At the 2024 Executive Day, attendees discovered that true connected leadership hinges on having clear, unified goals and accountability across the board.
Top CIOs, CFOs, and CHROs gathered at the trendy 39 Melrose Boulevard on 5 September for high-level networking and relationship building at one of the city's most vibrant shopping and business precincts, Melrose Arch.
The day’s biggest highlight was the interactive boardroom simulation.
“What made the simulation interesting for me was how there were dynamic approaches in the group to make a decision, that is, making a profit. While some members focused on R&D, others focused on how much to spend,” said Alfred Raulinga, lead: business solutions at Exxaro Resources.
“You’re also competing for talent in that simulation. For instance, how much to spend on a developer or are you taking the route of spending the least to get the most out of them. However, the key is what you are getting out of that talent, how innovative you are,” he added.
Guest speaker Brian Simelane, the founder and head of learning and simulations at LearningSims, hit the stage to announce the winning group who recorded a R24.3 million in accumulated profit.
Thoughts from the CEO
Vodacom CEO Shameel Joosub, was next to share insights on the secret to successful exco collaboration – a CEO’s perspective.
“On the technology side, IT has to have a clever target in order to get the products to market on time,” he said. “The worst thing businesses do is build platforms and throw them away for new ones – or try to incorporate the old stuff into the new solutions.”
“One of the things I’ve learned is that you’ll have nice conversations but nothing happens. Be clear on what you’ll deliver and what you won’t. A nice conversation that you can reflect on at the end of the year with some room for slippages that may have occurred,” he added.
During the Q&A session with Shameel, Hamzah Asmall, the GM for digitalisation at Al Baraka Bank asked. “When something happens in the environment and things change, how do you manage that?
“What we do as exco after having already agreed on tracking performance, the second part that often works for us is exco taking on the big decisions and also running committees within the business – monthly performance review in each business,” Shameel explained.
“If you put every topic on the table in one exco, people switch off, so rather be specific to the topic and look at its relevance first," he added.
Dr Denisha Jairam-Owthar, CIO at the Council for Medical Schemes asked about the process of alignment. “How much of that is delegation versus persuasion and how do you flip that around for alignment?”
“Have a clear path, look at the strategy for deliverables. The key is that the whole process must have a financial impact,” Shameel responded. “Create a pyramid where the company is aligned, champion self-development and enforce it through mandatory training, online and external training.”
According to Shameel, Vodacom is an ambidextrous organisation over and above being a massive telco. “You can go with mickey mouse solutions and that will definitely not solve the problem,” he explained. “What works instead is choosing the right platform and the right investment: be clear on the strategy and what you want to invest.”
That was Shameel’s advice for CIOs on how to find a solution to first identify the right platform then figure out how to fund those unfinanced platforms or solutions. “Reimage the problem and find a way and think beyond today when you look at your budgets,” he added.
Collaboration for discovery
Dr Susan Winks, head of research operations and business development at H3D Foundation then shared how the innovation lab she leads collaborated to drug discovery on the continent.
She explained the importance of doing drug discovery research in Africa. According to Susan, the greatest threat in Africa is from the combined effect of the wide range of diseases in humans, crops, and animals, which interact with each other and with the environment.
Susan emphasised that drug discovery research and innovation in Africa is critical to meet the pressing health needs of the continent.
Talking about projects, Susan said that funding will follow once you have established a track record. Strategic partnerships and collaborations are also essential. To be sustainable, “you need to strengthen operational systems and create career paths to retain skilled scientists”.
Risk and rewards
KWV IT manager Philip de Kock went on stage, joined by Viniola Singh, CHRO at Adcorp Group and SAPPI Southern Africa CFO Pramy Moodley, to discuss the good, bad and avoidable when it comes to collaboration.
The topic on collaboration between the organisation and suppliers came up, where Philip noted that the responsibility to structure your own partnerships lies with leadership. He did exactly that for KWV by changing their SLA with suppliers from a retainer to a case-to-case basis.
“In the last couple of years, we’ve had to be innovative in terms of dealing with vendors and staff. You need to be honest about the high costs and cut them down accordingly,” he said. “It’s worked well so far at KWV, especially with SLAs in cases where we wanted to cut costs. Fortunately, the vendors also came to the party and that was critical because we really needed that collaboration at the time.”
According to Phillip, KWV has three wine businesses and people often move between the companies, but they have established great relationships, which is key. “In IT’s case, we’ve nurtured the relationship between the entities in order to get support at a technical level.”
Don’t count the small guys out! "You get great value for money with smaller companies. The goal is for both parties to grow and mature together in a collaborative relationship as they provide their services," he highlighted.
“Never sign a long-term agreement, There needs to be room to walk away (an exit clause), it can be a very frustrating exercise when you don’t,” he advised.
Pramy shared Phillip’s sentiments. “Take the pain upfront when it comes to supplier agreements, get the right people involved early, referring to the lawyers,” she added.
Unleash the power of your backstory – an interactive conversation with Harambee CEO Kasthuri Soni and executive transition coach Graham Fehrsen was a great way to close off the day’s programme. A key takeaway there was the power in understanding someone’s background. Their story can resonate with the next person and inspire them.
This full day of high-level networking and knowledge-sharing would not have been possible without the support of CIO, CHRO and CFO South Africa’s incredible trusted Principal Partners Entelect, iOCO, Liquid Intelligent Technologies, MakwaIT, Mercer, Onestream, Old Mutual. Executive Partners Africa Data Centres, BCX, BDO, Equinix, HCLTech, Stanlib, Workday and Associate Partner SAS.
