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COVER STORY: SHAAH BOOTHA

WHY EFFECTIVE LEADERS MUST MANAGE UP, DOWN AND SIDEWAYS • 9 WAYS TO UP YOUR GAME

AND MULTIPLY YOUR EARNINGS • 8 HABITS OF INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE

FOCUS of the

MONTHIAASB IN SAUpdate on Enhancing Audit Quality Projects

2017 TOP35-UNDER-35

FINALISTS ANNOUNCED

MENTORPEOPLEWHO AREN’T LIKE YOU

THE DEFINITION OF AGE

1www.accountancysa.org.za JULY 2017

CONTENTSJULY 2017

ON THE COVERShaah Bootha stepped right out of high school at 15 to pursue a BCom degree at North-West University. Going beyond just qualifying as the youngest CA(SA) in South Africa, Shaah proudly ranked in the Top 10 Honours Roll too. And no – he is anything but a nerd!

UPFRONT4 UPDATES Environmental, local, economy and

political news updates

FEATURE12 MENTOR PEOPLE WHO AREN’T

LIKE YOU 14 THE CHALLENGE OF BUSINESS

PARTNERSHIPS

FOCUS18 WHY EFFECTIVE LEADERS MUST

MANAGE UP, DOWN AND SIDEWAYS Strong team leadership isn’t

enough.

22 9 WAYS TO UP YOUR GAME AND MULTIPLY YOUR EARNINGS

The object of a good, solid meaningful career is to operate from a position of influence.

28 8 HABITS OF INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE Influential people have a profound

impact on everyone they encounter. Yet, they achieve this only because they exert so much influence inside, on themselves

ANALYSIS39 ANALYSIS: CPD The Significance of the Paris Agreement

42 ANALYSIS: CPD IAASB in SA update on enhancing

audit quality proxjects

REGULARS

30 Profiles: Based in Beautiful Berlin32 Viewpoint

37 Thought Leadership

60 Lifestyle: Motoring

TOP 35-UNDER-3546 Finalists announced

17 – FOCUS OF THE MONTH

30 #PROUDLY CA(SA) PROFILE Stephanie Davis says

international experience has changed her whole approach to tackling her many tasks.

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thirty five35

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2 www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017

EDITORIAL Editor Gerinda Engelbrecht

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Irecently listened to a Simon Sinek TED video in which he talks about what makes a good leader. He

says it’s someone who makes their employees feel secure, who draws staff into a circle of trust. But creating trust, cooperation and safety – especially in an uneven economy – means taking on big responsibilities.

Trust, cooperation and safety are all feelings (not instructions), so you have to instil those feelings in others, not instruct them to feel them. Unfortunately, you can’t instruct someone to trust you or instruct two people to cooperate.

You may wonder where these feelings come from, then … Sinek says that a million years ago the world was filled with danger – the type of danger that could reduce someone’s lifespan. In order to survive, people had to work together – and that created a circle of trust. Where people depended on each other for safety, an environment of trust and cooperation was created. It allowed you to fall asleep at night – knowing that someone is watching out for the dangers around.

Today, in the modern era, the world is also filled with danger; things that frustrate our lives and are out to destroy our success. It can be the ups and downs of the economy, the uncertainty of the stock market, or even a new technology that can make your business obsolete. Sometimes it’s your competitors, who are

trying to put you out of business. These are a constant and will never go away.

The only variables are the conditions inside your business – and that is where leadership matters. Because it’s the leader that sets the tone. When leaders make a choice to put the lives of people in the organisation first and sacrifice their own comforts and tangible results so their people can feel safe, remarkable things will happen.

When people feel safe in an organisation, they will combine their talents and strengths and work tirelessly to face the dangers outside and seize opportunities for the organisation.

Sinek says that the closest analogy he can give of a great leader is like being a parent. Think about it. What makes a great parent? We want to give our children great opportunities, a good education and discipline them when necessary so they can grow up and achieve more than we did. Great leaders want exactly the same – they want to provide opportunities to their people, educate them and discipline them when necessary, build their self-confidence, give them the opportunity to try and fail – so that they can achieve more than we can ever imagine for ourselves.

Charlie Kim is the CEO of a company called Next Jump. He makes the point that if you had hard times in your family, would you ever consider laying off one of your children? We would never do it. Then why do we consider laying off people inside our organisation? He implemented a policy of lifetime employment. If you get a job at Next Jump you cannot get fired for performance issues. In fact, if you have issues they will teach you and support you – just like you would do with one of your children.

That is why people are so angered by CEOs of companies that are in trouble but who receive millions in bonuses. It’s not the numbers that anger people – it’s the fact that these CEOs are willing to sacrifice others in their own interest. Great leaders will never sacrifice people to save numbers – they would rather sacrifice numbers to save people.

GERINDA ENGELBRECHT EDITOR

www.accountancysa.org.za 3JULY 2017

WWW.ACCOUNTANCYSA.ORG.ZA

WHAT’S HAPPENING ON OUR WEBSITE THIS MONTH

►ASA ONLINE Pioneer Foods appoints Felix Lombard CA(SA) as their new CFO @ http://bit.ly/2rzjxgK

FIND YOUR FAVOURITE EXPERTS ONLINE

BUSINESS ADVISORKEVIN PHILLIPS CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/ADW_07_17

LEADERSHIP ADVISORGUGU MTETWA CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/SP_07_17

PUBLIC SPEAKING TRAINERDINESHRIE PILLAY CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/TB_07_17

WEALTH ADVISORMIKE LLEDO CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/BT_07_17

PERSONAL FINANCE ADVISORGIZELLE WILLOWS CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/MH_07_17

On 2 June 201, the Independent Regulatory Board for Auditors (IRBA) announced the requirements for the adoption and implementation of Mandatory Audit Firm Rotation (MAFR) in South Africa.

SAICA notes the release of the rule announced by the IRBA and supports efforts to strengthen auditor independence to enhance audit quality.

View the IRBA rule on MAFR for more information here:https://www.saica.co.za/Technical/Assurance/Latestdevelopmentsintheauditingprofession/MandatoryAuditFirmRotation/tabid/4047/language/en-ZA/Default.aspx

YOUNG CHARTERED ACCOUNTANT’S JOURNEY TO PRESTIGIOUS

INTERNATIONAL AWARDS @

http://bit.ly/2sJtg4K

DOWNLOAD THE 2016 SAICA INTEGRATED

REPORT @

http://bit.ly/2syOFdO

SAICA UPCOMING EVENTS @

http://bit.ly/2rCeeKe

UPCOMING EVENTS

SAICA 2016 INTEGRATED REPORT

YOUNG CA(SA) INTERNATIONAL AWARD


UPFRONT | UPDATES

5JULY 2017www.accountancysa.org.za

UPDATES | UPFRONT

ECONOMY • POLITICS

FREE PLANE TICKETS FOR LIFE

$1,7 billion – the cost of two more man-made islands that Dubai is planning to build by 2020. They will be on either side of the Burj Al Arab Jumeirah, the city's iconic sail-shaped hotel.

ICELAND MAKES INEQUALITY ILLEGALEven in Iceland, the country considered by the experts to be the best for gender equality, a gap still persists with Icelandic women, on average, earning 14% to 18% less than men. As part of a plan to close Iceland’s gender pay gap by 2022, the government announced a new law that will require public and private companies to pay employees equally ‘regardless of gender, ethnicity, sexuality or nationality’, The Associated Press (AP) reported

Source: WEF

Jet Airways gave a newborn baby boy free flight tickets for

life because he was born on one of their flights between

Saudi Arabia and India.

The carrier is one of the India’s biggest, flying to 65 domestic and international

destinations. Now that’s what one calls a good start to life.

Source: CNN

ECONOMY • LOCAL

REWIRING THE RETIREMENT FUND INDUSTRY At the latest Batseta conference in Sun City, panellists were asked how to ‘re-wire’ the retirement industry to get it to where it should be. A systemically complex subject, it is not just about making the right decisions in creating wealth for members. It includes a whole range of interrelated issues, including regulatory change, the markets, education, behaviours, attitudes, etc. And in the current macro-economic environment, this isn’t easy. But what stands us in good stead in South Africa is our considerable energy that is a result of our collective diversity.

For the investor it’s all about inclusion and access … access to information and knowledge, access to product and solution, access to the market. This is where financial technology (FinTech) can play a huge role, actively driving down costs and improving efficiency. We also need to view education differently, as our definition might be too narrow.

WHO IS THE RICHEST WOMAN IN 2017?

COST EFFECTIVE TIP

Before enlisting external training consultants, consider creating an internal training module to communicate your basic expectations to the team. This will provide guidance and information on expected outcomes in the workplace.

Source: SAGE

Forbes has reported that French heiress Liliane Bettencourt is the richest woman in the world and ranks among the world’s top 20 richest overall,

with a net worth of $39,5 billion. Her father, Eugène Schueller, was the founder of the iconic cosmetics company L’Oréal in 1907. As an only child, Liliane inherited her father’s fortune when he died in 1957. Today 94-year-old Liliane is one of the principal shareholders and owns a third of L’Oréal,

along with her children.

In 1987, Bettencourt, with her husband and daughter, founded the Bettencourt Schueller Foundation which supports scientific research, the

arts and social change in France. The foundation awards grants and prizes each year for projects addressing these categories.

Source: Time

65% The percentage of Syria’s whole population who are either internally displaced or have become refugees outside the country. The conflict in Syria has displaced 12 million people overall.

Source: Time

THIRD CONSECUTIVE YEAR WITHOUT CARBON EMISSION GROWTHAccording to the 2017 BP Statistical Review of World Energy, global carbon emissions have remained flat for the third consecutive year. However, South Africa remains one of the most energy-inefficient in the world, meaning it uses more energy to create a unit of GDP than other countries.

Source: Mail & Gaurdian

6 www.accountancysa.org.za 7JULY 2017 JULY 2017www.accountancysa.org.za

UPFRONT | UPDATES UPDATES | UPFRONT

LOCAL • INTERNATIONALCHINA’S GLASS BRIDGE IN NUMBERSThe world’s longest and highest glass-bottomed bridge is situated in Zhangjiajie, in central China’s Hunan Province. The 430-metre-long bridge cost $3,4 million to build and hangs 300 metres above the ground. Paved with 99 panes of three-layered transparent glass, the 6-metre-wide bridge was designed by Israeli architect Haim Dotan and has already set world records for its architecture and construction. It connects two steep mountain cliffs and can accommodate up to 800 people at once.

Source: BBC

WORLD'S OLDEST FISH MARKET CLOSES

World-famous for its early morning tuna auctions, Tokyo’s iconic Tsukiji Fish Market is set to close after more than 80 years and will be relocated to a district near Tokyo Bay. The current market is one of the top tourist destinations in Tokyo, attracting as many as 42 000 visitors a day.

Source: Bloomberg

HEALTH • LOCALTHE WORLD’S MOST-USED COOKING OILIf you had to pick up most packages in a supermarket, there’s a 50% chance you’ll find palm oil in it. You can find it right from chocolate and ice-cream to shampoo and cosmetics.

Global per capita consumption has more than doubled since 2000 to 7,7 kilograms in 2015, according to data from Gro Intelligence.

Malaysia and Indonesia grow about 85% of the world’s supply.

Palm oil is so popular because it has a high resistance to oxidation.

Source: Bloomberg

… JUNK FOOD AND DEPRESSION

PLANETS WITH POTENTIALNASA has announced that one of its teams discovered hundreds of new po-tential planets, 10 of which may have the potential to be habitable. The potential planets could be rocky and orbit in a range called the ‘habitable zone’, which means there could be liquid water on their surfaces. Source: BBC

SOUTH AFRICA’S LOVE FOR FAST FOODThe National South African Customer Satisfaction Index (SAcsi) for 2016 compiled by Consulta reports that South Africans’ fondness for fast food continued unabated in 2016, despite strained economic conditions.

According to the index, the fast food industry achieved an overall satisfaction score of 82,2, which was marginally up from 82 in 2015 and 80,5 in the previous year.

The National SAcsi offers impartial insights across a variety of South African industries by blending a Customer Expectations Index, Perceived Quality Index and a Perceived Value Index to achieve an overall result out of 100.

South Africa’s top brands in nine industries are included in the 2016 National SAcsi namely fast food, life insurance, cellular handsets, full service restaurants, banking, supermarkets, short-term insurance, wireless internet providers and municipalities. The sample included 36 519 customers who were randomly selected for inclusion in each of these surveys in 2016.

LEGAL EDUCATION

The Council for Higher Education (CHE) recently released the outcomes of the National Review of LLB. Four universities were issued with a notice of withdrawal of accreditation if their programmes did not jack up the standard and quality of legal education. The review’s intention is to strengthen the quality of legal education across South African universities.

Source: Reuters

A study in the journal Public Health Nutrition found that people who eat junk food regularly are 51% more likely to develop depression than those who eat it occasionally. The researchers also found that the more junk food you eat, the higher your risk for developing depression. Instead of having junk food for lunch, eat a variety of greens, wholegrains, healthy fats, and lean protein to help curb depression.

Source: CAMAF

OF AGE

9JULY 20178 www.accountancysa.org.za www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017

COVER STORY

Shaah Bootha stepped right out of high school at 15 to pursue a BCom degree at North-West University. Going beyond just qualifying as the youngest CA(SA) in South Africa, Shaah proudly ranked in the Top 10 Honours Roll too. And no – he is anything but a nerd!

AUTHOR: Lynn Grala – PHOTOS: André van der Merwe

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S haah’s Bootha’s two older sisters, Saffiyah and Farzeen, both also CAs(SA), describe their brother as a little spoilt, a bit of a clown and sometimes cocky. But Shaah does

not agree completely. Instead, he sees himself as the Tony Stark (Iron Man) of auditing.

A well-rounded, highly intelligent individual, Shaah is athletic and exudes great social skills, getting along with practically anyone he meets. Also the owner of a great sense of humour, he is said to tease his sisters. And that explains a lot.

‘I am, however, extremely competitive,’ he adds candidly. ‘This carries through to my work, so those working with me might sometimes find me quite demanding.’

Shaah is always proactive and would not hesitate to take the initiative. In a situation where a decision has to be taken, he has the ability to persuade others to see it his way. This quality has made his

colleagues at work, and others around him, often rely on him on certain important matters.

THE DREAMSo what motivated Shaah to complete Grades 8 to 12 in less than half the time it usually takes? ‘My parents sold me on the idea of being one of the youngest people in the country to have finished high school,’ he says with disarming honesty. ‘The idea of my achievement being reported in newspapers all over the country as well as on radio and television was an added motivator.’

One can understand from whom Shaah has inherited his intelligence. His father, Professor Akbar Bootha CA(SA), is the former director of the School of Accounting Sciences at North-West University and has been instrumental in assisting youngsters, often from impoverished backgrounds, achieving their dream of becoming CAs(SA). Many

THE DEFINITION

• Try to be positive and have confidence in yourself. If someone else can do it, why can’t you?

• Nothing comes easy. You have to work hard to achieve your goal, but at the same time, it should not be all work and no play. Make time for things you enjoy.

• Give your best in whatever task you undertake. Those working with you will respect you even more and you yourself will feel proud of the result of your effort.

• Integrity and work ethics play a big part in your success as well as in your happiness.

• Begin with your end goal in mind.

SHAAH’S FIVE TIPS TO ACE SUCCESS

11JULY 201710 www.accountancysa.org.za www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017

COVER STORY

of his students are now highly successful leaders in South Africa. Shaah’s mother, Shireen, has also been a backbone to her children’s success, diligently home-schooling Shaah while instilling high standards and values for life. Shireen is a qualified school teacher and has a Master’s degree in Industrial Psychology.

‘We were taught certain basic values, which certainly had an impact on the way I think and behave today,’ says Shaah. ‘From childhood, my dad instilled in us the importance of honesty in our dealings with others and respect towards all, no matter what the person’s status in life. We were also strongly encouraged to give our best in whatever we undertook. Although my father is very happy that my two sisters and I followed in his footsteps and became CAs(SA), it was actually my mom who wanted us to go that route. We often tease her that if she could have helped it she would have included the designation on our birth certificates,’ he quips.

