergies between the two companies.

There are unlimited ways in which we can partner with the bank, and I look forward to making a bigger contribution to the overall group.

4 In your view, what does the future of finance look like?

The future of finance requires more than just a CA, CFA or actuary qualification. The exciting part about learning new skills is that you get to decide what that is. Some of the team members are adding robotic skills to more effectively utilise technologies, some are adding art and philosophy skills to help them think more creatively, while others are adding engineering skills to improve processes.

Throughout my time with Liberty, I have gone through a similar learning process. I’m an actuary by education and trade, but as I got involved in different things within

the group, I’ve picked up new skills that we weren’t taught at university, like people management, which is an important aspect of being a leader.

I also believe that you have to understand where you are now to decide where you want to go, and you have to use the tools at your disposal to create a path for the organisation to move forward.

When I took over the cost teams, for example, I found a lot of the language and interaction was around cost cutting. To me, however, cost is actually about deciding where you spend your money and making it available in the right places, rather than cutting your spend. You have to start with the revenue plan and then shape the cost base to fit that plan, rather than limiting the possibilities for the business to grow.

5Who is Willa at home?

A job like this is quite time consuming, so the free time I do have I spend with my wonderful wife of 16 years and daughter, who is turning five soon. This means my hobbies include whatever interests a five-year-old, and at the moment she is fascinated with animals, so we visit a lot of bird and lion parks. l

ACCOUNTING FOR A BETTER WORLD

ACCA South Africa business development manager Kada Phiri calls on accountants to play a role in improving the future by helping to build a better world. By Nicola Mawson

While we, in the South of Africa, are counting our blessings that the globe hasn’t yet entered WWIII, the Russia-Ukraine conflict is a reminder that lives are precious. We’ve seen many European countries open their hearts and homes to displaced Ukrainians, helping them fight the Russians, and providing aid.

While the accountants of the world may operate in a space outside of all of this, they too, have a role to play, says Kada Phiri, business development manager at ACCA South Africa, the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants.

“The conflict highlights that we have a role to play in helping ensure that future generations inherit a world that hasn’t been destroyed, a platform upon which they can grow.”

There is a need to support emerging economies so that they can trust businesses and institutions. All of us must also transform life-time education opportunities, build more inclusive and equitable societies, and respond to the climate emergency, he says.

“While we, as accountants, cannot tackle these challenges alone, we can play our part and contribute to helping make the world a better place for the future in different ways,” says Kada.

Accountants can help develop global standards of governance and regulations that underpin the workings of the modern economy, and deliver assurance and financial management practices that drive trust at the heart of sustainable organisations. After all, the profession is a cornerstone of economic and societal progress.

As we all do this, ethics must be at our core and in the public interest, wherever it discharges its responsibilities across the world, says Kada.

For accountants to play their roles in ensuring a brighter future, ACCA has seven core pillars against which they suggest that accountants around the world

benchmark themselves:

• Economy: Building resilient economies

• Talent: Developing the talent of tomorrow

• Sustainability: Driving sustainable business

• Regulation: Advancing standards and regulation

• Public Sector: Transforming the public sector

• Small Business: Supporting entrepreneurial growth

• Trust: Strengthening ethics and trust

How we get there

Each of these seven pillars are vital if each accountant is to leave a lasting legacy. However, they require buy-in from everyone if they are to be implemented, says Kada.

“In South Africa, a particular need is financial literacy and the improvement of financial skills, which underpins the sustainable development of our market. The accountancy profession helps expand financial literacy across countries, widens educational interventions and training programmes, and creates wider access for individuals to participate in the real economy. This is about ensuring a common finance language.”

In fact, the accountancy profession is part of the fabric that helps individuals across society access financial training opportunities. From financial literacy campaigns to ambassadorial programmes and school education interventions, the role of the accountant is to be a force for public good in helping economies develop, Kada explains.

At the same time, we need to promote trade and collaboration, he says. “Finance is key when it comes to modern international trade, which generates economic growth, resilience and international political stability.”

The accountancy profession actively advocates the future benefits of free and open international trade and collaboration, while also contributing to the devel-

opment of the appropriate trade policies, regulation, common standards, and governance frameworks that facilitate this, Kada says.

“One of our key priorities is continuing to help smalland medium-sized businesses (SMEs) participate in international commerce. Unlocking the potential of smaller businesses through international trade supports economic growth and job creation.”

