Top Women Across The Board: Bertina Engelbrecht, Clicks Group CEO

A Powerhouse at The Forefront of Gender Empowerment

By Fiona Wakelin

The appointment of their first female CEO, Bertina Engelbrecht, positioned Clicks Group as a powerhouse at the forefront of gender empowerment in the Healthcare and Pharmaceutical industry, with a demonstration, at the highest level, of their commitment to the empowerment of women. With extensive experience in leadership positions at various industry giants, Bertina brings management expertise together with a love for people. The focus on people is what has driven her work at Clicks Group and will inform how she goes about leading the company.

A qualified attorney with a master’s degree in commercial law and a background in human resources, Bertina is the first to concede that her career journey has not been that of a typical CEO. Prior to joining Clicks in 2006 as Group HR Director, she worked for Spoornet, South African Airways, Transnet Group, Sea Harvest and Shell SA, the latter as an executive director.

She was Group Corporate Affairs Director at Clicks before assuming the role of CEO earlier this year. “From the outset, my job at Clicks has always been broader than the traditional HR remit,” Bertina explains. She attributes both of the Group’s previous CEOs for this, as they actively championed for the people agenda to be integrated into the business and for HR to have a seat at the decision making table. This philosophy facilitated her progression to the most senior leadership position.

Over the years, she has methodically set about shifting the employer brand by addressing the Group’s existing employer value proposition gap. Today, the Clicks Group is consistently rated as the top employer in the retail space. Clicks continues to embrace its heritage as a proudly South African company. It was the most empowered retailer in 2015, integrating transformation into its overall business.

What Bertina is extremely proud of is Clicks’ employee share scheme. In 2018 the scheme vested fully, resulting in the first 50% pay-out of R1,3-billion to employees. A final pay-out of R1,5-billion was made in February 2019. The Clicks Group boasts one of the most successful employee share schemes to date.

Transformation is an ongoing journey for Clicks Group rather than an end-destination. “Clicks is heavily focused on preferential procurement – by supporting local suppliers, black and female-owned enterprises and investigating how we can advocate for equity equivalence programmes that benefit local suppliers,” - Bertina.

She aims to maintain Clicks’ positioning as the leader in the health and wellness sector. “We will be strengthening our engagement with all stakeholders to share much more of the work we do particularly insofar as our localisation strategy, empowerment and sustainability commitments are concerned,” she says. Clicks sources more than 90% of its products locally, a strategy which she intends to continue driving forward.

The Group prides itself on supporting South Africa’s transformation goals, including, the government’s healthcare agenda and policy of making healthcare more affordable and accessible to all South Africans, the National Development Plan which includes the goal to reduce the current shortage of healthcare personnel which has been recognised as scarce and critical to South Africa’s development and “uplifting the communities in which they operate through the implementation of enterprise, supplier and socio-economic inventions and projects within the Group’s sector.”

The business has continued to make good progress in ensuring equity within the organisation through good governance, policies, practices and building a culture that enables diversity and inclusion. The majority of the organisation’s workforce are women with representation across all levels of the business.

“I’m a firm believer that corporations have a responsibility to deliver sound financial performance and to do so in a way that positively impacts all of our stakeholders. Research indicates that today’s generation of employees want to work for organisations that are ethical, with values that resonate with their own. Customers are likewise attracted to companies that conduct business ethically and sustainably,” - Bertina.

At the 2022 Standard Bank Top Women Awards, the Clicks Group Ltd was awarded the Standard Bank Top Gender-empowered Organisation in Health & Pharmaceuticals. In the past year, the Clicks Group Ltd has been involved in a number of initiatives supporting:

• 8twenty8® - an award-winning, women-led Non-Profit Organisation that empowers young women by developing strategies for their educational and personal development.

• Kerr House, the Durban Hospice for Women - Kerr House provides a safe haven for abused and destitute women, and women in crisis.

• The Safe House - empowering survivors and supporting communities by providing abused women and children with a safe place to heal, rebuild and reconnect.

• Public Health Enhancement Fund – supporting bursaries to medical students (of which 72% are female) with R2.8-million for the year.