Other than the motivation from his parents, realising his dream was up to Shaah. ‘In my first year of high school I registered for Grades 8, 9 and 10 with a private distance learning institution,’ says Shaah. ‘In my second year (Grades 11 and 12) I enrolled at a government school for examination purposes but continued studying from home.’

No doubt, attaining the big dream had its gruelling moments. To young Shaah, self-discipline was at times a bit challenging. ‘Although my parents and private tutors monitored my progress and encouraged me, when and how to do my school work was my responsibility,’ Shaah continues.

PUTTING THE DREAM TO WORKFollowing a normal school timetable as far as possible, Shaah would study on his own in the mornings, working on tests and assignments. He did this with limited supervision from his parents. His parents ensured that his studies were supplemented several afternoons a week with private tutors in Mathematics, Accounting, English and Afrikaans. ‘My parents felt (and rightly so) that it was risky to leave these subjects for me to do by myself,’ says Shaah. Being a born achiever, each year he participated in an Eisteddfod, an annual performing arts and speech and drama competition, where he always received Gold Star awards for the various items he took part in.

The home-schooled teenager took holidays just like his peers. Socially, he kept in touch with some friends from primary school and he had his two older sisters to contend with! Being an avid sportsman, he obtained provincial colours for cricket (representing North West Province country districts at junior level). He joined the local cricket club until he completed his undergraduate degree at university.

Because of the number of out-of-town audits he is involved in today, Shaah has unfortunately had to give up playing club cricket for now. ‘I was passionate about it, but had to stop as I could not make it to the regular practice sessions held during the week. Golf has also been neglected recently, which resulted in my triple-digit handicap, but I do want to start focusing on it again soon. So, at the moment, I am an armchair sportsman,’ he laughs.

Shaah does, however, have a number of other interests too. ‘Since childhood I have been in the fortunate position to have travelled abroad extensively; I really enjoy exploring different places. I also enjoy movies, TV series, outdoor activities and spending time with friends and family. I see myself as a bit of a foodie as well.’

NEXT PHASE OF THE JOURNEYHis final matriculation examinations were externally supervised and marked. His goal achieved, Shaah matriculated at the age of 15. He then started studying towards his BCom at North-West University. At 18, he started a BCom Honours. Despite being several years younger than his classmates, he was treated like any other student. ‘And that’s what I wanted,’ he adds. ‘I have always been one of the guys.’

Shaah understood from an early age that winning comes at a price and requires great effort. ‘My father told me, “Choose a profession of your liking, but whatever you choose, make sure you are the best at it. Don’t be afraid or ashamed of working hard to achieve what you want.”’

Brought up to think of others, Shaah would also sacrifice some of his Saturdays to help tutor fellow students who were struggling at university.

A WORK ETHIC OF NOTE‘This was part of my upbringing and the great role models I’ve had to look up to. There is no substitute for working hard to achieve your

dreams. I worked very hard for my qualification. Nobody can say they became a CA(SA) without making big sacrifices.’

While the constant desire to be successful may increase the risk of burn-out, Shaah offers a simple solution. ‘You need to ensure that you do not bite off more than you can chew.’

Registering as a CA(SA) at just 23 (in 2016), when most of his peers had not yet finished university, Shaah was the youngest qualified CA(SA) in the country. Today he is a manager in PwC’s Assurance Division and is based in the Mafikeng/Lichtenburg office in North West, where he did his articles. He is involved in the audit of various public and private companies and their subsidiaries, as well as the public sector.

What does he enjoy most about his job? ‘Interacting with other people outside my own organisation and observing different business methods and processes. These are opportunities unique to auditors because you are engaging with more than one organisation at the same time and the knowledge and experience you gain from them is something that is not readily available to everybody. I find it enjoyable to chat to people who are passionate about their business and to hear from them the challenges they face and their plans to overcome such challenges.’

Among his career highlights was passing his final board exam while an employee at the firm in 2015. ‘The Territory Senior Partner for PwC Africa (CEO) phoned me when the results were released, congratulating me on making the Top 10 Honours Roll.’ Shaah was one of more than 2 050 candidates that passed the SAICA exam.

He was also awarded the PwC Experience Award. This annual award is given to 50 employees out of more than 8 000, across all PwC offices in 26 countries in Africa, who personify the PwC values and experience.

‘Although I have obtained the designation CA(SA) (and I am truly grateful for it), I feel there is a lot I would still like to achieve in life,’ says Shaah.

‘I think my ultimate goal is to be recognised as an industry leader and someone who is highly revered in whichever field I decide to pursue. At the same time, I want to make a meaningful contribution to society as a whole, assisting particularly those who are underprivileged.’

Despite the accolades, Shaah remains humble. Asked what he would have told his 12-year-old self, the 24-year-old replies: ‘Don’t write off the dorky girls, they actually turn out quite pretty in the end!’

Shaah with his family

FEATURE | MENTORING

Leaders tend to coach and mentor their ‘own’. Even those who believe that

diversity improves creativity, problem-solving and decision-making often invest in and advocate for the development of subordinates who are most like them. They see less experienced versions of themselves in these people, so they’re inclined to believe in their potential. Of course, this also means that growth and advancement opportunities go disproportionately to those who belong to the demographic or social group that’s already in power.

Telling protégés that diversity matters won’t change anything. We must demonstrate our commitment by mentoring people who aren’t like us. Otherwise, we do what’s comfortable, and we risk saying with our actions that we only care about cultivating the talents of a homogeneous few.

he had initially assumed. Senior leaders took notice of his initiative and desire to develop, and now that he was communicating more freely and comfortably with them, they better understood what he had to offer and what his career ambitions were. They, in turn, coached him on management and leadership skills. This captain went on to receive multiple prestigious assignments and continued to excel not just because of his expanded skill set, but because several leaders invested in him and advocated for him. They might have missed out on his talents if they hadn’t made an effort to mentor someone with high potential who didn’t fit the dominant social profile. And I would have missed out on an enriching relationship that has deepened my understanding of the challenges that diverse groups face.

Mentoring across social and demographic lines is also good for the mentor. It has made me a more empathic, emotionally intelligent leader. I’ve become better at spotting potential outside the usual mould — and better at understanding the obstacles people face when they aren’t part of the dominant group. And that makes it a little easier for the next person to get the attention and support of leaders.

© 2017 Harvard Business School Publishing Corp.

We may also overlook developmental needs on our teams because it can be difficult for people from minority demographic and social groups to speak up. As an army officer who has trained diverse groups of recruits, soldiers and staff, I’ve always cared deeply about helping all kinds of people reach their potential. But it took years to understand this basic dynamic: those who look less like me might find it hard to share their concerns or ask for help. They might feel uncomfortable raising their hand if they aren’t sure I will identify with them. And it’s on me, as the leader, to help close that gap.

For example, one captain I recently mentored was a smart, high-performing officer who felt invisible to the leaders in his organisation. He thought he was being overlooked for opportunities because of his religion. Though I didn’t agree with his perception

of how others viewed him, I understood why he felt that way — and talking with him made me see some of the complexities of social acceptance and integration. He had approached me for mentoring because I treated people from diverse backgrounds with respect and kindness, but he was still sceptical about how much I could help him. Through many conversations, I helped him examine his own thinking and behaviour, assess the organisation’s culture, and identify which jobs he could volunteer for to build the credibility and confidence he needed to succeed.

At first, he held fast to his negative assumptions about how leaders saw him. But after volunteering for some tough assignments – and receiving superior performance evaluations – he confronted his own unconscious biases, and his confidence grew. He realised he wasn’t as invisible as

AUTHOR: Richard Farnell is an army officer and a doctoral candidate in education at Northeastern University

MENTORPEOPLE WHO

Mentoring across demographic lines extends the organisation's talent pipeline and increases leaders' social and emotional intelligence, so it's a win all around


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FEATURE | PARTNERSHIPS

The optimal functioning or ‘health’ of a business partnership lies at the core

of businesses structured in this way. But too often insufficient attention is paid to the dynamics of partnerships and as a consequence, businesses may fail. Well intentioned from the start, a plethora of problems can occur, many of which are preventable if only people realised what goes into creating and maintaining sustainable partnerships.

A great deal of the literature on business partnerships likens the relationship to that of a marriage, with which many can identify. It is indeed a useful metaphor for thinking about how partnerships form and develop from there. From the idea of courtship to a prenuptial contract to the marriage and honeymoon period, as well as facing the vicissitudes of life thereafter –

examined as the business evolves and changes. Just as in a marriage, unforeseen circumstances arise, new developments are introduced and consequently good, regular and meaningful communication lays the foundation for dealing with such factors.

For example, are meetings regular and do they deal honestly with issues? Are the parties able to raise with each other contentious as well as positive developments? A high degree of trust between the parties is fundamental to the process of communication. This includes the experience that all parties’ interests continue to be served. Have roles remained clear and are they serving the business well? What changes may be needed to make improvements? Working on the relationship and keeping potential challenges top of mind are key to success.

all lend insight into the highs and lows of any partnership.

Some of the dynamics played out will of course depend on the relationship between the parties from the start. Were they relative strangers, good friends or family? How did they come to see the potential complementarity between them? What has been the nature of the ‘courtship’ as both parties negotiated their mutual and individual interests?

Once the idea of a business relationship is contemplated, all the advice points to putting a great deal of effort into the ‘prenup’ agreement – a partnership agreement in which mutual expectations and roles are clarified in addition to interrogating various eventualities, including exit strategies. Some writers have highlighted that such agreements are in fact not done for a variety of reasons. The excitement and

Frequently, eventualities in the business cycle introduce complexities that need to be resolved. To what extent is the business growing and acquiring additional staff? Who manages and how are people managed? What happens to profits? Are they re-invested in the business or paid as dividends? One partnership had huge difficulties as the one party, to support an expensive lifestyle, needed all the money he could get out of the business while the other wanted to reinvest to meet the strategic objectives of the business, including the hiring of additional staff. The resolution of this explosive situation required the input of a mediator who had to facilitate a difficult conversation in which both parties needed to confront their differences and give each other tough feedback to find a compromise.

optimism in the initial stages of building a business may lead to the feeling that this is unnecessary and that focus should rather be on developing the business as opposed to thinking about potentially negative issues. The use of an outside expert contracts lawyer is highly recommended but at this stage, money may be tight and such input viewed as too expensive. But wisdom points to the importance of this document to guide the partnership through good as well as tricky times.

At the heart of a partnership is the extent to which parties know each other well, both personally and professionally. A clear understanding of what each brings to the table is critical. Skills, resources, leadership styles as well as personal values, ideals and goals are paramount to interrogate. These need to be revisited and

Like so many other professionals, accounting partnerships face a lot of challenges. Accommodating the expectations of clients in the context of increasing compliance requirements, heavy workloads and perceived problems with the distribution of work and therefore individual income generation, require reflection and honest communication between partners.

Another partnership in trouble had at its core a problem with communication styles. The more senior partner came across as a ‘critical parent’, which resulted in the other party responding as an ‘angry’ or ‘withdrawn’ child. This led to their interactions ending up either in a fight or a period of ‘sulking’ and no communication at all. Once the unhealthy way of communicating was pointed out and explained, both parties understood the dynamics and were able to change their interactive styles.

As in the context of a marriage, third-party intervention in the form of mediation can be a useful process to deal with partnership hiccups. The earlier on in potential conflict this happens, the better. Too often it is not until the conflict has spilled over that a mediator is called in to assist in resolving the matter. A better idea is not to wait until this occurs. The concept of a partnership ‘health check’ is a useful one. In this practice, a third party would be called in to assist the partners to identify both the strengths and weaknesses of their relationship and facilitate a way forward that plays to their strengths and helps resolve any potential issues they may be facing. It is a preventive measure to help preclude problems from developing in order to sustain a healthy business.

AUTHOR: Dr Angela du Plessis is an accredited mediator and works in association with Gateways Business Consultants

PARTNERSHIPS | FEATURE

THE CHALLENGE

OF BUSINESS

Many professionals, including accountants, doctors, lawyers and engineers, form partnerships as a way of organising their professional services. Research shows that many of these partnerships fail. This article suggests that mediation may offer a mechanism to assist partners both to foresee challenges to their relationship and offer a way forward once such challenges have been identified

PARTNERSHIPS

AS IN THE CONTEXT OF A MARRIAGE, THIRD-PARTY INTERVENTION IN THE FORM OF A MEDIATION CAN BE A USEFUL PROCESS TO DEAL WITH PARTNERSHIP ISSUES

15www.accountancysa.org.za JULY 201714 www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017

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MANAGEMENTEXCELLENCE

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Navigate your business in the right direction with a CA(SA) and get the tools to take your business to the next level. A CA(SA) understands that numbers are not a game. Numbers defi ne your business. That is why they leave nothing to chance.

Partner with a responsible business leader. Partner with a CA(SA) today.

responsible leadership.

> Beyond the numbers

WHY EFFECTIVE LEADERS MUST MANAGE UP, DOWN AND SIDEWAYS

Most of the leadership advice aimed at senior functional managers is how to build, align, energise and guide a world-

class team. This is a challenging task in its own right, but we all know it isn’t the whole story. Leaders, even those in the C-suite, must also extend their influence upward and horizontally.

Organisation theory suggests that managing upward and sideways is good for both the company and the individual leader’s career: CEOs need the insights and pushback of trusted executives to help sharpen strategy. And complex modern organisations benefit when people engage with their peers across functional and business-unit boundaries to bring a range of perspectives and drive change and innovation.

functional skills, personality traits, socio-demographic variables, and external factors, such as peoples’ fit with the company). We supplemented this research by analysing existing 360-degree data on 7 429 marketing and non-marketing leaders – a total of 67 278 individual evaluations by these leaders’ bosses, peers, subordinates, and themselves.

Our findings lend support to the notion that senior executives should pay more attention to mobilising their bosses (managing upward) and functional colleagues (managing horizontally) (see diagram). Taken together, these upward and horizontal actions were about 50% more important than managing subordinates for business success (45% versus 30%) and well over twice as important for career success (47% versus 19%).

Our research confirms this theory, and then some. In a wide-ranging study of the leadership actions of chief marketing officers (CMOs) – a good proxy, we believe, for the skills and behaviours of functional leaders in general – we’ve shown how ‘managing’ the CEO and mobilising colleagues increases business impact and career success. (For leadership research on another C-suite proxy, the CFO, see ‘How functional leaders become CEOs’.1) To test our hypothesis, we asked more than 1 200 senior marketing executives from 71 countries about their perceived business impact (contribution to revenue and profit growth), their career success, and their characteristics against 96 variables. Using statistical techniques (explained below12), we were able to relate to these outcomes the 96 variables (which included leadership behaviours,

Clearly, there’s more to success than managing up and sideways: leading a high-performance functional team accounted for 30% of the explained variation in our CMOs’ business impact, and 19% for career success, and managing yourself accounted for the remaining variation.

Mobilising subordinates, in particular, is the base executives need to build from if they want to establish credibility with the CEO and with colleagues. The best executives build strong teams, relentlessly enhance team members’ skills, keep subordinates focused with objective performance measures, and establish an environment conducive to trust and loyalty.

But they also do much more. Our model helped us identify the most important specific actions associated with managing upward and horizontally, and our 360-degree survey data confirmed that some of those actions receive less emphasis than they should.2

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19JULY 2017www.accountancysa.org.za18 www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017

AUTHORS: Thomas Barta is a McKinsey alumnus and was a partner in the firm’s Cologne office; Patrick Barwise is emeritus professor of management and marketing at London Business School

Strong team leadership isn’t enough. New research shows the importance – for business impact and career success – of also mobilising your boss and colleagues

MOBILISING SUBORDINATES IS THE BASE EXECUTIVES NEED TO BUILD FROM IF THEY WANT TO ESTABLISH CREDIBILITY WITH THE CEO AND WITH THE COLLEAGUES

MOBILISING YOUR BOSS: FOCUS ON STRATEGIC ISSUES AND DEMONSTRATE FINANCIAL RESULTSWhen we asked CMOs about their primary role, some responded that they ;'ran the marketing organisation’ or ‘led their companies’ advertising and brand campaigns’. We believe many other functional leaders would provide similar departmentally focused responses. By contrast, the most effective and successful leaders in our study were more likely to describe their primary role as increasing company growth or better outreach to customers to improve performance. We found that a key determinant of success was taking on the big issues, those in sync with the CEO’s agenda and contributing to the company’s overall performance. Aligning with the CEO’s strategy explained 10% of CMO business impact and 10% of career success.