There are instances in which SMEs contribute 50 percent to the economy, and 60 percent to employment. We can’t ignore this vital, entrepreneurial, growth sector, he adds. Part of the way we get here, with SMEs becoming increasingly important, is to develop tomorrow’s talent, especially in a digital world, while pushing for an equitable workforce: “Grasp the potential of new generations instead of trying to make them conform to current expectations.”

Sustainable business, too, is needed to ensure that economic growth is inclusive and consistent, while advancing standards and regulations need to continue to evolve as the world changes. We cannot afford to

leave anyone behind, Kada says.

The public sector also needs strengthening so it can play its part, while ethics and trust will go a long way towards ridding African countries of the scourge of brown envelopes being passed under the table to secure deals, he says.

There is also a trust deficit as society continues to grapple with major trust-related issues, such as concerns with data privacy, intrusion, free speech, income disparity, government corruption, unequal access to employment opportunities, inadequate provision of public services and broader systemic racial and other equality challenges, Kada notes. “As accountants, we can go a long way towards rebuilding trust through ensuring ethical practices.”

Together, we can all make a real difference in building a thriving economy that leaves no one behind, Kada concludes. l

For more information you can read ACCA's 2022 benchmark report on www.accaglobal.com.

“As accountants, we can go a long way towards rebuilding trust through ensuring ethical practices.”

AUDIT TRANSFORMATION TOUCHES EVERY ASPECT OF THE PROFESSION

From making the accounting and auditing profession more inclusive to ensuring the right skills are being taught and the entire ecosystem is ready to face digital disruption, audit transformation is something that every stakeholder needs to consider.

By Tamara Oberholster

Portia Tsakane Mkhabela, head of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) South Africa, Botswana and remotely managed markets, says that the word transformation can be interpreted in many different ways, depend ing on context. While the word “transformation” in South Africa is often used in the context of the pur suit of racial and gender equity, it also relates to broader change, from digitisation to audit reform and beyond.

“At ACCA, we believe transformation is critical because it forces us to think differently about what the world requires from us as a professional body, to do things dif ferently in developing the accountancy profession the world needs,” Portia says. “From our perspective, and in the work we are tasked with implementing, one funda mental question we always ask ourselves is, ‘How do we remove artificial barriers to the accountancy profes sion and allow entry at various levels?’ We believe we need to continuously improve and revisit our strategy as an organisation on how best we service our clients by responding to the current challenges we face within our country and neighbouring states.”

Portia says ACCA believes that access to financial lit eracy at a young age will shape how we change the current inequalities to access the accounting and audit ing professions, as will offering multiple pathways into a career in audit for interested professionals, and efforts to broaden the market (such as providing more options for SMPs and upcoming professionals, particularly in terms of building capacity with the introduction of man datory audit firm rotation requirements).

ACCA is also working with the Local Government Sector Education and Training Authority (LGSETA) to assist in

supporting the transformational agenda with munici pality finance staff.

“The project was launched in 2020, and to date we have a total of 153 beneficiaries who have been trained on International public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS),” Portia says. “The LGSETA has made it possible for beneficiaries to improve their skills while we drive them towards formal ACCA designations. This proj ect is addressing the current audit findings confirmed in the AG 2020/21 reports. The importance of inter preting financial statements, governance and financial reporting by municipal workers is key in addressing the current challenges. This is how ACCA is contributing to capacitating the public sector and improving financial management competencies in collaboration with the LGSETA.”

Ensuring sustainability

Bashier Adam, CEO of Nexia SAB&T, says there are many themes relating to audit transformation in 2022, rang ing from new regulations and auditing standards, to developing talent pipelines, and dealing with digitalisa tion and disruption, among others. He believes that the most important measure to ensuring the sustainability and success of the profession is for audit stakeholders to define common objectives.

“In South Africa, the profession is dealing with the intro duction of the Auditing Profession Amendment Act, which came into effect in April 2021,” says Bashier. “It’s given the regulator (the Independent Regulatory Board for Auditors, IRBA) far-reaching powers, including the power to conduct search and seizure operations in

certain circumstances and to subpoena someone with information required for an investigation or disciplinary process, for example.”

