When the BANKSETA  (Banking sector Education & Training Authority) selected Henley Business School Africa (Henley) to partner with it to design and execute its 2016 International Executive Development Programme (IEDP), little did it know just how effective Henley’s creative problem-solving methodology and course design would be in achieving the training authority’s mandate of transforming leaders from the financial services sector into disruptive leaders.
 

By Max Marx

WOMEN Development Businesses (WDB) celebrated its 25th anniversary last week with a dialogue titled Making Poverty History.

It was attended by women from across SA’s socioeconomic spectrum, facilitating sobering discussion on poverty and the ways in which sustainable livelihoods can be created for the poor.

WDB has since 1991 been working to eradicate poverty in rural communities. The brainchild of former first lady Zanele Mbeki, it provides microfinance to impoverished rural women and runs social support programmes through the WDB Trust.

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IMAGE: Mamphela Ramphele and Zanele Mbeki attending the Women Development Businesses (WDB) dialogue. Picture courtesy of WDB

Max Marx rounds up the major new developments on the events scene in Gauteng. 

Gauteng, Africa’s economic powerhouse, is gearing up to position itself as a mega-events destination.

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Already the province’s world-class infrastructure – from roads and telecommunications to its high-tech conference and convention centres, stadiums, exhibition halls and first-rate accommodation options – makes it an attractive destination for medium-sized meetings, incentives, conference and exhibitions (MICE) as well as for large stadium events such as sports matches and music concerts.
Now several new developments on the cards will enable Gauteng to attract mega business events to the province and further enhance its status as South Africa’s premier events destination.

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The building of two new international convention centres has been confirmed and a third is under discussion.

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Image by Max Marx for South African Tourism

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STEPHEN Dondolo, CEO of the African Pioneer Group (APG), has energy and entrepreneurship in his blood. Growing up in Kwanobuhle township on the outskirts of Uitenhage, he took a job as an electrical apprentice just as student protests broke out in the aftermath of the 1976 Soweto uprising.

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Despite the upheavals in the 1980s, he launched several township businesses in retail, distribution and logistics — and also a shebeen. He was the first entrepreneur to open a hotel in Kwanobuhle, an initiative for which he was named the Institute of Marketing Management’s Businessman of the Year in 1990.

That was also the year Dondolo started APG.

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Image: Stephen Dondolo    Picture: The Herald