But are functional leaders well aligned with the CEO’s agenda? Seventy-six per cent of our CMOs said yes – but just 46% of the bosses in our 360-degree database believed their marketers knew where the organisation was going. Many functional leaders, it seems, could and should better align with the top.

Building a reputation as an effective user of resources also increases standing with the CEO. In our study, the ability to demonstrate returns explained 12% of CMO business impact and 3% of career success. Here, we again found a gap: while 67% of our CMOs said they had a strong returns orientation, only 39% of C-suite executives in another study reported that marketing executives were delivering measurable return on investment for their expenditure.3

MOBILISING YOUR COLLEAGUES: FORGE STRONG TIES WITH PEERS TO BUILD MOMENTUMIf you want to build a ‘movement’ within the company, lead from the front with an inspiring story to win the hearts and minds of colleagues, including those who don’t report to you, and with a clear action plan to deliver tangible results. That can initiate a virtuous circle of internal recognition by energising a cadre of early followers among colleagues. Our research suggests that leading from the front and having a strong narrative together explained nearly 10% of business impact and about 20% of career success. The ability to reach beyond the marketing silo to executives in areas

such as IT and finance explained an additional 13% of the variation in both business impact and career success.

Only 56% of CEOs, however, described their marketing leaders as role models who lead from the front, and only 61% of CMOs said they use their storytelling skills. Tellingly, while marketers are adept at telling stories that mobilise customers to buy their products, we find they are less likely to ply that strength internally, despite the importance of effective engagement with colleagues.

Mobilising horizontally means walking the halls, getting out of the office to share ideas with peers, listening to their concerns, and working jointly to attack strategic issues. In theory, leaders could do many of their interactions on video these days. But that’s rarely inspiring. Instead, the best leaders connect directly with as many people as possible through town halls when they travel to local markets, and hunker down to help teams solve their biggest problems.4

Fortunately, the actions needed to mobilise the CEO and colleagues are often mutually reinforcing. For instance, moves by functional leaders to build support horizontally are often related to their simultaneous efforts to show tangible results and advance the organisation’s strategy.

While CEOs rely on functional leaders’ ability to build high-performance teams, much more needs to be done to help these leaders extend their influence upward into the C-suite and horizontally across the organisation. Happily, our work suggests that not only business impact but also career success redounds to those CMOs (and, we believe, functional leaders of all stripes) who can increase their span of leadership influence upward and across functions.

NOTES1.CMO = chief marketing officer; share for mobilizing self not shown: business impact = 25%, career success = 34%

2. See Thomas Barta and Patrick Barwise, The 12 Powers of a Marketing Leader: How to Suceed by Building Customer and Company Value, McGraw-Hill Education, September 2016

3. Outside looking in:The CMO struggles to get in sync with the C-suite, Economist Intelligence Unit, 2012

4. Thomas Barta, “CMO leadership talk with Diageo’s Syl Saller: ‘Life’s too short for PowerPoint,’” Forbes, February 24, 2017, forbes.com.

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9 WAYS TO UP YOUR GAME AND MULTIPLY YOUR EARNINGS

As a CA(SA), moving up the value chain is important. It’s almost an intrinsic ingredient of the personal self-actualisation process.

We’re an ambitious bunch and we want more! The puzzling question is how is it that some of us are

able to get there so much quicker, whilst others make little progress even though they have the same academic qualifications.

I personally have never disfavoured Lady Luck but there is a lot more of a lasting benefit attached to knowing that you are empowered to effect change all by yourself!

So the answer to the above question is a resounding ‘yes’ – you can definitely speed up your development!

So here is part of the secret: it’s all about moving from a manager mentality to executive mind-set.

That’s it.Game over!And it all begins with this: managers get CPI annual

increases whilst executives get paid what they are worth!Getting to manager status is usually a natural

progression. Once you qualify, you move up the scale and attain the title ‘manager’. Sure, there are good managers

It's a process. And it’s more about relationship building than it is about skill development.

Part of it will be automatic. But, by being creative and proactive, you can make a significant difference in speeding up the process.

The following nine critical steps will help you enter the executive orbit more effectively.

1THE RELATIONSHIP DYNAMICSUnderstanding the relationship dynamics at play in the work place is critical. There are three basic

relationships that need to be clearly understood:• You and your staff – you are the boss and need to be

in charge.• You and your colleagues – you are not the boss and

therefore cannot be in charge.• You and your boss – you are the subordinate and

your boss is in charge.

Being aware of the importance of each of these relationships allows you to set the stage for your admittance into the executive space. How to interact to create maximum advantage is the name of the game.

and bad managers but, as a CA, you can reasonably assured that you will land a management role once you qualify. And you will grow yourself and move forward at a leisurely pace, earning an acceptable ‘market-related’ package.

But the next stage of your development will require a little more proactive manoeuvring. This is the proactive manoeuvring that is required for you to make the transition from manger to executive.

You might think that some of your colleagues do this quite easily. This is especially possible if they are the extrovert-type, good networkers and go cycling/golfing with the boss or stay for drinks after work.

Well, here’s the good news. It’s not only about that – there’s a lot more involved.

And, if you did a proper post-mortem, you would find that the outer frills that looked so important at the outset, are actually backed up by a number of critical attributes that run much deeper.

And it is these attributes that you can learn and apply to take yourself solidly into the executive realm.

But know this! – it is definitely is not an overnight sensation.

But this needs to be understood. And practised. The benefits are incalculable. Knowing how to deal

with people can make a big difference to the results you will get. Learn this skill and you are one big step ahead!

2STICK WITH PROTOCOLFollowing closely behind the relationship dynamic is the principle of corporate protocol.

Protocol is defined as a system of rules that explain the correct conduct or procedures that need to be followed in formal situations.

This might sound awfully stuffy but it operates like this: in organisations there are lines of command. This is usually laid out in the corporate organogram. Jumping these command lines will upset people. You are less likely to be let into the executive club if you are constantly ignoring protocol.

3YOUR PERSONAL BRANDHow others perceive affects your progress. Do not underestimate the importance of your personal

brand. If you start looking the part, you will get there much quicker.

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AUTHOR: Clive Kaplan CA(SA) is CEO of The Green Mind Capital Group

The object of a good, solid meaningful career is to operate from a position of influence. The question is, how do you get there?

THE NEXT STAGE OF YOUR DEVELOPMENT WILL REQUIRE A LITTLE MORE PROACTIVE MANOEUVRING. THIS IS THE PROACTIVE MANOEUVRING THAT IS REQUIRED FOR YOU TO MAKE THE TRANSITION FROM MANGER TO EXECUTIVE

Branding yourself as an executive requires a greater level of awareness and focus. This could range from wearing branded clothing, clever props like pens and note pads to manicuring your nails. The impact of a good visual presence is worth the effort. The saying ‘first impressions are lasting impressions’ is appropriately valid in the corporate context.

4PLAYING THE GAMEI've got some bad news for you – the workplace is a game.

Ignore the game at your peril! Sure, if you want to stay on the management level,

the game is not that pronounced. But in the executive space it’s essential. If you do not know the rules, it is unlikely that you will be let into the executive club.

So it looks as simple as this: you cannot play cricket when everyone else is playing soccer.

Part of this game playing is understanding the different personalities in the mix. Often the executive team is dominated by a person with narcissistic tendencies.

Failure to deal with such people in the appropriate manner will prevent you from gaining traction on the team. Standing firm on important issues is part of the process but it’s more about avoiding getting sucked into some of the manipulative tactics that are used.

5STEPPING UP – MAKE A DECISIONThe concept of stepping up is one of the deciding markers between managers and

executives. Managers ask for confirmation whilst executives

make a call and step forward and commit themselves to a course of action.

Obviously corporate governance sets the boundaries, but within those boundaries executives will make decisions even if they turn out to be wrong. And even more than that, they take responsibility – if it’s a bad decision, they stand firmly behind their choice and, if necessary, face the music. Although there are unsavoury characters who will look to shift blame onto an unsuspecting subordinate, in the main, executives will stand solid on their decisions – even if they face the possibility of dismissal.

Decision-making is an important part of leadership. Being able to weigh up the options and choose a course of action, is the sign of strong leadership. Stalling on decisions and floundering in a space of uncertainty will expose your inability to ‘carry the flag’.

6PRESENT THE ANSWER NOT THE QUESTIONFollowing from the point above, managers tend to be more likely to ‘dump’ than to solve. Where

the manager will arrive with good ideas, the executive will arrive with a fully researched feasibility study confirming the viability of the project including clear identifications of the pros and cons. All the boss has to do is sign it off!

7BE SECOND-IN-COMMANDAs mentioned above, it is you who needs to make a proactive move into the executive space. It is

your actions that will create the outcome.Like all clubs, in order to become a member, you

need to be nominated. The best way of doing this is to select a respected referee to put you forward. And who better than your boss?

If you want to be recognised as a candidate executive, you need the vote of your boss. Accordingly your relationship with your boss is paramount. But it’s more than that. When you sit on the side of management, you are positioning on the wrong side of the fence. Moving over to the executive side is a game-changer.

But beware!Attempts to get closer to your boss can look like

approval-seeking behaviour. This will not work! If you become high-maintenance, constantly needing his attention and support, you are displaying immaturity. That will be disastrous!

What is needed is something much more subtle.The desired alternative is to set up a regular weekly

meeting. Prepare an agenda and inform him of what you are doing and the progress being made by your team. By keeping him up to date you give him the ability to be more in control. This makes him look good to his boss as he will be able to always give up-to-date feedback. This might also allow him to feed some of the more higher-level information down to you. This empowers you as well.

This will result in you moving closer to the executive space. The more this happens, the easier it is for you to slot in as his second-in-command and that is the beginning of your journey to the top.

8AVOID CONFLICT AT ALL COSTSI’m amazed at how many of my clients believe that by not being confrontational they are

ineffective and weak.There could be nothing further from the truth!

Here’s the good news – confrontation results in

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inefficiency and wasted energy. It is the least effective mechanism in achieving results and should only be used when all other avenues have been exhausted.

Executives don’t fight – they manoeuvre. They seek resolution by firstly understanding the problem and then following due process to ensure the matter is dealt with openly and professionally.

This does not mean to say that your boss will mirror this approach. But when you are looking to enter the executive space you will be disqualified if you are known to be too confrontational.

9NETWORKINGMost people find networking difficult. It is, however, an essential part of presenting yourself

in the executive space. Here is an interesting slant on networking:

It’s not what you know and it’s not who you know, it’s who knows you!

Bearing this in mind, you will find that the whole strategy changes. Your intention centres on gentle interventions here and there so that influential people get to know you be name.

So here are some pointers when networking at company events:• Show up at company events. By just being present

allows you the opportunity to create connection.• Always go up to influential directors and greet

them. You don’t have to hang around and chat. Just make the connection in a pleasant and engaging way. This requires humility and subservience.

• Find a way to connect with those senior executives who could advance your career. This could include taking stuff directly to their office instead of sending it via a messenger. You could also position yourself to being in the parking area when he arrives. Get into their line of vision in a non-invasive way. But do it!

External networking is a little more difficult. Apply the same principles as described above but you might want to set a target for yourself. Aim to speak to three new people at an event and give out your business card. Here is the bottom line on networking: you need to be seen engaging with others. Choose a way that is most comfortable for you but show up and do it.

CONCLUSIONThere is nothing particularly earth-shattering about the process described above. Nor is there a call for you to compromise your value system or change your personality.

Just know that you have the responsibility to develop yourself and if you are not making headway, look at your actions. It’s got little to do with whether you are an extrovert or introvert.


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Weather turbulent times with the best corporate governance

Register online or fi nd more information about the conference www.chartsec.co.zaContact: [email protected] to make your booking. Cell: 083 788 0010 Fax: 086 503 6657

Conference costs (includes vat) CSSA Members and CSSA Students Public

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Group bookings A group discount of 10% will be offered for groups of 5 or more delegates from the same company

Speakers

GovernanceCorporate Premier

conference since ‘09

MC John RobbieMontecasino, Johannesburg18 & 19 September 2017

Challenges in corporate governance and corruption Mavuso Msimang, Chairman, Corruption Watch

Compliance strategy and corporate culture: overcoming challengesDr Yondela Ndema, Chief compliance and ethics offi cer, Sasol Ltd

Company secretary panelLerato Manaka, Group Company Secretary, Barloworld LtdCarina Wessels, Group Company Secretary & Legal, Exxaro Resources LtdAlice Mathew, Company Secretary, Sanral SOC LtdJill Parratt, Group Secretary, Liberty Holdings Ltd

Law & corporate governance panel Yaniv Kleitman, Director, Cliffe Dekker Hofmeyr IncChristina Pretorius, Director, Norton Rose FulbrightVlad Movshovich, Partner, Webber Wentzel

Responsible board leadership in a digital and global age Daniel Malan, Director of the Centre for Corporate Governance in Africa, University of Stellenbosch Business School

The threat of cyber attacksDanny Myburgh, Managing Director, Cyanre – The Computer Forensic Lab

Audit committees’ communication on internal audit to boards of directorsGeorge Williams, National Head, BDO Risk Advisory Services

King IV “a qualitative approach”Richard Foster, Richard Foster & Associates

Governing for radical inclusive growthSikonathi Mantshantsha, Deputy Editor, Financial Mail

Topic TBCStephen Sadie, CEO, Chartered Secretaries Southern Africa

The protection and processing of special personal informationNeil Kirby, Director, Werksmans

Developments in company lawProf Michael Katz, Chairman, ENSafrica

Governance, politics and the state we’re inProf David Everatt, Head, Wits School of Governance

The vital role of the company secretary in preparing for and conducting a board meetingDavid VenusInternational President, Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators

8 HABITS OF INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE

We see only their outside. We see them innovate, speak their mind, and propel themselves forward toward bigger and

better things. And, yet, we’re missing the best part.The confidence and wherewithal that make their

influence possible are earned. It’s a labour of love that influential people pursue behind the scenes, every single day.

And while what people are influenced by changes with the season, the unique habits of influential people remain constant.

Their focused pursuit of excellence is driven by eight habits that you can emulate and absorb until your influence expands:

1 THEY THINK FOR THEMSELVESInfluential people aren’t buffeted by the latest trend or by public opinion. They form their opinions

carefully, based on the facts. They’re more than willing to change their mind

when the facts support it, but they aren’t influenced by what other people think, only by what they know.

5 THEY WELCOME DISAGREEMENTInfluential people do not react emotionally and defensively to dissenting opinions – they welcome

them. They’re humble enough to know that they don’t know everything and that someone else might see something they missed. And if that person is right, they embrace the idea wholeheartedly because they care more about the end result than being right.

6 THEY ARE PROACTIVEInfluential people don’t wait for things like new ideas and new technologies to find them; they

seek those things out. These early adopters always want to anticipate what’s next. They’re influential because they see what’s coming, and they see what’s coming because they intentionally look for it. Then they spread the word.

7 THEY RESPOND RATHER THAN REACTIf someone criticises an influential person for making a mistake, or if someone else makes

a critical mistake, influential people don’t react

2 THEY ARE GRACIOUSLY DISRUPTIVEInfluential people are never satisfied with the status quo. They’re the ones who constantly ask,

‘What if?’ and ‘Why not?’ They’re not afraid to challenge conventional wisdom and they don’t disrupt things for the sake of being disruptive; they do it to make things better.

3 THEY INSPIRE CONVERSATIONWhen influential people speak, conversations spread like ripples in a pond. And those ripples

are multidirectional; influencers inspire everyone around them to explore new ideas and think differently about their work.