Bashier says that while the Act was introduced with noble intentions, it has also created some unintended consequences. “Nobody wants to be in a profession where someone's constantly looking over your shoulder and where there is a perception that the regulator’s view is superior to that of the practitioners and the firms who make up the profession” he says. “This has resulted in a significant amount of attrition in the profession. We’re losing registered auditors at a very rapid pace. And unfortunately, we're not attracting new ones into the profession. Now, depending who you speak to, on which day, they'll give you a different view on that, but I can tell you at the coalface of working with this on a daily basis, attracting new entrants and then retaining them in the profession is an issue.”

There is also the question of how the profession can stay relevant in the age of digitalisation, artificial intelligence and blockchain, among other emerging technologies.

Bashier believes that the regulators and industry bodies should play a role in addressing some of these chal lenges, adding that there’s a need for consensus and common objectives among audit stakeholders.

“This profession has stood the test of time and served the world well over centuries, so we need to ensure we keep it relevant. All the mentioned parties have a role to

play in taking the profession forward.” he opines.

One of the ways of “unshackling” auditing would be to accredit more professional bodies (currently, the only accredited professional accounting body in South Africa is SAICA) and to understand that the profession needs to integrate with other skillsets to remain relevant.

Adapting academia

Prof Philna Coetzee, Associate Professor at Tshwane University of Technology (TUT), who helps head up research in the institution’s auditing department, says that universities need to adapt the way they prepare students for the workplace to avoid becoming outdated, moving from “lecturing” towards “training”, prioritis ing critical thinking skills. She also believes the focus may need to shift from quantity to quality in terms of turning out graduates who can add real value in the workplace.

“We have these big classes at universities – some times 300 students in a class – and there’s no way you can interact with each person then,” she says. “We keep saying that the profession requires scarce skills, but I question whether that’s true. Many accountants and auditors are still struggling to find jobs. Maybe we should be focusing on quality, rather than quantity, the way they do in other professions.”

As an example, she cites UP’s physiotherapy depart ment, which has an intake of only 20 students per year.

Buhle Hanise Bashier Adams

“All of those people find jobs when they finish their qualifications and enter the workplace,” says Philna.

In her own work, she consistently engages with prac titioners in the industry to understand the skills gaps they are dealing with in placing young profession als, using their feedback to help shape curricula. “I ask them, ‘What do you need from graduates? What skills are you looking for? What are the problems you have?’ and then we work with them to understand how we can deliver these things through our programmes,” she explains.

Good stories to be told

While there are many challenges facing the account ing and auditing profession, Buhle Hanise, President of the African Women Chartered Accountants (AWCA) and CFO of Beijing Automotive Group Company (BAIC) South Africa, believes that good progress has been made in transformation, and that it’s important to highlight suc cess stories to continue this important work.

This is one of the reasons that AWCA works to iden tify and acknowledge women through its Woman of Substance and AWCA Recognition Awards, includ ing awards such as Audit Partner of the Year and Tax Specialist of the Year.

The Woman of Substance award celebrates women (in any sphere) who have achieved remarkable accom plishments, while the AWCA Recognition Awards are

specifically for women in the accountancy profes sion. “There are so many black women doing wonderful work, but they are sitting in their corners, focused on that work, and not getting the spotlight,” says Buhle. “But receiving a nomination or an award doesn’t just affirm the work that they do and motivate them to con tinue with it; it also encourages others. It gives young women role models and the confidence to also make their mark.”

The awards also help AWCA to raise funds for the bur saries it offers to young black women who wish to study accounting – something that has always been core to what AWCA does. And Buhle says that as the organ isation celebrates the milestone of 20 years since its founding in 2002, there is a drive to “get back to basics” on the back of poor exam results over the past few years (the SAICA Initial Test of Competence qualifying exam inations) and the challenges that COVID-19 wrought. AWCA is therefore refocusing on building a support system of sisterhood for women at every level of their careers.

“We understand that many companies have been through the hardest two years of their existence,” says Buhle, who joined BAIC – a Chinese-based multinational – in January 2020, shortly before the pandemic saw the country locked down. “But one thing I have going for me is that I’m Miss Positivity,” she says, laughing. “I will look for the good. And something I have learnt from working for a Chinese company is how they focus on what they can do, rather than dwelling on the bad.” l

Prof Philna Coetzee

Portia Mkhabela

DEEP RELATIONSHIPS INTO THE FUTURE

Cape Town’s finance professionals gathered at the 180Lounger for a Summit, overlooking the beautiful skyline of the Mother City, to share ways in which they can enable their finance teams and ready them for the future. By Caylynne Fourie and Ronda Naidu

After taking in the marvellous views of Table Mountain, the Atlantic Ocean and the towering buildings of Cape Town’s bustling city centre, attendees gathered together for the start of the CFO Cape Town Summit on 22 June.

