Professor: Gordon Institute of Business Science
Prof Nick Binedell
Professor Nick Binedell is a professor in the area of strategy and leadership at the Gordon Institute of Business Science of the University of Pretoria.
He was the founding Dean of GIBS (2000-2015).
After a career in business, including a period as a general manager, he began an academic path. He completed his PhD at the University of Washington in Seattle.
He was invited to establish a new business school for the University of Pretoria to be based in Johannesburg, South Africa. His mandate was to establish a world class business school that would meet the needs of the 21st century for South African business and business leaders.
Professor Binedell’s key area of interest is in the area of strategic leadership with particular focus on strategy in complex environments. He is a frequent public speaker in South Africa and abroad, is a visiting lecturer at the Rotterdam School of Management (for the past 18 years) and has been a consultant to companies in South Africa and internationally. He was recently a visiting Professor at London Business School.
In June 2015 the Academy of International Business elected him as global Business Educator of the year.
Natural History Filmmaker
Pippa Ehrlich
Pippa Ehrlich is a natural history filmmaker and environmental journalist, specialising in the field of marine science and conservation. She has worked with some of the world’s top marine researchers and underwater photographers and edited the acclaimed photographic book Sea Change: Primal Joy and the Art of Underwater Tracking.
Pippa has been an avid freediver for more than a decade and has spent her last four years exploring the underwater forests of Cape Town and directing My Octopus Teacher – South Africa’s first Netflix Original documentary. The film has garnered attention from celebrities, conservationists and scientists all over the world and won the more than 15 international awards, including the prestigious Golden Panda and Grand Teton.
Pippa is a member of the Sea Change Project – a collective of divers, storytellers and scientists who are dedicated to connecting people to nature and protecting The Great African Seaforest.
My Octopus Teacher is Pippa’s first feature documentary.
CEO: SLAP
Stan Slap
The commitment of the company’s culture is a major asset gained by your investment or acquisition. You don’t want to put the funding in the front door and have that commitment walk out the back. Or reduce spending to do more with less, only to have less commitment from the company’s culture to help you do it.
Anyone that considers culture to be soft stuff is clinically insane. It is the stuff of hardcore business results. If the culture wants something to happen in a company, it will happen.
If the culture doesn’t want it to happen, it’s not going to happen. Stan Slap knows how culture really works and how to get yours to really work for you. He is a New York Times bestselling author, a world-renowned thought leader about business culture, and the CEO of the international consulting company called SLAP. For 24 years, in 44 countries (including 12 in Africa), SLAP has achieved billions of dollars in performance impact for many of the world’s most successful, demanding companies. The kind that don’t include Patience on their list of corporate values.
Stan Slap is provocative, proven, and profound. Buckle up, we’re going off road.
slapworld.com
Global speaker | MC | Business Strategist
Zipho Sikhakhane
Zipho is currently the CEO of EMZ Advisory, which provides facilitation and consulting services to PAN African and multinational organisation primarily in the financial sector focusing on areas of change management, organisational strategy, team interventions and effective leadership.
Zipho’s professional background includes holding strategic positions in world-leading organisations locally and internationally (such as the world’s biggest fashion retail group Inditex Zara & the world’s biggest management consulting firm).
She is the first black South African to complete an MBA at the top ranked Stanford University in the USA. She also holds a Business Science Honours Degree from UCT and has completed leadership courses around the world.
She is a Board Member & Investment Committee Member of E- squared which owns 17% of Allan Grey and a Chairperson for Maneli Perdigon Commodity Trading.
Having worked in 6 continents and travelled over 30 countries her global outlook gives her a unique perspective to local and challenges.
Founder & CEO: The Strategists
Abdullah Verachia
Having presented and consulted in over 60 cities globally, Abdullah has been recognised as a leading speaker, disruptor, strategist and thought leader on competitiveness and the interplay between strategy and innovation. He speaks and consults globally in this area.
Abdullah Verachia currently serves as the founder and CEO of The Strategists (www.thestrategists.co.za), a leading strategy and advisory firm, which helps organisations around the world craft competitive future strategies. He also serves as faculty at the Gordon Institute of Business Science as well as programme director for the Harvard Senior Executive Programme for Africa. Abdullah also serves on a number of boards as a non executive.
He holds a Bachelors in Law and a Masters in Management (cum laude). He has also completed executive programmes on strategy and shared value, with Professor Michael Porter’s Institute of Strategy and Competitiveness, at Harvard Business School. He also completed an executive programme at University of Oxford’s Said Business School as well as an executive programme on broadcast technology at Columbia Business School.
Abdullah Verachia is a highly sought-after and accomplished speaker, strategist, writer and businessman whose career boasts compelling corporate experience at executive level.
As an academic, and strategist, Abdullah has crafted a reputation for engagement, deep understanding of the trends impacting the business world and an ability to grasp the potential impact of complex disruptors.
He has presented to leading listed firms, international organisations and governments around the world. Abdullah works globally with boards and executive teams to craft competitive future strategies.
He is renowned for his ability to guide organisations through a complex and rapidly evolving external environment.
In December 2017 Abdullah received a standing ovation at the acclaimed TEDx Euston in London. Abdullah was also asked to be the keynote speaker at the 2018 World Speech Day.
Abdullah has built a number of disruptive and truly innovative companies. He is thus able to fuse experience, insight, strategy and expertise into a beautiful tapestry that has relevance and application to companies and organisations around the world.