4 THEY LEVERAGE THEIR NETWORKSInfluential people know how to make lasting connections. Not only do they know a lot of people,

they get to know their connections’ connections. More importantly, they add value to everyone in their network. They share advice and know how, and they make connections between people who should get to know each other.

immediately and emotionally. They wait. They think. And then they deliver an appropriate response. Influential people know how important relationships are and they won’t let an emotional overreaction harm theirs.

They also know that emotions are contagious and overreacting has a negative influence on everyone around them.

8 THEY BELIEVEInfluential people always expect the best. They believe in their own power to achieve their

dreams, and they believe others share that same power. They believe that nothing is out of reach, and that belief inspires those around them to stretch for their own goals. They firmly believe that one person can change the world.

BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHERTo increase your influence, you need to freely share your skills and insights, and you must be passionate in your pursuit of a greater future.

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AUTHOR: Dr Travis Bradberry is the award-winning co-author of the bestselling book Emotional Intelligence 2.0 and the cofounder of TalentSmart, a leading provider of emotional intelligence tests, emotional intelligence training, and emotional intelligence certification, serving more than 75% of Fortune 500 companies

Influential people have a profound impact on everyone they encounter. Yet, they achieve this only because they exert so much influence inside, on themselves

INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE BELIEVE IN THEIR OWN POWER TO ACHIEVE THEIR DREAMS, AND THEY BELIEVE OTHERS SHARE THAT SAME POWER

[ REGULARS | INTERNATIONAL PROFILE ]

BASED IN BEAUTIFUL BERLIN

DESCRIBE YOURSELF AS A PERSONI am very driven and welcome a challenge.

WHAT DO YOU LOVE MOST ABOUT BERLIN?It’s a city that is steeped in history but at the same time, it is modern and fast paced.

It is also very multicultural and everyone is encouraged to celebrate their differences.

HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN LIVING THERE? Three and a half years.

[ INTERNATIONAL PROFILE | REGULARS ]

HOW HAS YOUR CA(SA) QUALIFICATION BENEFITED YOUR CAREER?As a CA(SA) my qualification is recognised internationally, which opens up many opportunities.

AN INTERESTING LESSON YOU HAVE LEARNED IN BERLIN?I have learned to be more flexible as I do not only have to comply with IFRS for group reporting but also with local GAAP in many countries.

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE CHALLENGES YOU HAVE ENCOUNTERED IN BERLIN?The language has definitely been the biggest challenge.

IS THERE A COMMUNITY OF SOUTH AFRICANS LIVING IN BERLIN?Yes, there is a small community of South Africans here and throughout Germany. We get together from time to time for a braai.

WHAT DO PEOPLE DO IN BERLIN TO RELAX AND ENJOY THEIR FREE TIME?Berlin comes alive in summer and everyone spends as much time outside as possible whether it’s relaxing in a park or swimming in one of the many lakes around the city.

WHAT IS THE QUALITY OF LIVING LIKE IN BERLIN?Berlin is described as poor but sexy. Evidence of the division is still visible in the architecture around the city, but most flats have been renovated internally over the last 10 years. It is a very family- and pet-friendly city with a lot of communal spaces. The transport system is one of the best in Europe and it runs 24 hours a day.

WHAT DO YOU MISS MOST ABOUT SOUTH AFRICA?The Bush …

WHAT DOES A SOUTH AFRICAN EARN IN BERLIN?€40 000 – €70 000. The tax system has different rates based on the social situation, including marital status and number of children.

WHAT IS THE COST OF LIVING – RENT, FOOD, ELECTRICITY, WATER, GASOLINE, ENTERTAINMENT, ETC? Rental prices have increased significantly over the last few years due to the increasing popularity of the city. A two-bedroom flat is about €800 a month but food and entertainment prices are fairly low compared to most European cities.

Apartment prices start at about €150 000 and you can buy a new car for €6 000.

BASED ON THESE FACTORS, CAN A SOUTH AFRICAN GO TO BERLIN TO SAVE MONEY OR IS IT DIFFICULT BECAUSE OF THE COST OF LIVING?It is definitely possible. Although the salaries are lower than in other parts of Germany, the cost of living is a lot lower, too.


Being based in Berlin, Stephanie Davis works with a number of regions. In the process, she has learned there are many ways to achieve the same goal.

One just needs to be open to experimenting and embracing new ideas and be sensitive to cultural differences.

YOUR CURRENT JOB TITLE AND NAME OF THE COMPANY YOU’RE WORKING FOR?Team Specialist Financial Reporting – Iberia, Turkey and Emerging Markets at BASF.

BERLIN IS DESCRIBED AS POOR BUT SEXY. EVIDENCE OF THE DIVISION IS STILL VISIBLE IN THE ARCHITECTURE AROUND THE CITY, BUT MOST FLATS HAVE BEEN RENOVATED INTERNALLY OVER THE LAST 10 YEARS

Stephanie Davis says international experience has changed her whole approach to tackling her many tasks.



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BUSINESS ADVISORKEVIN PHILLIPS CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/KP_07_17 CEO of IDU Group

LOCKDOWN TIME THIEVES

In my May article I suggested that one of the biggest challenges to innovation and business progress is simply finding the time to think, research, experiment and develop new ideas.

The notion of carving out 20% time, à la Google, is a pipe dream for most. So I thought it would be interesting to figure out what is keeping finance people so busy.

To do this we held a snap survey of finance managers and administrators across a range of industries to find out what takes up their time, preventing them creating space for strategic review thinking.

The top three time thieves at budget/forecast time were investigations or enquiries from source, incomplete or incorrect data, and manual processes, while the top three time thieves at month-end reporting time were report compilation, manual processes, and investigations or enquiries from source. The top three time thieves at other times were ad hoc reporting requests, firefighting, and other ad hoc information requests.

Interestingly, but perhaps unsurprisingly, there was no single time thief, which perhaps points to the complexity of the real world today, plus shows that there is not a silver bullet solution – companies need a fix that comprehensively tackles a web of challenges.

Alarmingly, manual processes ranked in the top three for both budget/forecast time and during month-end reporting. Automation of these processes is the key not only to freeing up time in its own right, but it also results in timely, accurate data that you can confidently use for decision-making. In addition automation is the cornerstone for further innovation and new ways of working.

What’s more, it looks like too much time is being spent on report compilation. This is a red flag because if you are spending your time compiling reports, you are not spending it analysing the information therein!

Ad hoc reporting, information requests and firefighting also rank highly, though probably more understandably and, unfortunately, this is not an easy challenge to master. However, ad hoc reporting requests, in particular, are indicative of an un-empowered business that relies too heavily on finance to deliver and explain anything with a number in it. Consider how much time would be created by empowering the non-financial user through removing the frivolous queries, and freeing time for review and analysis.

The survey, though brief, did re-iterate that the key challenges we all face have not changed over the years. However, if we continue the status quo and fail to innovate, our relevance to the business will reduce and the spectre of robot replacement will become a reality.

We are the principal architects of our own reality so it is time to start shaping our future!

[ VIEWPOINTS | REGULARS ]

PUBLIC SPEAKING TRAINERDINESHRIE PILLAY CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/DP_07_17 Business Owner and Public Speaking Trainer

• Arrive early. This helps to orientate you with your surroundings and the protocols.

• Remember you are the expert. This is your topic, so be confident in your ability.

• Have respect. Never talk down to the audience or a caller-in – you have a personal brand to protect.

• Avoid overselling but provide useful information. Re-read the release or pitch that got you the booking, since the host will use that as a starting point.

• Write a thank-you note to the interviewer. Few people do this, so you will stand out if you do!

TV AND RADIO INTERVIEW TIPS

Your moment has arrived and you’ve been invited as an expert guest onfor television or radio. Below is a list of tips to help you uplift your brand and spread your message.

COMMON TO BOTH RADIO AND TELEVISION INTERVIEWSRelax and focus on having a conversation with your interviewer. Forget that there are many people listening to you. Answer the question that you are asked and not the one that you were expecting to be asked.

When you speak, use simple words that are free of jargon, acronyms or technical terminology. Be informative and entertaining without directly pushing your book, product or service. Make a mental note of the interviewer’s name and make sure that you use it throughout the interview.

Practise the response to the questions before your interview. Know your time allocation, which can be anything from 30 seconds to three minutes and more. Tailor your answers to the allotted time. Try not to over think your response – do frame your response and answer quickly to give the impression that you are honest and sincere. Avoid answering by saying ‘That is a good question’. This wastes time – get straight to the answer.

If the interviewer has made a mistake with your name or your product, don’t correct them directly. Instead, include in your next statement the correct pronunciation or use of terminology.

Conduct some research on the show and the interviewer. Determine if you are speaking to a local or national audience. Find out about the different formats that the show will be using - such as live streaming. Tailor your message accordingly.

Speak with enthusiasm and energy. Smile: this softens your facial expressions and makes you sound more relatable.

SPECIFIC TO TELEVISION INTERVIEWSWear simple, plain colours. Avoid wearing excessive jewellery and distracting clothing like pin stripes, or checked and fancy patterns. Make sure that you conduct a full top-to-toe analysis to ensure that everything from your hair to your polished shoes isare in place – you never know which camera angle will be used. The camera lights make you look lighter and make-up assists in adjusting your look to more of your natural tone – so do wear make-up.

SPECIFIC TO RADIO INTERVIEWSRadio interviews require verbal responses. Avoid nodding your head or using hand gestures. Have water on hand if you need to sip on it between your questions. Use the ‘cough’ button if needed. Once you are in front of a microphone you may be recorded at any time. Stay focused on the interviewer to start the interview. Before your interview, ask the producer for a copy of your radio interview – you can be provided with this on your way out.

MORE TIPS


• There’s no silver bullet for a complex challenge.

• Automate, automate, automate – the tools to do so are out there.

• If reports are taking up too much time, how can the data be timely?

• Empowering the business will redefine our function from bean counting to strategic analyst.

• The pace of change is only going to speed up, so start today.

• We are the principal architects of our own reality, so it’s time to start shaping our future!

UNBUSY YOUR DAYS



• Read widely and understand the ratings as part of your decision-making framework.

• Choose investments that meet your benchmarks for both returns and volatility over agreed time horizons.

• Use experts to construct a balanced investment portfolio, selecting the right asset classes and best of breed managers in the right combination, and then to assess and monitor delivery against your benchmarks.

There’s no point in choosing the winning fund if it doesn’t meet your objectives.

AWARDS ANDEXCELLENCE

We all love awards. We love the pomp and ceremony. We love the recognition by our peers. We love being able to provide our clients with that independent and expert assessment of our excellence in investments. But should we rely on them?

Many of us will have heard of our local awards through the media or marketing. But do we know what they represent in terms of investment excellence? Some of the more prominent awards are the following.

RAGING BULL AWARDS ‘Eight awards are given to the top-performing funds in the unit trust sectors that attract the most money from investors; these funds include foreign-domiciled funds that have been approved by the Financial Services Board (FSB) as suitable for South African investors.

‘Four of these eight awards are made on the basis of outright (straight) performance over the past three years; the other four awards are made on the basis of risk-adjusted performance as measured by the PlexCrown ratings, which take into account the consistency of performance over periods up to five years.‘The most coveted award, for the South African Management Company of the Year, is made on the basis of an average PlexCrown rating that measures risk-adjusted returns and consistency of performance across all of a manager’s qualifying funds for periods up to five years.’

MORNINGSTAR AWARDS‘The annual Morningstar South Africa Fund Awards recognise funds and fund houses that added the most value for investors within the context of their relevant peer group in 2016 and over longer time periods.

‘Morningstar selects the finalists using a quantitative methodology with a qualitative overlay that considers the one-, three-, and five-year performance history of all eligible funds, and adjusts returns for risk using Morningstar Risk, a measure that imposes a higher penalty for downside variation in a fund’s return than it does for upside volatility.’

DO YOU RELY ON THE AWARDS?There is no doubt that the expertise and sophistication in research and methodology provide a strong case to understand the awards, as well as what they mean in the selection of your investment managers. Persistency, quality and long-term objectives are increasingly important.

The S&P Dow Jones Persistence Scorecard (June 2014) states: ‘An inverse relationship exists between the measurement time horizon and the ability of top-performing funds to maintain their status. It is worth noting that no large-cap or mid-cap funds managed to remain in the top quartile at the end of the five-year measurement period.’

WEALTH ADVISORMIKE LLEDO CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/ML_07_17 Mike Lledo is an Associate of Citadel Investment Services

WHAT SHOULD YOU DO?

[ VIEWPOINTS | REGULARS ]

LEADERSHIP ADVISORGUGU MTETWA CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/GM_07_17 Non-Executive Director

• Play to your strengths – and thereafter surround yourself with a team that complements you.

• Know your playing field – knowing and understanding your environment drives how and to what extent you will excel.

• Balance striving for perfection at the cost of non-delivery. Know when great is good enough.

• ‘We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit’ –Aristotle.

COMMITMENTTO EXCELLENCE

TI remember that when I was a manager, I once drafted a two-page report on findings of a small assignment. The client was relatively small, with a very tight budget. I was an inexperienced manager at the time. After drafting the report,

the director made some corrections to my report. I corrected the report and took it back for re-review and sign-off. The director made further corrections (because I had only made the necessary corrections without re-reviewing the entire report).

After the fifth reiteration of the report I learned the lesson that no matter the size of the assignment or of the budget, excellence is the minimum standard because excellence represents you and what you do. From then onwards what I did had to be as excellent as I knew how irrespective of any recognition.

Excellence is a combination of our talent, passion and discipline.

TALENT AND PASSION All of us are good at something. It’s up to us to find what it is that we are good at. Self-esteem is built on focusing on and spending your energy on the positive attributes in you … focusing on what you are talented in.

Like a magnifying glass, if you focus on something you enlarge your perspective of it. Similarly, if you focus more on your strengths (your natural gifts) you boost your self-esteem. Nurture your strengths and enhance them by seeking opportunities to excel using these talents.

At the same time having a natural interest and passion for what you do not only motivates you but drives you to deliver excellence. Aligning your talents and interests leads to attaining excellence easier.

BEING DISCIPLINEDExcellence is putting in the hours and working smart. In the book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell presents a case that it takes 10 000 hours of practice to become an expert at something. Any gift is raw talent and putting in the effort to enhance it takes discipline. Discipline means making a personal sacrifice in your life, and one of the most costly sacrifices we can make is time.

WHY SHOULD YOU BE EXCELLENT?Excellence aces mediocrity. Excellence is your brand and is what you stand for. It demonstrates the value you bring to the table, and makes others take you seriously. It distinguishes you from your peers and may lead to more opportunities for you in future. Excellence makes it easier for you to attain what you are due.

‘The world never gives you permission to shine,’ as Marianne Williamson once said. In other words, you need to give yourself permission to shine by being excellent. 18 July is Nelson Mandela Day; let us continue to strive to lead with excellence as he did.


LEADERSHIP EXCELLENCE


PERSONAL FINANCE ADVISORGIZELLE WILLOWS CA(SA)

http://bit.ly/GW_07_17

DEBILITATING INFLATION

In the May 2017 issue of ASA, I wrote an article on the power of compounding, the inspiration for this being my recent exposure to retirement modelling. As mentioned, those models are wrought with

assumptions, and one of those assumptions is inflation.The importance in understanding inflation and its debilitating effects

should encourage us to always ensure that our investments are outperforming it. To test yourself, imagine an investment banker said the following to you: ‘If you invest R30 000 today, your investment will double in value in 10 years’ time! It will be worth just over R60 000.’ Is your initial reaction that it sounds like an attractive investment plan? It isn’t. It’s merely grown by 6% every year for 10 years (see the power of compounding again?). Therefore, you have exactly the same amount of money (or less, read further) as you did at the start of the investment. No growth in purchasing power whatsoever.

What you’re hopefully seeing from this example is that the time value of money is a b**ch! It erodes purchasing power and is difficult to spot, because we’re focused on absolute rand amounts. You don’t need a fancy financial calculator to work out these numbers, though. Get in the habit of thinking in terms of percentage growth rather than absolute numbers. And compare that percentage growth to current inflation levels.

The South African Reserve Bank’s target is to remain within an inflationary band of between 3% and 6%. Despite these targets, CPI averaged 6,4% for the 2016 calendar year, reaching a high of 6,8% in December 2016. And if local interest rates are not increased, there may be no alternative but to allow inflation to increase even further.