The prevailing view throughout the evening, from the speakers and attendees, was that deep relationships with the business and its stakeholders were the key to becom ing future-fit. Coronation Fund Managers CFO Mary-Anne Musekiwa said, “If things change like they did when the

Covid-19 pandemic broke out, or during the multiple uncertain events we’ve faced since, the strength of our relationships are part of what’s going to get us through.”

“When you are in a crisis, suppliers are able to give dis pensations because of the strong relationships they have with you as a client, and if you have a strong relation ship with your board, they will trust you to weather the storm,” she added.

Woolworths South Africa CFO Justin Crowhurst agreed, saying that finance professionals can’t know everything, so they have to rely on strategic partnerships to help move them to be more agile and innovate.

For FNB South Africa CFO Markos Davias, his relation ship with his chief risk officer is the most important one. “Finance and risk data are both assets to any organisa tion, but they don't always talk to each other and often go in opposite directions. We then have to do endless rec onciliations to align the data with our strategy. However, when you are aligned with your CRO, you can converge these data sets.”

Enabling growth

Mary-Anne revealed that fostering and investing in these relationships is what makes you a good leader. When some of her team members expressed interest in learn ing how to code, she had to invest in their growth, even if it had nothing to do with finance. “They then brought AI and bots into our finance division, and took away most of the mundane tasks we used to do.”

She explained that: “The delivery will take care of itself if you take care of the people who deliver.”

Webber Wentzel CFO Aneshree Naidoo said that growth was an essential part to moving into the future. “If we’re not creating the space for others to grow and move for ward, we won’t either. You have to truly understand your team’s passions and how it can play into the group’s strategy.”

Harmony Gold FD Boipelo Lekubo and Santam CFO Hennie Nel both agreed that enabling an environment in which people can flourish is important, and that finance leaders need to allow their people to arrive and be seen for who they are.

“As leaders, we assume people should listen to what we say and we don’t take the time to listen to them,” Hennie explained. “I started intentionally creating opportunities to engage, not just around the processes and numbers, but around how they saw the business. I listened to their opinions and built their confidence to contribute to the future of the organisation.”

Echoing this, Justin said that finance leaders have to build on their own empathy skills, as they might not come nat urally. “We have to make sure we have time to actively listen to and engage with that presenting voice so we can create an enabling environment where they have the confidence to raise that voice.”

The finance function of the future

Markos explained that, if finance wants to become a busi ness partner of the future, CFOs have to let their teams become solutionists. “A while ago, we threw a chemi cal engineer in our finance team, and during one of our reporting periods they noticed a problem with the num bers. The finance team knew how to solve the problem by just dragging the number from one place to the next, but the chemical engineer was interested in where the prob lem came from and why.”

He explained that through this interaction, his team learned how to analyse problems “scientifically” and to solve it in a way that it would never occur again. They’ve since applied the same thinking to other problems in the organisation.

Similarly, Justin believes that finance teams need to have entrepreneurial mindsets. “As a finance team, we have to be more customer-focused – it’s what entrepreneurs do well. They build long-term relationships and emotional connections with their customers, know what their needs are and how to fill it. If you don’t apply the same mind set, your organisation won’t remain relevant and it won’t succeed.”

Agreeing that a mindset shift needs to happen within organisations, Boipelo believes that finance should be innovative. “We deal more and more with uncertainty and complexity, but you have to have the ability to be agile and adapt, to innovate and move forward.”

In the same vein, Aneshree noted that people and tech nology are not mutually exclusive. “We can’t go digital without thinking about people. Technology can be an

enabler, creating capacity and space for people to get closer to the business. And if you deploy the right people, the benefits of your technology transformation will be fast and furious.”

During a presentation, SAP industry head of financial ser vices Darrel Orsmond referenced a recent interview with Standard Bank CFO Arno Daehnke in which he explained that finance is past the stage of measuring income state ments. “CFOs have become the de facto measuring point for value and are being held accountable to have an opin ion on divisions that reach far beyond the numbers of the organisation.”

