Supporting The People on The Continent

“WE ALSO HAVE TO THINK BEYOND SURVIVAL. WE HAVE TO THINK ABOUT THRIVING.”

Worldwide, over a million people have lost their lives to COVID-19. Families have lost loved ones, people who were dear to them. In many cases, people have also lost individuals who were the hope of their families, their breadwinners. This pandemic has had a devastating impact on the lives and on the livelihoods of our people. I too have experienced a devastating loss. I lost my mom to COVID-19. This loss that is closest to my heart has left me in disbelief. What is grounding me is the gratitude that I have for the time we did have with her.

From a business perspective, the African continent has lost at a significant portion of all its economic activities. Things were starting to get better in level one, but we are nowhere near where we need to be.

Our real challenge is - how do we make sure that we survive as human beings and how do we make sure that our businesses ultimately also survive? We want to be the bank, which, across the continent, has the highest number of customers who survive through this time with their businesses intact and their livelihoods intact.

Funeka Montjane Chief Executive Officer, Consumer & High Net Worth Clients at Standard Bank Group Ltd.

One thing that I’m personally passionate about is that Standard Bank is an employer which puts the safety of our people first. However, more than anything, very close to my heart, is the ability to continue to pay all salaries to secure the livelihoods of our people. Over the last nine months, we have continued to pay a hundred percent of all salaries.

As an organisation, we want to create the highest value for our shareholders. Success is not about the one who has got the highest profit or even the lowest loss. Success, right now, means providing the best support to the people of our continent.

This is because if the people of our continent and the businesses of our continent do not thrive, we all don’t have a future. There are over 2 million people who have lost their jobs. There are many women out there who have children that do not have access to the internet and therefore cannot attend online school classes. There are also many families who can’t afford groceries.

Therefore, it seems to me that one of the biggest courageous conversations that we need to have, is that we can’t only be talking about ourselves. We must realise that we are part of a broader community. Conversations are now more important than ever. Some of the conversations we need to have are centred around questions such as, how are we going to survive? How are we going to help each other? How do we help our businesses survive? How do we make sure that we can get out of this so that we can live, and continue to pay school fees and buy groceries for our children?

We also must think beyond survival. We must think about thriving.

We need to think about how we start making pivots in our business models to ensure that our business is in fact future ready. We also need to think about how we prepare the next generation of women and our children to be ready to thrive.

I am hoping that we can use this time we are in to redefine leadership. Perhaps we can pivot success and leadership away from wanting more and more and make it more about giving. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could all go back to our original communities to truly understand who they are and what is it that really matters to them?

We must also start having a conversation which redefines success and leadership for the young women and young men of this country and this continent, so that ultimately humanity can continue to thrive and survive through this time. I believe that ultimately, leadership is giving by creating additional value that will grow our continent.