So what inflation number should you be comparing your investment returns to? Inflation on a standard basket of goods seems to be in the range of 7%. But do you live your life to a standard basket of goods?

Statistics South Africa has released some interesting stats which show the breakdown of inflation amongst 12 broad groups such as food, clothing, and transport. Specific inflation for food and non-alcoholic beverages was 11,7% at the end of 2016. Within that, sugar, sweets and desserts increased by 21,3% and fruit by 19,2%. The cost of vehicle purchases increased by 9,2%. If these items are starting to sound like the ones sitting in your basket of goods, it would appear that your personal inflation is higher than CPI.

So with all this in mind, be cognisant of what your personal inflation is. And when considering investments, or looking at your historical returns, critically assess whether your wealth is increasing in real terms, or whether you’re merely keeping up with inflation … or worse …

The region you live in might give you some clues as to what you are spending your money on (and therefore help you assess your own personal inflation). In Gauteng, 25,8% of total household expenditure flows into housing and services, compared to 16,7% in the Northern Cape. However, the Northern Cape spends 20,8% of its household expenditure on transport, compared to KwaZulu-Natal that only spends 13,2%. Limpopo spends 24,9% on food and non-alcoholic beverages with the Western Cape spending 17,8%. And while Gauteng only spends 2,6% of its household expenditure on restaurant and hotels, the Free State spends 7%.

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36 www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017 37JULY 2017www.accountancysa.org.za

[ THOUGHT LEADERSHIP | REGULARS ]

HEDGE FUNDS THE CHARACTERISTICS OF SUCCESS

governing, inter alia, hedge fund operations, marketing and investor protection. there are now two types of regulated hedge funds: retail investor hedge funds (RIHFs) and qualified investor hedge funds (QIHFs), allowing hedge fund managers to access a much wider investor base.

While investment performance is clearly essential for the success of a hedge fund and growth in assets under management, the rapidly evolving demands of a sophisticated investor population are making it increasingly difficult for performance to shelter any shortcomings in other areas –

particularly over the long term. To look at how hedge funds

address this challenge, EY, together with the Alternative Investment Management Association (AIMA), recently published a research report, ‘Traits of success: What hedge fund managers think it takes to succeed’, aimed at identifying the characteristics and behaviours that contribute to successful hedge funds. The report found that although hedge fund managers have different opinions of what success means, it was quite clear that they all share similar views on what ultimately drives their success.

The adaptability of the hedge fund industry is one of its key strengths and in a world of increased regulation, empowered investors and global choice, the successful hedge fund manager needs to sustain this track record of innovation to meet the needs of tomorrow’s clients

AUTHORS: Anthony Cadman, Africa Hedge Fund Services leader at EY with Nailah Limbada and Izaan van As, Africa Hedge Fund Services specialists at EY

Hedge funds have existed in a number of different forms for much of the past 100

years, although they have gained significant popularity in the 21st century. In South Africa, hedge funds – accessed through word of mouth and private arrangements – have previously been unregulated and the sector remains small, with assets under management at less than 5% of those invested in more traditional collective investment schemes.

This has changed in recent years with the introduction of Board Notice 52, which came into effect in 2015, introducing regulations


[ REGULARS | THOUGHT LEADERSHIP ]

MANAGING PEOPLE AND CULTUREA strong and distinctive culture is increasingly important to the success and longevity of a firm, as well as adaptable leadership and the right blend of people. In the report, one of the managers interviewed describes culture as something that needs to live and breathe and come from the top, as the firm grows and augments over time. Recruiting the right staff is therefore seen as vital for any hedge fund and some managers even admit to putting job candidates through up to 10 stages of interviews. Once on board, the challenge then lies in retaining the right people as low employee turnover speaks about the stability of the manager’s operations. That being said, while employee turnover can play a key role in investor confidence, its impact will depend on the seniority or specific expertise held by a given individual, and in some cases a degree of turnover can be seen as helpful in maintaining the high performance of an investment team.

Unsurprisingly, there is widespread consensus that underperforming employees can be damaging to culture, reputation and performance, and cannot be ignored. However many managers see disruptive employee personalities in their firm as a greater threat. Clearly even the most talented individuals, if disruptive, have the potential to damage the culture of the firm if not dealt with immediately.

MANAGING THE INFRASTRUCTUREContinuously improving investment performance remains pivotal to any hedge fund, but a firm’s operational infrastructure is a core enabler of success. In today’s regulatory climate, a firm’s operational

credibility could make or break it and managers confirm that there is little to no tolerance for hedge fund firms that try to operate without a robust operational framework in place.

In South Africa, the typical hedge fund manager outsources the majority of back office functions. This allows managers to focus on and prioritise ‘core’ activities and is scalable – allowing the managers to grow without the need to reinvent back office systems and processes. However, it is imperative that appropriate supervision of outsourced activities be maintained and that responsibilities and reporting lines be clearly defined. At the end of the day, responsibility for managing the risks associated with outsourcing remains that of the manager.

MANAGING INVESTOR RELATIONSHIPSInvestment managers should not underestimate the value of communication and transparency in delivering excellent client

service. Setting realistic expectations upfront, without over-promising, is the foundation of a sound relationship between investor and fund manager. At times this will mean delivering bad news, but consistency is seen as crucial, and reassuring the fund’s existing investors is just as important as attracting them. One manager we interviewed pointed out that very few people get into trouble for over-communicating, but many get into trouble for under-communicating.

Perhaps counter-intuitively, successful hedge fund managers also find value in conducting due diligence on investors and not just the other way around. Choosing an investor is essential in ensuring that hedge fund managers and investors share common goals and that their interests are aligned, consistency of objectives makes for a more productive and long-lived relationship.

While success means different things to different firms, depending on lifecycle stages, strategies and chosen markets, it is clear that hedge fund managers see a similar range of factors as crucial to their success. Many of these factors are interlinked, for example firms with the right culture have an easier time recruiting the right people, helping them give the investors the right experience.

Visit https://go.ey.com/2kBmUfs to read the full report

NOTE

This material has been prepared for general informational purposes only and is not intended to be relied upon as accounting, tax, or other professional advice. Please refer to your advisers for specific advice.

WHILE EMPLOYEE TURNOVER CAN PLAY A KEY ROLE IN INVESTOR CONFIDENCE, ITS IMPACT WILL DEPEND ON THE SENIORITY OR SPECIFIC EXPERTISE HELD BY A GIVEN INDIVIDUAL, AND IN SOME CASES A DEGREE OF TURNOVER CAN BE SEEN AS HELPFUL IN MAINTAINING THE HIGH PERFORMANCE OF AN INVESTMENT TEAM

[ 30 MIN CPD | ANALYSIS ]

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PARIS AGREEMENT

There has been tremendous progress in South Africa in responding to the Paris

Agreement on climate change that was the key output of the Conference of Parties (COP21) held in Paris in 2015. The commitment to the agreement by South Africa has resulted in the country now needing to achieve a 42% reduction of its carbon emissions over ‘business as usual’ by 2025.

The agreement is a treaty under international law, but only certain provisions are legally binding, namely those expressed as ‘shall’. The COP21 decision takes

effect immediately and serves to ‘get the ball rolling’ by clarifying the implementation details of the agreement as well as the actions and/or processes that need to be implemented prior to the Agreement taking effect. The agreement will only enter into force when the following two conditions have been satisfied: The agreement is ratified by 55 parties to the Convention, which account for at least 55% of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

The agreement was founded upon a broad base of principles, the most fundamental of which is its grounding in the broader

sustainability context – a common concern for humankind. The agreement recognises that climate change represents an urgent and potentially irreversible threat to human societies and that the widest possible cooperation by all countries is required to mobilise stronger and more ambitious climate action in order to accelerate the reduction of GHG emissions. Key to the agreement is the principle of equity and common, but differentiated, responsibilities. This principle applies to the differing requirements placed on developed and developing country parties.

South Africa’s commitment to the Paris Agreement on climate change will require collaboration between government and business to achieve its stated carbon reduction goals

AUTHOR: Jeremy Grist CA(SA) is an independent consultant


40 www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017 41JULY 201740 www.accountancysa.org.za www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017

[ ANALYSIS | CPD 30 MIN ] [ 30 MIN CPD | ANALYSIS ]

sustainable economic development; improve basic education, health and social welfare; and enable access to food, shelter and modern energy services.

The NCCRP is quite clear that any mitigation and/or adaptation activities need to consider the above four priorities in the implementation of various programmes and projects.

The adaptation goals include:• Develop a National

Adaptation Plan and begin operationalisation as part of the NCCRP for the period through to 2030.

• Take into account climate considerations in national development, sub-national and sector policy frameworks through to 2030.

• Build the necessary institutional capacity for climate change response planning and implementation through to 2030.

• Develop an early warning, vulnerability and adaptation monitoring system for key climate vulnerable sectors and geographic areas through to 2030 and reporting of the National Adaptation Plan with rolling five-year implementation periods.

• Develop a vulnerability assessment and adaptation needs framework by 2020 to support a continuous presentation of adaptation needs.

• Communicate past investments in adaptation for education and awareness as well as for international recognition.

The mitigation goals include:• The principle that the country

will shift from a ‘deviation from business-as-normal’ commitment to a ‘peak, plateau and decline GHG emissions trajectory’.

• Time frames for the implementation of policy instruments under development that include a carbon tax, desired emission reduction outcomes (DEROs), company-level carbon budgets, as well as regulatory standards and controls for specifically identified GHG pollutants and emitters.

• The scope and coverage that will be economy wide for all sectors and with a material focus on three GHGs: carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide. The major categories identified include: energy; industrial processes and production (IPPU); waste; and AFOLU (agriculture, forestry and other land use).

• Planning processes, assumptions and methodologies based on the national climate policy (NCCRP) and the National Development Plan (NDP) and will be given effect to through energy, industrial and other plans and legislation.

• Determining that the South African contribution is an ambitious and fair effort to carbon reduction with a focus on ensuring that it takes into account the national context.

The Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA) issued three draft regulations relating to the implementation of the carbon reporting requirements. These include the regulation relating to the guidelines on how to compute and report on carbon emissions, the six gases and 15 processes that are required to be reported on (pollution prevention plans to be submitted to the DEA) and the carbon offset regulation.

The National Treasury also issued the draft carbon tax bill

that provides the approach for the levying of a carbon tax.

In response to these new regulations affected companies have been submitting pollution prevention plans for approval by the DEA.

These plans will enable the company to receive a carbon budget allowance. The plans will give the company and the DEA more certainty on where the carbon reductions will come from. However, it is essential that all companies begin the process of ensuring that they are able to report accurate carbon emission numbers because of the likely implementation of the carbon tax.

The overriding principles that form the basis for South Africa’s commitment to reducing global carbon emissions of equity, responsibility, capability and sustainable development are central to all activities being undertaken now and into the future. It is also recognised that those developed countries responsible for the creation of the current global emissions levels have a responsibility to assist those developing countries who have the task of contributing to the global reduction of emissions through providing climate finance and other technological expertise in order for them to achieve their country reduction commitments.

The long-term goals of the agreement are:• Holding temperature increases

to ‘well below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels’ and further pursuing efforts to limit temperature increases to 1,5 °C above pre-industrial levels.

• Increasing countries’ ability to adapt to the effects of climate change and to foster climate resilience.

• Encouraging low GHG emissions development that does not compromise food production.

• Making finance flows consistent with a pathway towards low GHG emissions and climate resilient development.

• Reaching a peak in GHG emissions ‘as soon as possible’ while recognising that the timeframes for achieving this will differ between developed and developing countries.

• Achieving carbon neutrality from 2050 onwards.

The key outcomes that arise from the agreement are:• Intended Nationally Determined

Contributions (INDCs): INDCs are public declarations in which countries outline their commitment to reduce their GHG emissions as well as the climate actions they intend to implement. The agreement establishes binding commitments to make INDCs and to pursue domestic measures aimed at achieving them. All parties are required to review and submit new INDCs every five years, with the clear expectation that the new INDCs will represent a progression beyond previous ones.

• Developed versus developing countries: The agreement ends the strict differentiation between developed and developing

country parties; establishing a common framework that commits all parties to put forward their best efforts and to strengthen those efforts in the years ahead. However, developed country parties are required to support the efforts of developing country parties, particularly through the provision of ‘climate finance’. Developing country parties are encouraged to make voluntary financial contributions to support other developing country parties.

• Commitment to finance: The agreement extends the current goal of mobilising $100 billion per year through to 2025. A new, higher goal is to be set for the period after 2025. The contribution towards this goal by developed country parties is binding while the contribution by developing countries is voluntary. The finance will primarily be used to enhance the implementation of policies, strategies, regulations, action plans, and mitigation and adaptation climate change actions in developing countries.

• Transparency and accountability: With the establishment of a transparency framework (to be negotiated in 2018), it is evident that reporting and accountability are important components of the agreement. Although parties are not legally bound to achieving their stated INDCs, the agreement commits all parties to reporting regularly on their emissions and progress made towards achieving their INDCs. Parties will be required to submit reports at least every two years. Additionally, the INDC progress and reporting of all Parties will be subject to an expert review. The first global stocktake will take

place in 2018 and the five-year measuring and reporting cycle will start in 2020. The purpose of the global stocktake is to assess the collective progress towards meeting the goals of the agreement.

South Africa submitted their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) on 25 September 2015. The commitment made is that South Africa’s emissions by 2025 and 2030 will be in a range of between 398 and 614 MT CO2e. Achieving this will require collaboration between national government, local government and business. South Africa’s response is guided by to objectives outlined in the National Climate Change Response White Paper (NCCRP) issued in 2011. The objectives that will guide the country include:• To effectively manage inevitable

climate change impacts through interventions that build and sustain South Africa’s social, economic and environmental resilience and emergency response capacity.

• To make a fair contribution to the global effort to stabilise greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that avoids dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system within a timeframe that enables economic, social and environmental development to proceed in a sustainable manner.

The strategy to deliver on these two objectives is contained in the INDCs. They also recognise the need to ensure that any strategy has to respond to the priorities in South Africa of eliminating poverty and inequality; creating decent employment which leads to

AFFECTED COMPANIES HAVE BEEN SUBMITTING POLLUTION PREVENTION PLANS FOR APPROVAL BY THE DEA

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[ ANALYSIS | CPD 30 MIN ] [ 30 MIN CPD | ANALYSIS ]

IAASB IN SA UPDATE ON ENHANCING AUDIT

QUALITY PROJECTS

The objective of the IAASB, being an international independent standard-

setting body, is to serve the public interest by setting high-quality international standards for auditing, assurance, and other related areas, thereby enhancing consistency and quality of these services provided by the accountancy profession throughout the world. This then translates into the continued relevance and value of auditing, assurance and related services, and confidence of users in the profession.

In line with the strategic objective of the IAASB to develop

and maintain high-quality audits, the priority projects that are currently under way include the revision of the following standards:• ISA 540, Auditing Accounting

Estimates, Including Fair Value Accounting Estimates, and Related Disclosures (ISA 540)

• ISA 315 (Revised), Identifying and Assessing the Risks of Material Misstatement through Understanding the Entity and Its Environment (ISA 315 (Revised))

• Quality Control Standards, including ISQC 1, Quality Control for Firms that

Perform Audits and Reviews of Financial Statements and Other Assurance and Related Service Engagements and ISA 220, Quality Control for an Audit of Financial Statements (Quality Control Standards), and

• ISA 600, Special Considerations – Audits of Group Financial Statements (Including the Work of Component Auditors) (ISA 600) The question that comes to mind is why these specific projects have been identified and how do they relate to the broader focus on enhancing

audit quality. Based on the first-hand feedback received, the reasons cited for this were clarified, as follows.

ISA 540, AUDITING ACCOUNTING ESTIMATES, INCLUDING FAIR VALUE ACCOUNTING ESTIMATES, AND RELATED DISCLOSURESAccounting estimates are an integral part of the financial reporting process and as such, it would be unlikely that ISA 540 would not feature in the audit of a set of financial statements. This project started with a focus on the issues relating to the audit of financial institutions in the context of the pending effective date of IFRS 9, Financial Instruments (IFRS 9); and more particularly the new approach to the recognition, measurement, and disclosure of loan loss provisions.