Knowing what you don’t know

Darrel said that finance leaders now need to bring together data that has to do with productivity, and marry sales data to marketing data to determine actual returns. “The finance function is being looked at to forecast and predict what the consequences of foolhardiness and wis dom might be to the organisation.”

However, he explained that various blindspots have emerged in this process, because they are not directly correlated to the income statement and financials.

These blind spots include:

• True buying behaviour and motivation;

• The real costs of doing business;

• Lost opportunities;

• Segment migration drivers;

• Substitute and replacement drivers;

• Future earnings risks and potential;

• True segment behaviour drivers; and

• Workforce motivation.

“These things matter more than ever. Because the people who don’t have those blind spots are getting all the busi ness,” Darrel said, encouraging the attendees to find their blind spots and to use technology to make the unknown known.l

This event was made possible by principal partner SAP, executive partner Workday, and associate partners ACCA, Coupa, Kyriba, Solugrowth and The Strategist.

“As leaders, we assume people should listen to what we say and we don’t take the time to listen to them.”

GO TO THE SOURCE

Centralised finance or outsourced solutions? That is the question finance leaders continue to consider as they prepare for an uncertain future.

Finance leaders have long debated the ques tion of whether to insource or outsource finance functions. There is little doubt that the Covid-19 pandemic has led to the topic gain ing more traction around the boardroom table.

At the recent Finance Indaba Online panel discussion, finance experts recently looked at material arguments for both sides.

“I have a personal preference regarding centralised transactional finance: the standardised way of accounts payable, accounts receivable or cash bank ing. We get economies of scale, governance and segregation of duties and we prevent conflicts of inter est, especially when it comes to very small businesses who might not have the manpower to have the right segregation of duties,” said Sharon Naidoo, CFO at TransUnion.

Centralised finance frees up time for finance to be more transformative and more aligned to business advisors and business partners, according to Sharon.

It also retains certain nuisances: “Something like tax will never be centralised, especially in the African con tinent, because you need in-house expertise. In my experience, centralised finance works much better,” she noted.

“As business advisors we focus on the strategic growth and direction of the company as opposed to being all to everyone. Having it in one place means standard

By Reabetswe Rabaji

processes, standard timelines and no deviations, and time to drive the business forward,” she added.

Hannes Boonzaaier, CFO at Afrocentric, said the deci sion boils down to what you want to achieve. “In cases where we have had three-year projects and wanted to achieve high economies of scale in localities that we were not familiar with, outsourcing worked quite well. Outsourcing eliminates the red tape that comes with appointing staff when a project begins and releasing them from their contracts once it is completed,” he said.

Hannes pointed out that in respect to continuous busi ness and as Afrocentric develops its finance staff to become commercial managers, the value that comes with understanding the business, its people and sup porting them is greater than the price you pay from acquisitions to procurement. “In contrast, specialised services and skills such as cybersecurity require both insourcing and outsourcing for several reasons,” he noted.

Sitting on the outsourcing end of the spectrum, InnoVent CFO Zakhe Khuzwayo explained that out sourcing declutters the balance sheet and allows the separation of soft assets from core assets, which means access without worrying about ownership and maintenance.

He also shared some of the current and upcoming insourcing and outsourcing trends. “We have witnessed

a move towards a world of access, where people or companies would rather access/outsource the technology or resources that they need than have these in-house themselves,” he said.

“In addition, products and services are being sup plied on an everservice basis; device as a service or software as a service rather than having it as an in-house service. The most significant trend has been large organisations selling off some assets for billions and leasing them back,” Zakhe noted.

“You would assume that these large corpora tions would want to keep these assets considering the level of the transaction, but they believe that if another entity can maintain and secure them, they’d rather not keep it themselves. A new world of accessing the resources that you need rather than owning them is emerging,” he added.

Looking ahead, the CFOs anticipate that insourc ing and outsourcing will take on a hybrid model of both directions being necessary on a case-by-case basis.

“Our biggest strength as CFOs will be to live in the future and work in the present, and let that roadmap dictate the decisions we make as lead ers. When it comes to insourcing or outsourcing, I think the conversation shouldn’t be about whether one is better than the other, but how both ecosys tems can co-exist,” said Sharon.l

“Our biggest strength as CFOs will be to live in the future and work in the present, and let that roadmap dictate the decisions we make as leaders.”

