SAISC PROFILE provided me with a great start. Don persuaded me to study further, which is where I met other role models – Professor Alan Kemp at WITS, and Hennie de Clerq( former CEO of the SAISC). Alan was an exceptionally bright and capable engineer who had the ability to explain complex concepts in easily accessible way. As I got more involved in the practical side of things, Hennie de Clerq, who presented some of the courses alongside Alan, was a big influence.
Q: Best advice you’ ve ever received?
A: Probably the best piece of advice I’ ve ever received is to go and study an MBA at UCT, which I did with a friend of mine, Rob Ballentine. We were both studying the GDE together at WITS, the post-graduate engineering course, when we sat down one night over a beer and Rob said“ Look, we’ re getting technically advanced in what we’ re able to do, and we’ ve got a relatively good grasp of this engineering thing, but we need to balance ourselves out to some extent.” So the two of us decided to go and do an MBA at UCT.
Q: How do you think your best friend would describe you?
A: My best friend, I think would describe me as somebody that works too hard, too long hours and takes life too seriously. I don’ t necessarily agree with that. I’ ve been fortunate in having very loyal friends in my life, and I think that they would also describe me as a loyal friend.
Q: What do you think the biggest challenge is facing our industry at the moment?
A: I think the challenges facing the steel industry, the construction industry and definitely the consulting engineering industry is the world economy not performing well. People are under pressure. We’ ve got a downturn, great expectations for people in all sectors of the economy, and then we’ ve got really very little work. That’ s a great challenge. I think it’ s something that will make us tougher over time. I think many of the people that are in the industry might not be here in 5 or 10 years’ time. Those that do survive will be a lot tougher for it. There are many challenges ahead.
I was chairman of the Institute of Steel Construction many years ago and it was the greatest time to be a part of the steel industry because it was the busiest time. People had work all over the place, everybody was in a happy space. It’ s changed. People now are in a different space. That’ s one of the challenges; keeping good people motivated, to survive, and to have something that performs better down the line.
Q: If you could go back 30 years, what advice would you give your younger self?
A: If I could turn the clock back or go back 30 years in some sort of time machine, I think the most valuable advice I could give myself is to cut out the weekend work and the work done in the evenings.
The work that you do, hoping to get paid, on some sort of speculative nature generally doesn’ t pay off. It’ s a bad negotiating tactic, and I think you get nowhere doing that sort of work. You really waste a solid portion of your life doing work that you are hoping to get paid for. I think you’ ve got to be a lot more practical and decide when you are going to cut things that you are doing. I think you have to be a lot more aggressive and say“ Look, this is going nowhere. I’ m going to stop doing it. And even if somebody else does it … that’ s fine.” As a young person, I think you kiss a lot of frogs, hoping that these things will work out well.
The other thing is learn to negotiate relatively early on. Negotiation skills are something that you’ re going to find you need all of your life. Go and get some top advice, and some practical skills at negotiating.
Q: Favourite book of all time? A: Born to Run by Christopher Mc Dougall. It really gives you an insight into human spirit, and the amount that people can do with having a lot of fun with really minimalistic input and no resources whatsoever. It’ s about the Tarahumara Indians in the Copper Canyons in Mexico, and their ability to run, and undertake these amazing endurance events. Christopher Mc Dougall builds in things about what humans are capable of biologically, what’ s happened in South Africa and how people used to hunt here in the early days and run down animals. It’ s a great insight into people … and it’ s about running, which I’ m relatively interested in.
Q: What makes a great leader?
A: Different things under different circumstances. One of the things that makes a great leader is the ability to analyse a situation, look at the bigger picture and understand what’ s important. Often people bog down on unimportant trivia. I think it’ s good to be able to take a broader look at the whole thing. As a leader you have to have a level of service to others in what you’ re doing. I don’ t think a dictatorial type of approach works very well. Giving service to others generally puts you in a better position, but I think it’ s a complex question. I’ m not really sure what makes a good leader! I’ ve seen great leaders with very different skills, and I think some of them very sadly lack in some areas and are very good in other areas. I think they achieve amazing things. A lot of it is to do with timing.
Q: What do you think has made CADEX SA so successful?
A: I think we’ re successful for a number of reasons. We’ ve got good people here. We’ ve got a great product, that advances year in and year out. It’ s well liked by the industry, and has a good fit with the industry. That makes it easier. One of the reasons I think is also consistency. We have an incredibly consistent approach from Tekla, now called Trimble solutions, in Finland. That gives you the space to grow and the certainty that things change and get better all the time. We’ ve worked with other products, bought from other software companies where that hasn’ t been the case. So this real, long term commitment and a great product has made us what we are.
Q: Where would you like to see CADEX SA going in the next 5 years?
A: CADEX SA will change dramatically in the next 5 years. In the software industry a 5 year horizon is a tremendous horizon. I think artificial intelligence and things like that is going to get into the products that we use dramatically. I think it’ s going to get to the shop floor and into the design phase dramatically as well. Things are going to change
Steel Construction Vol. 40 No. 2 2016 9