As this project progressed, it became evident that the difficulties being experienced in practice were not unique to IFRS 9 and financial institutions; it was much broader than this. The issues relating to complexities of accounting estimates; the nature of judgement involved; the extent of management judgement; including the level of subjectivity and estimation uncertainty were prevalent in other areas, such as revenue, leasing, tangible and intangible assets, insurance contracts, etc. It was then decided that this project should not be approached as a quick fix in response to IFRS 9 and a review of the standard as a whole should be performed in addressing all the relevant issues that are being experienced by auditors in auditing accounting estimates of different nature and complexity.

A project update was issued in March 2016 and more recently, the exposure draft of the revised ISA 540 was issued; with a comment

deadline of 1 August 2017. The IAASB have applied a different approach in revising this standard, including the introduction of a scalability model; recognising the vast spectrum of applicable accounting estimates and the challenges in drafting a standard that caters for all possibilities.

The specific focus on the scalability of standards is also a clear indication that the IAASB is conscious of the needs of small and medium practices, as well as the application of its standards in the audit of smaller entities.

ISA 315 (REVISED), IDENTIFYING AND ASSESSING THE RISKS OF MATERIAL MISSTATEMENT THROUGH UNDERSTANDING THE ENTITY AND ITS ENVIRONMENTAs part of the clarified ISAs' post-implementation review, one of the standards that emerged with the biggest challenges and in-practice issues was ISA 315 (Revised). ISA 315 (Revised) is foundational to the audit in that it drives the work effort of the auditor; yet there seems to be a gap between the planning, including the risk assessment performed in identifying and assessing the risks of material misstatement of the financial statements and the further audit procedures that are ultimately performed. At this point, this appears to be an implementation issue rather than a problem that needs to corrected in the standard. The IAASB may therefore consider other avenues that can provide implementation guidance.

Other issues relating to ISA 315 (Revised) that the IAASB are currently grappling with include:• In terms of ISA 315 (Revised),

the auditor performs all this work to understand the entity and its environment but what does the auditor actually

do with all this information and how does this then feed into the identification and assessment of risk.

• Qualitative risk factors. This concept emerged as part of the ISA 540 project and the IAASB are considering this concept in revising ISA 315 (Revised). The crux of the concept of qualitative risk factors is that the auditor creates an expectation of where there could be risks of material misstatement based on qualitative risk factors, such as complex areas; areas where there is ambiguity; areas open to interpretation; areas where there has been change or areas where there is uncertainty. These expectations are then either confirmed, or rejected based on the planning performed.

• Strengthening the link between the auditors understanding of the entity and its environment and the risk assessment. This goes back to the concept of the auditor creating an expectation about where the risks of material misstatements could be, based on an understanding of the financial reporting framework and taking into account qualitative risk factors.

• The concept of internal controls relevant to the audit and the meaning of this.

• The concept of significant risk, the approach to the identification of significant risks and the sufficiency of the response to risks other than significant risks; introducing the concept of a ‘spectrum of risk’, as opposed to a primary distinction between significant risks and not-significant risks.

SAICA recently hosted representatives from the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB) and received first-hand feedback on their work relating to quality control and related projects, with touchpoints regarding audit quality and how this is set to affect practice going forward

AUTHOR: Hayley Barker Hoogwerf is Project Director: Assurance at SAICA


[ ANALYSIS | CPD 30 MIN ]

QUALITY CONTROL STANDARDS, INCLUDING ISQC 1, QUALITY CONTROL FOR FIRMS THAT PERFORM AUDITS AND REVIEWS OF FINANCIAL STATEMENTS AND OTHER ASSURANCE AND RELATED SERVICE ENGAGEMENTS AND ISA 220, QUALITY CONTROL FOR AN AUDIT OF FINANCIAL STATEMENTS In December 2015, the IAASB released their Invitation to Comment, Enhancing Audit Quality in the Public Interest: A Focus on Professional Skepticism, Quality Control, and Group Audits (ITC). Based on the feedback received from the ITC, it was found, among other matters, that the current ISQC 1 does not have a central theme common to all the requirements; it is hard to scale; it is overwhelming for smaller practitioners, particularly where the practices is not audit related or where the client base consists of smaller type entities where the complexities of ISQC 1 do not seem to be appropriate.

In the ITC, the concept of a quality management approach (QMA) to quality control was introduced; an approach based on the notion of the firm being more proactive in thinking about how to manage quality at the firm level, in the context of identifying and assessing its quality risks and implementing appropriate policies and procedures in response to the assessed quality risks. QMA also seems an opportunity for the IAASB to build the platform that would enable the drafting of a standard that is capable of being scaled. The IAASB are sensitive to not lose the robustness of the existing standard (that is, the key elements of a firm’s quality control system). It is therefore foreseen that the revised standard will also demonstrate how the firm would incorporate the existing elements contained in ISQC 1 into its quality management system (QMS).

With respect to quality control at the engagement level, in the initial review of ISA 220, the IAASB are

trying to drive the principle of a QMS down to the level of individual audit engagements. The engagement partner remains solely accountable and responsible for the QMS at the engagement level. The IAASB have also recognised that ISA 220 can drive a more proactive consideration of how/where things could go wrong with respect to quality at the engagement level. Therefore, deliberations are focused on how to make the current requirements contained in ISA 220 more adaptable to the specific characteristics of a given engagement and how the engagement partner is going to practically direct and supervise the engagement.

ISA 600, SPECIAL CONSIDERATIONS – AUDITS OF GROUP FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (INCLUDING THE WORK OF COMPONENT AUDITORS) ISA 600 is seen to be a useful standard in that it helps firms in developing audit methodologies in relation to group audits, including dealing with components and the work of component auditors, and designing a group audit approach; thinking about the significance of the components, etc. However, ISA 600 also contains gaps in that auditors are required to incorporate foundational concepts that are not addressed in the standard into the audit methodologies, including the consideration of challenges/risks that face the audit, such as:• Where there is one significant

component and many much smaller components, how does the auditor deal with this?

• How does the auditor deal with the decentralised nature of the engagement?

• How does the auditor deal with the client’s use of shared services?

• What does the engagement partner do when they cannot gain access to a component auditor’s working paper?

Furthermore, there is not a clear understanding of how ISA 600 interfaces with ISA 220 and how the auditor really applies the principles of ISA 220 when dealing with another auditor.

The IAASB are cognisant of the fact that there is work to be done on ISA 600 and in the same way, they recognise that the project relating to the revision of the quality control standards needs to be advanced first in order to link the concept of a QMS to the special consideration contained in ISA 600.

IN CLOSINGThe IAASB’s project relating to the revision of ISQC 1, which is focused on the overall objective to enhance audit quality, is seen as the foundation to the completion of the other projects and is therefore receiving priority at this point.

The other projects, namely the revision of ISA 220, ISA 315 (Revised), ISA 540 and ISA 600, also all relate to the activities of the IAASB aimed at strengthening professional scepticism in enhancing audit quality. The areas relating to the firm’s QMS and professional scepticism are multifaceted, complex projects that need to be fed into the other projects and can therefore not be seen as once off, quick fix revisions to an isolated standard(s).

The standard-setting process is a lengthy, time-consuming exercise. It is further complicated by the evolving environment in which audits are being performed. However, in setting standards that followed a robust process, contain clear principles, requirements and application material, and are capable of being adapted to changing environments, the auditing and assurance profession will be placed in good stead in continuing to provide investors with confidence in the assurance process.

Investec Private Banking, a division of Investec Bank Limited registration number 1969/004763/06. Investec Private Banking is committed to the Code of Banking Practice as regulated by the Ombudsman for Banking Services. Copies of the Code and the Ombudsman’s details are available on request or visit www.investec.co.za. A registered credit provider registration number NCRCP9.

In partnership with SAICA, it gives us great pride to congratulatethe top 35 under-35 chartered accountants in South Africa.

The SAICA Top 35 under-35 competition recognises young men and women in the industry who have already achieved out of the ordinary results.

We wish all contestants the best of luck in the competition.To read more about these out of the ordinary individuals,visit www.accountancysa.org.za.

#MoreThanData

Data knows how far you’ve come, not how far you’ll go

Investec_CA_Print_Advert_4 (DTP) V6.indd 1 5/23/17 9:39 AM

46 www.accountancysa.org.za 47www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017 JULY 2017

Out of hundreds of entries, these 35 young CAs(SA) made the biggest impression and were selected as finalists. They are not afraid of challenges and are an inspiration to those around them.

They show the world that being a CA(SA) goes beyond just crunching numbers. The finalists will now be judged by a panel of high-profile business leaders, whereafter the category winners will be announced and finally the winner. Keep a look-out in future issues and visit www.accountancysa.org.za/35-under-35 for more information on these phenomenal finalists.

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THESE ARE THE GAME-CHANGERS, THE OUT OF THE ORDINARY UNDER 35 CAs(SA) FOR 2017

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TOP 35 UNDER thirty five2017 FINALISTS

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Lyle is positioning Laxton Group Limited as a global leader in providing high-technology, election, identity, and self-service solutions to governments and corporations. Flagship technologies include biometrics, cryptography and artificial intelligence. Lyle’s dynamic leadership has transformed Laxton from a one-man start-up into a market leader with revenues of $46 million in 2016. Annual sales are forecast to exceed $100 million.

In 2017 Laxton was awarded a $7,5 million contract to register 7 million Zimbabweans ahead of the 2018 national elections. This was followed in 2015 by a $40 million contract for instant issuance of identity cards in Tanzania. 23 million Tanzanians received identity cards within 90 days and voted in the 2015 national election in which John Magufuli was elected president. Other noteworthy achievements include a $6,5 million Malawi national ID contract, $6 million Guinea elections contract, $2,5 million Indonesia police contract and $3 million Colombia notary contract.

Laxton is headquartered in China with branches in the USA, South Africa, Colombia, Malawi, and Zimbabwe. Lyle heads up a team of more than 200 highly skilled employees. Laxton is regarded as one of the pioneering firms in its industry.

LYLE LAXTON (34), CEO OF LAXTON GROUP LIMITED

SURENE BEAGLY (32), MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTANT AT KHETH’IMPILO AIDS FREE LIVINGSurene has always dreamed of using her skills and expertise as a CA(SA) in the non-profit sector in South Africa. In the last four years, she has had the opportunity to do so in various roles.

Her current role has allowed her to move from a purely financial function to being closely involved in the daily operations of the NPO projects that she oversees.

In her previous role as finance director of an international NPO, Open Society

Foundation for South Africa, one of Surene’s first tasks was streamlining the full finance function and the development and implementation of financial policies and procedures in a short period of time.

In March 2017, Surene initiated the project Sponsor a Poncho to raise funds and purchase rain ponchos for 680 learners from a needy local primary school.

‘Using a flexible working arrangement to balance the demands of a young family, while still contributing to the NPO sector is a personal achievement that I treasure,’ she says.

DYLAN WUTH (35), DIRECTOR OF IKHWEZI FOODS T/A TRADESTAR Eleven years ago, post articles with Ernst and Young, Dylan headed to the UK and worked his way from back office associate to vice-president on the trading floor of a leading investment bank.

‘I am an entrepreneur at heart, and in 2011 I left the UK banking world to pursue my lifelong goal of owning, running and growing a business in South Africa. At this time I joined an FMCG business operating out of Ballito with grocery and liquor outlets in rural KZN,’ he says.

Over the last six years, Dylan has embarked on a steep learning curve to get to grips with a fiercely competitive market, and in doing so has managed to initiate changes to bring the business up to date from a technology and operating perspective. Since joining, the business has achieved high double-digit growth and currently employs over 240 people within the local Zululand communities.

KUBENDREN PILLAY (32), CFO AT TB/HIV CARE ASSOCIATIONAfter articles, Kubendren (Kuben) Pillay decided to leave the mainstream corporate to follow his passion of changing socio-economic imbalances facing South Africa. He has

since been actively involved in various high-impact

programmes ranging from addressing the issues facing

children to supporting projects that are aimed at eliminating the HIV/

Aids epidemic.

Kuben has built stakeholder confidence in the support service units – finance, procurement, IT and travel – of TB/HIV Care. Growing exponentially in a short space of time, it has become one of the biggest organisations funded by the President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (PEPFAR), with an annual budget growing from $10 million to over $50 million per annum and over 1 500 employees.

Kuben has successfully set up a grants and compliance unit to manage a variety of sub-recipients with a total of $26 million per annum. He was honoured to be a judge for the Youth Empowerment through Entrepreneurship Programme (YEEP).

COENRAAD STOKES (34), MANAGING PARTNER AT BERACA ACCOUNTANTS AND AUDITORS

Coen epitomises the modern young CA(SA) and his acquisition of Beraca Accountants and Auditors, a medium-sized public practice, is testimony to his go-getter spirit. He’s the only partner with 22 employees and more than 1 000 active clients.

Coen has been recognised by SARS regional offices and executives as one of the leading tax practitioners in Region 1 of SARS. His highlights include being nominated to represent SAICA on the SARS Region 1 Stakeholder Forum and being retained as a tax adviser for listed companies and subsidiaries of multinationals.

He has also established a tax discussion group in the SAICA Highveld District to empower tax practitioners in the district to improving their knowledge of the latest tax legislation and practice.

Coen has been approached to present workshops to heads of various rural schools in and around Secunda and Ermelo to improve their financial controls and performance, thus increasing the quality of education and nurture the leaders of tomorrow.



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Tyron Barnard is known to be an inspirational facilitator at KPMG. He was awarded the 2017 KPMG Europe, Middle East & Africa Facilitator of the Year in a region comprising more than 100 countries.

Tyron started the KPMG Spring School initiative in 2013 where KPMG hosts approximately 100 school teachers for one week a year offering free soft-skill training. The teachers are from largely underprivileged schools. Tyron has also voluntarily worked on the Unogwaja Challenge since 2013 in order to help empower education in South Africa.

Tyron established the KPMG Sports Leagues, an initiative that sees over 400 KPMG staff members compete against one another in four different sporting competitions. He is also an award-winning sports journalist and regularly features on radio and TV. He was recently selected as media officer for the SA indoor hockey sides for their World Cup qualifier in Namibia.

JONATHAN STRENG (34), SENIOR LECTURER AT UNIVERSITY OF

JOHANNESBURG

Jonathan currently lectures Accounting to CTA students. In this role, he contributes significantly to the Thuthuka repeat programme transformation initiative.

As a young student, he finished top in his class in Accounting and Finance in CTA, was placed in the Top 10 in the first board exam and holds a Master’s (cum laude) in International Accounting.

’The work I do as a reviewer on the JSE proactive monitoring panel ranks amongst the top highlights of my career. This truly exceptional process is making a phenomenal contribution to South Africa’s global dominance in the quality of financial reporting,’ he says.

Jonathan was recently appointed to the board of APT (Pty) Ltd, a SAICA-accredited professional programme provider. Since 2016, Jonathan has served as a judge for the prestigious CSSA Integrated Reporting Awards. His passion for innovation in education is evidenced by him being recently involved in an edu-tech start-up in the accounting education space during 2017.

ISMAIL ADAM (31), CFO AT SETSHABA RESEARCH CENTREIsmail Adam is more than just a CFO at this non-profit company in Soshanguve, which is responsible for medical research around HIV, TB and other diseases. Owing to the nature and size of the entity, Ismail plays many roles and wears many hats – including heading up the

IT department of the organisation. The financial management of the

organisation has improved significantly since Ismail has taken over the company.

The organisation’s goals are in line with the National Strategic Plan for HIV, TB and STIs 2017–2022. The company’s growth has been phenomenal and Ismail has been able to successfully implement good policies and procedures to manage this growth from a financial management and reporting perspective.

Ismail is also part of a steering committee that is considering expansion and setting up of another research centre in a much-needed part of the country. His efforts contribute towards global health improvement.

MONTAQUE SWANEPOEL (29), FOUNDER OF CFO360 Montaque is the founder of a modern accounting practice, CFO360. After completing his qualification, he spent a number of years in the corporate sector reaching the position of regional financial manager at Bidvest Steiner. In March 2016 he decided to take the leap of faith and venture out on his own.