Hannes Boonzaaier

Sharon Naidoo

Zakhe Khuzwayo

MEET THE NOMINEES UNDER THE CFO AWARDS SPOTLIGHT

On 16 November, the 2022 nominees will be celebrated at the glamorous “Oscars of the finance profession” for their hard work and achievements over the last year, and some will be crowned the winners of the prestigious CFO Awards.

Arno Daehnke

Standard Bank chief finance & value management officer

Before taking on the role of chief finance and value management officer at Standard Bank, Arno headed up the banking group’s treasury and capital management function. He has extensive experience in key finan cial aspects such as financial planning under varying macroeconomic scenarios, managing a complex ban king group balance sheet in volatile financial markets and a deep understanding of both local and interna tional bank regulatory frameworks. Prior to joining Standard Bank, Arno was one of South Africa’s leading seismologists, using mathematical models to interro gate how shocks move through rocks.

Boitumelo Mosako Development Bank of South Africa CFO

Boitumelo was appointed CFO of the Development Bank of South Africa (DBSA) in 2018. She is a qualified CA(SA) with over 12 years’ experience in financial servi ces. Prior to joining thethe DBSA, she served as the CFO at the South African Bureau of Standards (SABS), and before that, as general manager of finance at the DBSA. She also worked at Triumph Venture Capital, Citigroup and EY, respectively. She has a BCom in accounting, a post graduate diploma in accounting and a higher diploma in accounting.

Mohammed ‘Ashraf’ Dindar

Council for Scientific and Industrial Research CFO

Ashraf was appointed CFO on 1 July 2020. He joined the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) from Foskor, where he was the CFO and executive direc tor from January 2016, a position he was seconded to from the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC). At the IDC, Ashraf was the head of financial management from January 2002 to December 2015.

Ashraf is a qualified CA(SA), holds holds BCom and BAcc degrees from the University of Witwatersrand, and executive and development programme certificates from the Gordon Institute of Business Science and the Global Institute of Leadership Development. Boipelo Lekubo

Harmony Gold FD Boipelo was promoted to the position of FD of Harmony Gold in 2020 after serving as the group's CFO since June 2017. She is a qualified CA(SA) with extensive expe rience in group financial management and reporting within the mining industry. Her previous roles include CFO of Atlatsa Resources Corporation and financial manager of Northam Platinum. She served as an inde pendent non-executive director of Trans Hex Group from August 2013 until March 2017 and currently serves as an independent non-executive director on the boards of African Rainbow Capital and UBI General Partner.

Bradley Wentzel Douglasdale Dairy CFO

Brad was appointed CFO of Douglasdale Dairy in November 2018. Prior to this he was the FD at Global track SA and before that, at Nando’s. Brad also worked as a finance manager at Cycle Lab and The Pro Shop. He was an auditor at BDO Spencer Steward Johannesburg for four years.

Brad is busy with his doctorate in business and a post graduate diploma in accounting. He holds CA, CIMA, CGMA and ACMA accreditations, as well as a BCom accounting degree. He has also completed various industry-related courses.

Deepa Sita

Tiger Brands CFO

Deepa has been the CFO of Tiger Brands since 1 Octo ber 2020. She is a qualified CA and has an MBA (cum laude) from GIBS, where she also lectures. She has pre viously worked at Deloitte, Samsung Electronics, Entyce Beverages, and Mondelēz International. She joined the Masswarehouse division of Massmart as FD in 2016. In 2018, she was appointed as finance and commercial director. She has also served as the interim CEO and chief integration and strategy officer for Masscash.

Deon Smith

Thungela Resources FD

Deon joined Anglo American in 2007 and has headed up various finance departments within the company, including risk and assurance, accounting services, capi tal management and corporate cinance South Africa. In 2017, he was appointed as the CFO of Anglo American’s Coal South Africa division until it separated from the group and became Thungela in 2021. He then became the demerged Thungela Resources’ FD.

Before his time at Anglo American, Deon was a senior manager at KPMG Advisory from 2000 to 2005, and prior to that, he served as the CEO of Cura Software Solutions for a year.

Julian Palliam Foskor group CFO

Julian has several years of international experience in leading teams to deliver value on a large scale across many multinational organisations in finance, mining, chemical engineering and energy sectors.

Julian joined Foskor as its group CFO in November 2019. Before that, he served in vice presidency roles at Metso and ABB. He also served as a financial controller for ABB and ENRC.

