When the market can’t deliver, Santam group CIO Sam Nkosi develops his own data platforms and technology talent.
As a boy raised by a single mother, Sam Nkosi had no strategic career map pinned to his wall – just three dreams. First was becoming an airline pilot, but South African Airways turned him down due to poor eyesight. “They said ‘You're a glasses man’, so that dream ended there.” Next came accounting – not just for love of numbers but because “CAs were well paid”, and as the only breadwinner at home, financial security mattered.
He never attended university full-time. Instead, he studied through correspondence while working. It was during one such course at Damelin that everything changed. After scoring 100 percent in a computer module, an older lecturer named Barry pulled him aside: “You’re wasting your time in accounting,” he said. “Go into IT.”
Sam did exactly that. Today, Sam is group CIO at Santam, South Africa's largest short-term insurer, and is head of the company’s seven-year “Future Fit” strategy running until 2030. The programme centres on data-driven decision-making powered by modern technologies like AI and machine learning.
This new strategy requires significant modernisation of legacy systems that have slowed the organisation’s market responsiveness over time.
“We’re consolidating and building platforms across the entire organisation. There’s over 106 years of data in pockets everywhere; bringing that together will create insights even for new business models,” he explains.
But what excites Sam most is the people behind the technology. Unfortunately, South Africa’s tech skills shortage has made finding the right people painfully difficult. “We’ve been looking for a cloud architect for eight months now,” he says. “When you find one, they’re expensive and they usually already have two other offers lined up.”
Building his own timber
Instead of joining the bidding wars for scarce talent, Sam has developed a comprehensive approach to growing capabilities in-house. “I believe in building my own timber,” he laughs.
His approach is two-pronged. First, he partners with technology suppliers to transfer knowledge while delivering solutions. “We’re defining future roles now,” he explains, as his office creates targeted training programmes for positions difficult to fill externally. For cloud implementations, his team works with the “service owners” specialists who simultaneously train Santam staff.
Second, he creates structured internship programmes. This is something he’s done at every organisation he’s led, from Investec Bank, Standard Bank to AGSA, Absa and now Santam. Unlike conventional programmes focusing solely on university graduates, Sam insists on including young people who couldn’t afford formal degrees. “We mix them,” he explains. “University graduates with BScs in computer science, but also people with just a matric, who can start somewhere as learners.”
At AGSA, over 90 percent of interns received permanent positions; at Absa, every single intern was hired within three years; at Santam, all five interns from last year joined permanently. “If we don’t make a difference to our own communities as leaders, no one will do it for us,” Sam adds.
Culture before code
Sam’s approach to talent development is part of a broader leadership philosophy that prioritises cultural transformation. While his technical expertise gets him in the door, it’s his cultural leadership that creates lasting change. “I go into organisations with difficult technology and culture. They need someone very strong, but also good with people and stakeholder management,” he shares.
As such, Sam is not afraid to set expectations during job interviews. Before accepting his role at AGSA, where previous IT leaders had struggled, he had an honest conversation with then-Auditor General Kimi Makwetu: “If you’re going to give me this role, then be prepared to support me when things escalate.”
He points out that, if the culture isn’t what he wants, he’ll implement the culture he needs in his team first, starting with simple, tangible practices: breakfast meetings with new joiners to demonstrate his open-door policy, performance metrics centred on knowledge sharing and celebrating incremental wins to fuel motivation.
“In IT, we have a unique position,” he explains. “We touch every department eventually. So if you build strong culture here, it spreads.”
This was proven at Absa, where his department’s reputation and credibility grew so strong that “it was easy to consolidate teams from Singapore into the technology operations area. Tech ops teams in the African Region and Asia became one force as we created a successful operating model.
The long game
Similarly to his approach at work, Sam commits to walking 10,000 daily steps (he accumulates over 3.3 million steps per annum), believing that every step counts. “I don’t mess around with my health,” he says. “I’m not one of those thin people who can eat what they want, so I walk,” he jokes.
And, somehow, he still finds time to continue his own learning – albeit now full-time and in-person. His most significant educational experience came through Harvard Business School's executive management programme – AMP202. “It was the only time I got to sit down in class and learn. Everything else, my MSc included, was done part-time, travelling from South Africa to London to Leeds,” he explains.
After completing his Harvard programme, he joined their alumni network that reconvenes every two years. “I’ll always be learning from them,” he says, staying connected to global conversations about technology and other topical agendas of the day from economics to geo-political topics.
Sam also extends his leadership to his family, where he mentors his daughter. “I realised I cannot build everyone else’s futures except my own child’s.”
He leaves the next generation of industry professionals with his ‘code to leading successfully in IT’: It’s never just about systems or code, but about the human potential that powers transformation.