CFO360 uses a variety of cloud-based technology solutions to simplify and improve the accounting, compliance and reporting for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), helping SMBs focus on what makes their businesses successful. Within 16 months, CFO360 has grown to a large and varied base of South African and international clients and a staff complement of 8.

SMBs make up 52% of the South African economy. With 9% of SMBs still using paper records and a further 31% running their finances on a spreadsheet, this is a sector where Montaque feels he and his company can have the biggest impact.

TYRON BARNARD (31), HEAD OF AUDIT TRAINING AT KPMG


ELTON PULLEN (33), SENIOR LECTURER AT UNIVERSITY OF THE WESTERN CAPE (UWC)As deputy section head, Elton is playing a leading role in transforming the Management Accounting and Finance (MAF) discipline within UWC’s Department of Accounting. He is regarded as an academic whose heart is exactly where it belongs, with his students, and has thus been nominated as Teacher of the Year in the Commerce Faculty for four of the five years that he has been employed at UWC. He is also the first staff member in the Department of Accounting to rise in the ranks from lecturer to senior lecturer in under three years.

Elton holds an MCom degree in Financial Management and is currently pursuing his PhD qualification.

His thesis ‘Factors that Impact on Performance in Advanced Management Accounting’ was presented at the 2015 Southern African Accounting Association International Conference. The results of the paper have allowed him to play a key role in a SAICA task team addressing the performance of candidates in MAF at ITC level.

FRANCOIS HERBST (30), MD OF HOUSE OF GROWTH (PTY) LTDFounder and managing director of the business advisory and consulting firm House of Growth, Francois is the strategic partner to as many as 12 small and medium-size entities. Serving on their boards, his key purpose is to ensure the companies prosperity by collectively directing the companies’ affairs and helping them identify and optimise their full growth potential.

Born with an entrepreneurial spirit, Francois has, through House of Growth, established 13 successful start-up entities over a wide range of industries, including retail, manufacture and construction.

He was recently instrumental in establishing a community upliftment project (Shift the Frame) in Hermanus, where 21 unemployed individuals are being taught the craft of carpentry. This SETA-accredited carpentry programme does not only provide the practical skills but is also a mentor programme. Francois is actively involved in mentoring, motivating and coaching these students in order to promote entrepreneurship, personal growth and self-worth.



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AYANDA KANANA (35), MANAGING EXECUTIVE AT METROPOLITAN TRADING COMPANY (SOC) LTDAyanda Kanana personifies dynamism and agility when it comes to his professional career and personal life. He is an individual with diverse interests who not only enjoys the thrills of a boardroom tackling strategy as a CEO but also loves farming as a hobby and challenge.

Ayanda qualified as a chartered accountant in 2008. He worked as a learning and audit manager, a combination of skills that eventually led him to develop learning content preparing Grade 12 pupils for the job market.

He launched the new #JoburgCA's Programme and is the first training officer for the City of Johannesburg – the first municipality in the country to be individually accredited by SAICA.

Ayanda is the youngest managing executive at the City of Johannesburg and has the mammoth task of managing 900 km of fibre network for the metro. He is also a farmer and his passion is breeding Dorper sheep.

JACOBUS DE NYSSCHEN (32), DIRECTOR AND CO-OWNER OF CREATIVE CFOJacobus is a South African-born entrepreneur and investor with a vision to grow SMEs into globally competitive businesses by creating a platform to manage and focus their creativity, energy and financial resources.

Jacobus evaluates strategic opportunities and aggressively tackles business issues ranging from market adoption and product development to hiring to fundraising. He believes that innovative solutions are an interconnected web of small problems solved brilliantly. He has navigated well over 200 SMEs to sustainable growth and raised over R35 million in financing for these businesses.

Creative CFO has four core pillars – systems, accounting, taxation, and investment – that allow businesses to plan, structure, invest and grow. It has offices in Cape Town, Stellenbosch and London with clients around the world – the UK, Hong Kong, Switzerland, UAE, Malta, Curaçao, Mauritius and the USA. Creative CFO currently employs 15 financial professionals of which six are CAs(SA).

LYLE MALANDER (29), DIRECTOR OF MALANDER INC, MALANDER PLACEMENTS AND MALANDER DIGITALMalander Inc is a chartered accounting and financial advisory firm of talented finance professionals. The company’s core focus is providing talented, temporary staffing and financial function outsourcing solutions to a variety of large listed clients.

‘To enhance our service offering to our clients, our specialist finance recruitment team, namely Malander Placements with branches in Johannesburg and Cape Town, provides a permanent recruitment

solution of talented finance professionals,’ says Lyle.

Malander Digital, which was launched recently, provides web development and IT outsourcing services. Lyle has also introduced the Malander Incubator to nurture small businesses run by individuals from previously disadvantaged backgrounds to help reduce the rate of unemployment in South Africa.

The Malander businesses currently employ 20 people, including 15 CAs(SA). They have completed many finance projects both locally and in Africa.

Lukhanyo Dabula is a seasoned social entrepreneur who launched Gamerz eXplosion in 2014. Through Gamerz eXplosion, he addresses social issues right from the root with its core design being on building relationships. In 2016, he won first place in Soweto Business Stars in the category of Technovator.

Using gamification, Lukhanyo catalyses young people from different races to go out into the world with greater confidence in the world of technology. He also partnered with the Ahmed

Kathrada Foundation and Gauteng Department of Sport, Arts, Culture and Recreation on a programme to drive social cohesion.

Concerned that over 60% of South African children grow up without their fathers, Lukhanyo sponsored the event ‘Every Day Can Be Father’s Day,’ which was attended by 600 people, including fathers and their children. Lukhanyo also serves on the Johannesburg Chamber of Commerce and Industry in the portfolio of Youth and Economic Development.

LUKHANYO DABULA (35), MD OF GAMERZ EXPLOSION

CLIFFORD MACK (33), HEAD OF STRATEGIC PROJECTS AT NEDBANK INSURANCEAt Nedbank, Clifford played an advisory and support role as an executive assistant (EA) to the Group Managing Executive for the Wealth cluster, with the responsibility of managing more than R1 billion worth of annual earnings. He has recently been promoted to the role of Head of Strategic Projects for Nedbank Insurance, one of the divisions of the Wealth cluster. ‘As an EA, I was able to shift my focus from being a “pure” accountant to more of a strategic thinker,’ he says.

In February 2017, Clifford was voted into the Insurance Institute of Gauteng Council by the short-term industry. Serving on the Transformation and Impact portfolio, his initial focus has been leading a skills transfer initiative called the Roots & Wings mentoring programme.

Clifford has complemented his CA(SA) qualification with an MBA from Warwick Business School, one of the Top 3 business schools in the UK. He is a co-founder of Supreme Brands, a leading toilet tissue manufacturing company in Zimbabwe.

LIAAN KRETZSCHMAR (34), CFO AT JAGUAR LAND ROVER SOUTH AFRICA & SUB-SAHARA AFRICALiaan was one ofonly six candidatesglobally who were selected in 2016 for Jaguar Land Rover’s high-performance training programme - and the only candidate based outside the UK.

In September 2016, Liaan was asked to present at the global Jaguar Land Rover Finance Director’s conference: “My presentation was aimed at sharing best practice with the rest of the financialdirectors in the group and give an insight into thework and improvements we have been doing inthe South African company.”

Despite exceptionally challenging macroeconomic conditions, Liaan has continued to meet JLR SA & SSA budgets and commitments to the group. In 2017/18, he is on track to deliver bottom-line growth and continues growing the business across SA & SSA.



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Damian’s eagerness to understand and learn the history of Kaytech and discover how he could add value to the operation has paid off. Being recognised as a top achiever, Damian was appointed to the Kaytech Board of Directors and continues to add value to the business.

Some of his notable achievements have been his appointment to the Executive Board of the Manufacturing Circle and initiating and coordinating the establishment of the SA Inc strategy for the construction sector. This required the involvement of government, financial services, and the private sector.

Damian has also developed and implemented a tailored business analytics reporting system to improve decision-making within the business. He also developed and successfully implemented the first mobile application by a geosynthetic supplier that is specifically tailored to meet the needs of the business. The KayApp provides instant access to all functions at Kaytech, including product specifications and answers to technical queries.

RIVALANI GLEN NTULI (34), CEO OF MNB CHARTERED ACCOUNTANTSResigning from a great position in the corporate world, Glen Ntuli co-founded and became CEO of MNB Chartered Accountants, an accounting and auditing firm. Starting out with challenges of cash flow and no support system, Glen had to come up with ways to ensure that the organisation survived. Today, MNB Chartered Accountants boasts a turnover of R10 million for both the 2016 and 2017

financial years and has 25 employees, including three CAs(SA). Glen has registered MNB Chartered Accountants as a training office with SAICA to ensure that it offers SAICA training contracts to assist in the development of chartered accountants.

Glen assists start-up companies in the ICT, consulting engineering and auditing industries by providing them with office space and sub-contracts. He is the chairperson of the Audit and Risk Committee at MICT SETA.

SHIVANI RAMDHANI (33), GENERAL MANAGER: GROUP FINANCE AND GROUP INVESTOR RELATIONS AT AFROCENTRIC GROUPAs the Head of Group Finance and Investor Relations, Shivani initiated and transcribed the group’s first integrated report, which is today aligned to international standards and was nominated at the CSSA awards hosted by the JSE. ‘I had no prior experience in this and taught myself by researching and engaging with others,’ Shivani says.

Shivani was also at the forefront of the group’s significant mergers with the most recent being the Sanlam transaction. She managed this transaction closely with the JSE and prepared the group’s JSE circular.

Shivani is a proud PwC alumni and now Head of Finance, and each initiative she has been involved with led to improvements in her group. She is a well-balanced individual with a passion for life and people.

Her advice for future CAs(SA): Don’t neglect the soft skills. In the end, it is how you work with people that will count and help you to be great at what you do.

MONIQUE KEEVY (35), SENIOR LECTURER AT UNIVERSITY OF

JOHANNESBURGAfter completing her articles at a Big Four firm, Monique joined the University of Johannesburg to pursue her passion for teaching. This gave her the opportunity to combine her CA(SA) skill set with education by

completing a master’s on the benefits of teaching methods in transferring

SAICA’s pervasive skills.

Spending two years on her master’s instilled a passion in her to better prepare graduates for a changing

business world. Subsequently, she has been able to apply this knowledge in both the academic and the training environments.

Monique jointly developed a case study with a financial institution to provide students with a real-life simulation of the work environment, which has also been made available to the University of Venda.

She has published numerous accredited articles on the development of pervasive skills. Monique is also using her knowledge to build a successful business assisting trainees in developing learning portfolios.

DAMIAN JUDGE (34), FINANCIAL DIRECTOR AT KAYMAC

PTY LTD T/A KAYTECH

VANGELIS KYRIAZIS (27), CO-FOUNDER OF SYFT ANALYTICSSyft Analytics is a free, real-time cloud analytics and reporting platform that directly integrates into accounting software such as Sage One, Xero and Quickbooks. Syft’s goal is to leverage the cloud and AI to improve business decision-making and access to capital markets. It achieves this by reducing the lag time between accounting data and reporting.

Since launching in January 2017, Syft has had over 3 500 companies sign up to the platform. More than 120 accounting firms use Syft’s software to automate and visualise their clients’ monthly management accounts.

Syft’s vision is to become the Bloomberg of SME data and provide aggregated industry reports to the market. It has grown from two co-founders to six employees in just nine months. ‘Our strategy is to hire young and grow our employees as part of the business,’ says Vangelis.

MICHELE TAGLIATTI (29), FINANCIAL MANAGER AT LIQUID TELECOMMUNICATIONS SOUTH AFRICA (PTY) LTDMichele Tagliatti is a financial manager at Liquid Telecom South Africa where he is responsible for managing the finances at the largest operating company within the Liquid Telecom Group. Since joining Liquid Telecom in 2015, Michele has developed and implemented financial processes for two companies within the group, as well as helped standardise processes, forecasting and reporting group-wide. He now also performs an advisory role within the group relating to African tax affairs.

In February 2017, Liquid Telecom successfully completed the R6,55 billion acquisition of Neotel (Pty) Ltd in South Africa. ‘Since the acquisition, I have played a fundamental role in the integration of Neotel with the Liquid Telecom Group by streamlining and improving synergies,’ says Michele. Liquid Telecom is the leading independent data, voice and IP provider in eastern, central and southern Africa. It supplies fibre optic, satellite and international carrier services to Africa’s largest mobile network operators.



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In pursuing his long-term career objective, Averen actively looked to diversify his experience across various industries, which included fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG), banking, pharmaceuticals and services.

He joined magic circle law firm Allen & Overy during its infancy in South Africa and was responsible for building the finance team, establishing relationships and compliance in addition to formulating and entrenching policies, procedures and controls. He is the chair of the Pension Fund Committee and a member of the Management, Risk and Equity committees.

In his previous occupation within the pharmaceutical industry, Averen played a leading role in formulating strategies for the company’s southern African markets. He further co-led the roll-out of strategies including the financial modelling of investment plans, obtaining approval for funding, and discussions with foreign government departments and service providers. Averen has completed his MBA and is a registered ACMA. He is an encouraging mentor to aspirant CAs(SA).

KAREN ODENDAAL (33), HEAD OF DEPARTMENT: ACCOUNTANCY

STUDIES AT MONASH SOUTH AFRICA

Karen Odendaal is an energetic, positive person who has excelled in the accountancy profession.

She is a senior lecturer and head of the Accounting Department at Monash South Africa, where she focuses on accounting teaching and research, also directing departmental academic excellence and driving student employability. From a market leader perspective, she has given significant input into a newly launched MBA offering at Monash in 2017.

Karen has received numerous awards for outstanding teaching, including a Dean’s Commendation for Teaching Excellence from Monash University Australia. She has published two research manuscripts in international journals as well as one local publication. She completed her BCom, BCom (Honours) and MCom degrees cum laude and graduated top of her class. She completed the SAICA and IRBA qualifying examinations in the Top 10. She is passionate about the environment and describes herself as the motivator of the team, always noting the potential and best attributes of every student and colleague.

ROBIN HERSELMAN (34), GROUP FINANCE DIRECTOR AT INTERNATIONAL FACILITIES SERVICES (IFS)At the age of 22, Robin had already founded his own successful residential construction company. But he soon realised his limitations and the immense value that the CA(SA)

programme could add to his career through the learning and development

process of articles exposing him to what makes businesses succeed or fail.

So at age 26, having completed his BCompt through correspondence, he

exited his business to take on the CA(SA) journey.

Fast forward five years. After acquiring an immense amount of knowledge during articles at BDO and consulting at EY, Robin joined IFS where he was later promoted to finance director for the group. IFS is a dynamic group employing more than 1 800 people across eight countries who bring world-class innovation and services to the most remote mining and oil and gas locations across Sub-Saharan Africa.

Having championed various initiatives in all of his roles, Robin is passionate about leadership and CSI.

HUSAIN COOVADIA (30), SENIOR LECTURER AT UNIVERSITY OF JOHANNESBURGHusain has played a leading role in integrating technology into the teaching and learning process. To this end, he developed a solution called e-NACT. This was selected out of more than 500 applications worldwide to be showcased at a Wharton – QS Reimagine Conference held at Wharton University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League institution.

Husain was the winner of the 2016 Vice-Chancellor’s Award at the University of Johannesburg. He was also selected as a judge it the annual global Reimagine Education competition, dubbed the Oscars of higher education.

Through his engagement with companies like Google, he identified available software and created an APT application. The application facilitates online marking and allows students to view their results online. Pre academia, Husain successfully listed products at a major South African retail store. Through innovative solutions, he managed and implemented processes required for the business to be a success.

AVEREN DEONANAN (35), HEAD OF FINANCE AT ALLEN & OVERY (SOUTH AFRICA) LLP

www.accountancysa.org.za

JULIAN PALLIAM (33), ADMINISTRATIVE MANAGING DIRECTOR (AMD) AT METSO SOUTH AFRICAJulian Palliam says he is living proof – no matter if you fail at first, or if people write you off, you can still achieve great things with hard work, passion and perseverance. Julian is the youngest AMD worldwide leading Metso across Africa, with a staff of over 800 employees and looking after a turnover close to R4 billion.