Dirk Viljoen Hollard Insurance group CFO

Dirk has been the group CFO of Hollard since October 2018.

Dirk holds a masters of actuarial science degree from Wits and is a fellow of the Faculty of Actuaries in Edinburgh.

Prior to his current appointment, Dirk served in various actuarial roles within the Hollard Group. Before this, he held roles at Fedsure and Commercial Union Asset Managers in Cape Town. He holds directorship roles on the boards of various companies under the Hollard Hol dings group, as well as non-executive directorship roles and chairman positions.

He completed his articles at Deloitte South Africa, and has a B.Com degree in accounting and finance from the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Kagiso Lerutla

Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality group CFO

Kagiso was appointed as the CFO of the City of Ekur huleni Metropolitan Municipality on 30 May 2019. He joined the City of Ekurhuleni in 2014 as divisional head of governance and compliance within the finance department. Prior to joining the City of Ekurhuleni, he worked in the office of the Auditor-General.

Kagiso is a qualified CA and SAICA member, with a BCompt degree from the University of Limpopo, and a BCom accounting Honours degree from the University of Johannesburg.

Elmarie Maritz

Sedibelo Platinum Mines CFO

Elmarie started her career as a cost accountant at Sil verton Engineering. After completing her articles and passing her board exam in 2022 she joined KPMG’s tax department for two years, then joined the South African operation of an international software company as the financial manager.

Shortly after, she was approached by one of Sedibelo’s group companies, Platinum South Africa, to be their group financial manager. In 2016, she was promoted to the group’s CFO.

Lerena Olivier Pick n Pay CFO

Lerena was appointed as the CFO of Pick n Pay in Sep tember 2019. Prior to that, she headed up 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, including serving as Shoprite’s group financial accountant for 10 years, and an audit manager at PwC for three years.

Lerena has a BCom Honours degree in accounting, finance and tax from Stellenbosch University.

Mark Stirton

Mr Price CFO

Mark is an experienced financial professional with strong entrepreneurial agility and large corporate expe rience. He was appointed CFO of the Mr Price Group in January 2019 and the FD in January 2016. He has pre viously worked as a financial manager for the group. Before this he worked as group commercial manager of strategic business development and pharma affairs at Aspen Pharmacare. He also served as the managing director of Eurotap Investments for eight years. He ser ved his articles at PwC and is a qualified CA(SA). Mark has a BCom from UNISA and an FCMA from CIMA.

Risto Ketola

Momentum Metropolitan Holdings FD

Risto joined Momentum Metropolitan Holdings in August 2016 to head up investor relations and business performance management. In 2017 Risto was appointed as the group’s CFO.

Risto has extensive experience as a financial servi ces analyst and researcher with Standard Bank, Ketola Research and Deutsche Bank. He is also a CFA charter holder, and is a fellow of the Institute of Actuaries and Actuarial Society of South Africa (ASSA). He graduated from the University of Cape Town with a BSc in econo mics and statistics.

Mpolaheng Mohlopi

Lanseria Airport CFO

Mpolaheng was appointed CFO of Lanseria Interna tional Airport in March 2018. She has over 15 years experience in finance management and executive posi tions, having previously served as the senior finance manager of rail networks at Transnet Freight Rail, as well as its senior manager of finance operations. She has also served as an audit senior at Deloitte, as well as a consultant at the Auditor-General of South Africa. She is a qualified CA(SA) with a BAcc from the University of Cape Town and a commerce degree from the Lebowakgomo Commercial College.

Sandile Ntsele

Liquid Intelligent Technologies South Africa CFO

Sandile was appointed CFO of Liquid Intelligent Tech nologies South Africa in April 2021. Sandile joined MTN in 1999 as a senior manager. He progressed through the ranks, becoming CFO of MTN Zambia in 2005 and CFO of MTN Cameroon in 2012. He was appointed CFO of MTN SA in April 2015. Prior to this, he served as a corporate financial accountant in 1998. Sandile was a trainee accountant at Deloitte from 1995 to 1998. A qua lified CA(SA), he holds a BAcc Honours from UNISA and a BCom Honours from the University of KwaZulu-Natal.