Julian has been involved in M&A deals across Africa exceeding $1,25 billion. He was most recently at ABB (Asea Brown Boveri), where he was the youngest divisional manager with full responsibility of running the division across southern Africa and where he improved profitability and increased operating cash flow. He worked as a finance lean champion across Asia Middle East and Africa to transform the ABB finance group.

Julian is involved in CSI projects, is a former KZN volleyball player and, most of all, is a loving dad and husband.

JAMES WILKINSON (33), GROUP GENERAL MANAGER: BUSINESS IMPROVEMENT AT DISTELL GROUP LIMITEDJames heads up Business Improvement at Distell, which helps solve difficult problems and creates value through new opportunities. The recipient of the first PwC CEO Innovation Award, he has brought this energy and passion for executing to Distell. He launched initiatives such as the E+Scalator programme that works with over 40 Distell suppliers to drive transformation and create new jobs.

In the last year, Business Improvement went live with a first of its type centralised procurement shared service centre that operates dynamic new capabilities such as reverse auctions. 33 Degree Energy Systems is an associated start-up company launched by his department that delivers group power solutions. Another highlight is the announcement by the president of the Apple Juice Concentrate project as a Top 10 priority investment project.

James has been a guest speaker at the first Business of Design Conference in Cape Town and has worked as a start-up coach.



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DAWIE SWARTS (28), GROUP FINANCIAL REPORTING MANAGER AT GROWTHPOINT PROPERTIES LIMITEDDawie is a young leader and, today, Group Financial Reporting Manager at a JSE Top 40 company. Growthpoint Properties is the largest South African primary-listed REIT on the JSE and has a market capitalisation of R73,3 billion (31 December 2016).

Growthpoint Properties was recently announced the overall winner of the Investment Analysts Society Excellence in Financial Reporting and Communications Awards 2016 and the winner for the property sector for the sixth consecutive year.Dawie works closely with the Executive Committee

in respect of property and fund acquisitions in terms of due diligence for technical accounting and international as well as South African tax.

He is also a member of the SA REIT Association’s Regulation and Tax Committee and makes an important contribution to the ongoing changes to the REITs legislation contained in the South African Income Tax Act (section 25BB).

Dawie holds a master’s degree in taxation and is currently completing the MBA programme through the Henley Business School, UK.

LOGAMAL RAMIAH (33), CFO AT NETSURITRated as a high performer at PwC, Logamal’s passion for service led her to leave the consulting space and move into a CFO position.

After five interviews at Netsurit, she was appointed as the group chief financial officer of an international business. She successfully concluded an MBO, mergers and acquisitions, built international offices, and also concluded a forward merger in the USA for the group.

Her belief in service stems from her motto in life: ‘If you inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.’

She started the Netsurit Women’s Forum to motivate, inspire and encourage women to stand out in all aspects of life.

As a dream coach, Logamal is involved in life coaching to high school kids from Alexandra, in partnership with Netsurit and Afrika Tikkun, to expand on the DREAMS Programme. She strives to give back as much as she receives in life.

Janice is driven by her passion to empower, promote growth and provide socio-economic solutions to SMMEs in Africa. She has focused on oversight of a broad portfolio of companies and has been instrumental in concluding four transactions: a joint venture with a successful Eastern Cape 5 000-hectare farm which resulted in the farm becoming South Africa’s largest black-owned potato/maize operation; facilitation of funding which resulted in an investment of R200 million in affordable housing; financing of SMMEs which has enabled school feeding of 150 000 children monthly; and the purchase of a retail store in Durban.

Janice also oversees the establishment and on-going management of Musa Group’s Emerging Farmers Programme, which involves the development of a retail BEE upliftment programme focused on identifying, training, and establishing qualified black entrepreneurs as retail store owners. Both programmes will be run with Musa Group’s operations at the hub, with an aim of promoting greater economic growth through innovative business solutions.

JANICE SAMBAZA (34), SENIOR ASSOCIATE – INDUSTRIALS AT MUSA GROUP

ROBERT ZWANE (34), DIRECTOR: EDUCATION & TRANSFORMATION AT IRBAOn 1 October 2016, Robert was appointed as the first African and youngest director at the Independent Regulatory Board for Auditors (IRBA). He also sits on the International Federation of Accountants’ International Accounting Education Standards Board (IAESB) as a technical adviser serving on a number of task forces.

Robert is part of the team that drives the IRBA’s branding, raising awareness and transformation initiatives.

He has been instrumental in the implementation of the IRBA’s Audit Development Programme (ADP).

The ADP is a period of work experience undertaken by qualified professional accountants, currently CAs(SA), and it is relevant to the work of a registered auditor (RA).

Over the last few years he has delivered motivational talks and talks about the profession to learners and students across South Africa. He is actively involved in coaching and mentoring initiatives for young professionals.

DARREN LANG (28), DIRECTOR AT EXCEL ACADEMYAfter achieving a Top 10 position (honours) in the ICT, Darren Lang launched into his first year of articles lecturing Financial Accounting to third-year students and reviewing JSE-listed entities’ reporting compliance. This equipped Darren with public speaking skills and immense technical knowledge but, he admits, no practical experience. He was forced to develop soft skills as well as core expertise during his remaining article training. Darren then joined Excel Academy as director and partner to its founder, Dan Stillerman. ‘Everything we do is geared towards making people around the world more productive and confident in their work. We achieve this through our interactive Excel workshops (online, webinars and face-to-face),’Darren says. To date, they have transformed the traditional classroom learning environment into a stimulating experience for some 6 000 delegates. Darren has been instrumental in growing the start-up into a global brand and at the same time, building a dynamic team.

Itumeleng is an innovative and proactive chartered accountant who launched ITU, a platform which strives to empower, connect and uplift Southern African designers who specialise in using African print and colours to showcase their work in the UK and the rest of Europe. They are young, female and entrepreneurial designers who work with local cooperatives and disenfranchised and unemployed local women to manufacture designs of clothes and accessories for women, men and children.

She is also the Southern and East African buyer for the London Designer. She successfully convinced London designers to order in bulk goods from ITU designers, lobbying investors and partners to enable shipping these textiles to the UK.

Itumeleng currently works on listed blue chip financial services clients in London after being head-hunted from South Africa by KPMG UK for her current role as Benefits Lead in PMO.

ITUMELENG BARNARD (30), FOUNDER OF INSPIRED

TRENDS UNDESIGNED (ITU)

www.accountancysa.org.za 61JULY 201760 www.accountancysa.org.zaJULY 2017

[ REGULARS | MOTORING ] [ MOTORING | REGULARS ]

BMW recently refreshed its line-up of the 4 Series and introduced some name

changes as well. The 440i test vehicle replaces the 435i. The nameplate ending with a ’5’ used to be known as the ultimate pre-‘M’ version, but this has now changed.

The new 4 Series has been given a few nips and tucks, thereby

as well. There is an upgraded sports steering wheel and high gloss surrounds the infotainment system. The iDrive system has also been updated and is now tile-based, making it easier to use.

The motor has been updated, now producing a healthy 240 kW and a whopping 450 N.m, translating into a very powerful

enhancing its overall look. The front and rear aprons have been tweaked and seem to be better carved out of the bumper, giving the car a lower and more brute look. The standard LED lighting ensures that the updated version is easily recognisable from the pre-facelift. The new headlights now feature twin LED semi-circle lights that

machine. This, together with the updated suspension, enhances the experience of the 4 Series.

On the road, the car still feels a bit stiff, but that said, for a sports coupé it is actually very comfortable. The power is instantaneous each time you floor the accelerator and so is the melodious sound that emanates from the six-cylinder

extend towards the kidney grills. In keeping with this look, the rear LED lights also have two lines that have a squarish loop in the outer lights and stretch towards the centre.

Inside, there have also been some changes, which start with double stitching on all leather sections. The new digital dashboard looks much sportier and has some customisation

motor, which in turn raises the hairs in the back of your neck.

Overall, the updated 4 Series has raised the benchmark of sports coupés, so if you prefer a sports coupé that can be used to drive to work daily and transform into a thoroughbred track car on weekends, the 440i should definitely be on your list.

BMW 440I COUPÉ 3,0L 6 CYLINDER TURBO

ENGINE

240 KW

5,0 SECONDS

FROM R582 800.00

450 NM

POWER

0–100 KM/H

PRICE

TORQUE

AUTHOR: Torque Talk is a member of SAGMJ

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Investments / Advisory

Finance

Finance

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R1.2M neg. CA(SA) / B.Sc (Hons) / CFA with 7 yrs experience in empowerment fi nance and involvement in BEE transactions. Originate structure and place debt, hybrid and structured equity backed transactions and help build participation in BEE transactions. Utilise you solid network, passion for empowerment, transformation and deal making (debt / equity backed) origination. Awesome opportunity to make the fund your own. [email protected]

Competitive salary plus lucrative incentive structure. CA(SA) / CFA / MBA with 4-6 yrs exp in private equity or corporate fi nance to join admired private equity investor in high growth companies in Africa and Asia. Work in a highly collaborative team demonstrating your expertise in investment due diligence, industry analysis, fi nancial modelling and transaction support. Individual with exceptional academic and work track record will thrive in this exciting environment. [email protected]

Investments / Advisory

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R1M - R600K. Highly reputable global company seeks experienced valuations manager with strong valuations, fi nancial modelling and fi nancial analysis skills. CA(SA) / CFA / B.Com / B.Bus.Sci Hons with min 2 yrs relevant exp. Valuations to support acquisition and sale fairness opinions, investments, capital raising, management buyouts, restructurings etc. [email protected]

R880K - R650K. This essential FM role calls for a highly accountable (SA) / B.Com Hons with min 5 yrs commercial exp in fi nancial services. Assume responsibility for all aspects of fi nance and admin while working closely with the COO. High degree of SAP and Pastel profi ciency essential. Global fi nancial services fi rm with longstanding history of success and excellence. [email protected]

R800K - R700K. CA(SA) with at least 3 yrs audit management exp within fi nancial services. Strong project management skills and excellent attention to detail essential plus the ability to manage a team of 5-6 skills auditors. Good understanding of IT auditing a huge plus. Interesting assignments. [email protected]

R600K + bonus. Newly qualifi ed CA(SA) with strong communication skills and excellent academic track record for industry leader in fi nancial services. Provide end to end fi nancial support to several business units including the preparation and analysis of critical management reports. Ad hoc projects including competitor analysis and business process enhancement will ensure constant challenges. [email protected]

R750K - R600K. IB.Com IT / B.Sc Computer Science, pref CISA and / CISM with particularly strong IT audit skills covering various operating systems; SQL, Oracle databases and platforms such as COBIT 5, ITIL, ISO 27001. 5-7 yrs relevant exp in pref fi nancial services. Perform specialist reviews and provide assistance to the wider internal audit environment. [email protected]

HEAD OF LISTINGS

M&A MANAGER

CFO: PRIVATE EQUITY BOUTIQUE - EE ONLYCREDIT MNGR: NON-BANK FIN INSTITUTIONS (NBFI)

Salary market related. Advisory fi rm seeks corp fi nance professional to head up their listings division. Marketing / business development, reviewing of documentation etc. Min 4 yrs corp fi nance exp, specifi cally previous listings exp/ good understanding of listing process. Pref an approved sponsor. CA(SA) / LLB / B.Com Hons. [email protected]

Salary market related. Global fi rm seeks a manager for their M&A and debt advisory team. Be involved with top tier clients on a variety of corporate fi nance and debt transactions across borders and play an integral part in the entire transaction process. 1-5 yrs M&A experience. CA(SA) / CFA / B.Com Hons. [email protected]

R1.6M – R1.4M plus bonuses. CA(SA) with 8-10 yrs exp in a CFO function with an understanding of private equity principles and processes. Senior fi nance role, working closely with transactors and investors to grow the business. Establish and maintain fi n frameworks and procedures in support of business ops. Be responsible for fi nancial analysis, reporting, future forecasting and legal requirements. Amazing opportunity for an individual with leadership ability and entrepreneurial fl air to join a small, established team. [email protected]

R650 - R600K plus bonus. CA(SA) / B.Bus.Sci with credit exp and sector knowledge of NBFI clients. Manage portfolio of counterparty credit risks associated with lending, trading and investing opportunities. Analyse clients’ credit applications across the non-bank fi nancial institutions sector, work closely with the front-offi ce dealmakers and provide insight on the credit worthiness of transactions. [email protected]

For all our latest positions please visit our website: www.thepc.co.za | 011-244-5380

SENIOR MANAGER FINANCE - INVESTMENT BANKINGR1M NEG + bonus. Leading institution seeks CA(SA) with min 6-8 yrs relevant commercial exp to play a key role in fi nancial process improvements and effi ciency analysis, plus drive several business transformation projects. Conduct feasibility studies of existing joint ventures and any new product initiatives. Staff management exp essential. Grooming role for exec level appointment. [email protected]

[ REGULARS | MOTORING ]

The popular Ford Ranger has just had a midlife makeover and we had the opportunity

of driving the XLT 4x4 double cab variant.

To begin with, the new front end looks even more brute than before. The huge grill protrudes forward with ‘Ranger’ carved out in big, bold letters from the top section of the grill. Depending on the range, the grill comes in either charcoal or chrome. The chrome version looks more workhorse-like while the charcoal one looks a lot sportier – hence it is part of the Wildtrack range.

The new look makes the vehicle appear higher and bolder on the road. Added to this, there is a

Highrider option, like on the test vehicle.

Inside, the cabin is very spacious with ample rear leg and head room. The seats are comfortable, but there is a lack of lumbar support in the front. The dashboard has a car-like look and feel while the steering wheel is light and easy to use. The touchscreen infotainment system is good, but the display could be bigger. The gearshift is typical 4x4 with fairly long throws.

The entire vehicle shakes to life as the diesel motor starts but, being diesel, don’t expect any roars. Being a double cab, keep in mind its size. This is by no means a small vehicle. Parking and reversing can be a bit tricky for a novice, but once

you get used to its size it becomes almost second nature. This does have advantages, however, which are good cabin space and a decent load box.

Surprisingly, driving the vehicle is a lot of fun. You feel like you can drive over almost anything and to be honest, I think with this car’s off-road ability and diff locks, it actually could. The updated Ranger now also comes with some additional creature comforts like a lane-departure warning and an LCD display in the dashboard – to name but a few.

On the whole, the Ranger has always been a top contender and with its new updates, I think it will be even more appealing to those looking for the outdoor life and a workhorse.

FORD RANGER XLT 4X4

AUTHOR: Torque Talk is a member of SAGMJ

3,2L 5 CYLINDER TURBO DIESEL

ENGINE

147 KW

N/A SECONDS

FROM R226 900.00

470 NM

POWER

0–100 KM/H

PRICE

TORQUE


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CLASSIFIEDSARE YOU INTERESTED IN A MERGER?Should you be interested in merging with a long established and extremely successful accounting and auditing firm in South Africa, which is JSE accredited and internationally affiliated, then there is no doubt that this could be mutually beneficial to both practices. Let us explore the possibility. Call Marius on 0828873496 now.

ARE YOU INTERESTED IN SELLING?In the world of accounting and auditing, a well established, JSE accredited and internationally affiliated CA firm is looking to acquire your accounting or auditing practice in Gauteng, Cape Town, Bloemfontein or Durban. Should you be interested in selling, please give Marius a call on 0828873496.

PARTNER ROTATIONDo you value your independence? 2017 audit partner rotation problematic? Call me Marius on 0828873496 for solutions.

KEEN TO PURCHASEWe are keen to purchase an accounting or auditing practice in Gauteng/Paarl/Western Cape. We have done this before and are prepared to pay fair value. For a confidential discussion contact Joe on 0828548269.

WE BUYAccounting, auditing and tax practices or blocks of fees. Contact Pieter at 0823320646 or [email protected] if you are interested in selling.

PARTPARTNERSHIPS & PRACTICES

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