Riaan Davel

DRDGold CFO

Riaan was appointed CFO of DRDGold in January 2015. Prior to this, he was an audit partner at KPMG for seven years. Riaan has over 17 years of experience in the mining industry. He also has experience as an IFRS Technical Partner, having represented SAICA in the International Accounting Standards Board’s project on Extractive Activities from 2003 to 2010. He has also served on committees compiling or updating the South African codes for reporting and valuation of mineral reserves and resources. He has a Master’s degree in accounting from the University of Johannesburg.

Sean Doherty Transaction Capital CFO

Sean was appointed CFO of Transaction Capital in June 2019. Prior to this he worked at Standard Bank in a number of positions including head of new business innovation and ventures, and CFO and COO of Invest ment Banking. Sean ran his own consultancy for a year. Before this he worked at FirstRand and JP Morgan in London. He also served as a manager in the corporate finance division of Deloitte after completing his articles with the firm. He has an MBA from IE and a BCom Honours from the University of Johannesburg.

Tinyiko Sihlangu

Royal Bafokeng Holdings FD

Tinyiko is a qualified CA with a Masters degree in tax. She served her articles at PwC, which included one year of Academic Articles at the University of Pretoria.

She also spent three months on secondment in PwC's USA offices. She was appointed as the FD of Royal Bafo keng Holdings in July 2019 after having served as the group’s group manager of finance for three years and a financial accountant for one year. Before that, she served as a financial reporting analyst at MTN for two years.

Yusuf Bodiat

The Federated Employers Mutual Assurance Company CFO

Yusuf is a qualified CA(SA) and holds a BAcc degree from the University of the Witwatersrand. He is also a member of SAICA. Yusuf started his working life at Deloitte, where he gained experience in insurance, ban king, medical aid, pension funds, private equity and parastatal industries, and was the acting CFO of Lion of Africa Insurance. He was appointed as the CFO at The Federated Employers Mutual Assurance Company (FEM) in February 2019.

Yusuf also joined the board of Legal Expenses Insurance Southern Africa Limited (LEZA) as an independent non-executive director in February 2022.

Zaf Mahomed

Former Cell C CFO

Zaf was appointed CFO of Cell C in December 2018. Prior to joining Cell C, he was CFO at McDonald's and Ellerines Holdings and FD at Johnson & Johnson. Zaf has more than 24 years of finance and business experience across major industries, multinational and listed companies and world wide brands in multiple industries.

He is a qualified CA(SA) with a Masters in Business Lea dership from the UNISA School of business leadership. Zaf also holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the Uni versity of Natal and an BCom Honours degree from UNISA.

CHANGE AND GROWTH

– KEEPING COMMUNITIES FRESH

We’ve been very busy at CFO Enterprises in the past year. One of the things that’s kept us invigorated and inspired has been the launch of another executive community (in addition to CFO South Africa and CHRO South Africa), in the form of CIO South Africa

This new community of IT executives had had an astonishing upward trajectory, thanks to the referrals from the CFOs and CHROs that we already know. These referrals are a great endorsement of everything that we do, so if you passed our details onto the IT leaders in your organisation, thank you very much! (And if you haven’t, please put them in touch!)

Through this community launch, I was given the opportunity to observe the cycle from the beginning. We met with many CIOs, explained to them what we did, and started engaging with them through our media products (CIO-SA. co.za and the newly launched CIO magazine). And then we started inviting them to events.

There’s something magical in bringing a group of likeminded executives together for the first time. We pull out all the stops in creating great events, of course, but the secret sauce is in the community members themselves, being given a platform on which they can interact with, learn from and grow among their peers. As we always say, it’s your community – tell us what you want from it.

The CFO South Africa community is a lot further along in its journey than the CIOs are. But there’s a lot to be reminded of and to re-learn from a new community’s launch. It has given me the opportunity to reinvest in what we do, seeing the value that it provides for an entirely new group of executives.

So, here’s to continuing to build our most established com-

munity. CFO South Africa goes from strength to strength but never strays from its founding values – of helping finance executives to build their knowledge, networks and careers, through down-to-earth yet valuable engagements, events and media.

Of course, change is a constant in any organisation, and CFO South Africa is certainly no exception. Community manager Brian Chivere has accepted a great professional opportunity and has moved on. So after a long history of working with CFOs as a managing editor, editor in chief and then content director, I am now taking the reins as executive community director, and you should be hearing a lot more from me as I support this community in everything that we do.

Please drop me an email if there’s anything you’d like from CFO South Africa – this is YOUR community.

Warmest regards,

Georgina Guedes

Executive Community Director