Opportunity Issue 103

Barloworld, reimagining diversity
Gender-linked bonds bring new levels of transparency and
accountability to promoting gender diversity in the workplace.
GENDERED FINANCE
Biography: Relebohile Malahleha
After studying at the University of KwaZulu-Natal and having done her articles at
KPMG, Relebohile worked as a Chief Director at National Treasury. She returned to
KPMG for an eight-year stint as partner. She describes much of her work as “accounting
transformation”. She was first appointed in Barloworld as the CFO of Avis Budget and
subsequently promoted to Barloworld Corporate Office as the Executive Strategic Finance
responsible for Group finance strategy, Treasury, Corporate finance and Technical.
Barloworld is committed to improving its gender diversity
outcomes. The group has been a leader in this field for decades,
going back to the 1970s with the formulation of a group-wide
code of employment practice, the first of its kind to be adopted
by a major South African company.
Now, performance-linked gender bonds will drive further positive
change within the workplace and among the companies that supply
Barloworld with goods and services. Women will be empowered.
As Relebohile Malahleha, Barloworld Executive: Strategic Finance
and Treasury, says, “The bonds are a perfect fit with the group’s policy
and purpose.” Barloworld was announced as the Gender Mainstreaming
Champion for 2020 and is proud that two black women are chief
executives of business units: Car Rental and the SMD business unit.
But the group continues to search for new ways to promote
women and women’s issues with diversity, equal opportunities and
procurement practices as the key focus. This is why the issuance
of Africa's first gender-linked bond is a significant milestone for
Barloworld in their transformation journey.
Malahleha notes that the journey towards setting diversity targets
began in 2017. When discussions began with financial services
company RMB about placing a bond with them, the response
from the bankers was very positive. “They said that Barloworld is
probably the most gender-diverse business on the listed exchange,”
remembers Malahleha. “RMB thought that our pioneering a genderlinked
bond would be absolutely perfect messaging for what the
business believes in.”
Sustainable finance with gender-specific key outcomes will also
encourage greater transparency when Barloworld reports, and from
other companies who might choose to follow the group’s lead in
going to the market for this type of bond financing.
Says Malahleha, “Investors can purchase a bond that holds us
accountable in terms of performance from a gender perspective.
The key performance indicators (KPIs) imposed were to achieve
equity in the number of women employed at senior levels and
to procure from women-led businesses. We are looking for 50%
representation of females in those senior positions.”
The Barloworld Business System (BBS) is a structured business operating
system that enables a high-performance culture of both continuous
improvement and business excellence and enables our strategy execution.
BBS is underpinned by two principles – respect for people and continuous
improvement. Malahleha comments, “We are trying to make sure that
there is decision-making at the lowest level of the business. We hold
huddles every day where we identify problems. What doesn’t get resolved
gets escalated. That’s how we make sure that we promote diversity and
inclusion and it becomes a conversation at all levels.”
On her own journey within the company, Malahleha remembers
her early days as the CFO of Avis Budget: “You are always going to
get challenged as an individual first and foremost, as a woman and
as a black woman, even more so.”
But she worked hard to overcome the challenges. “When you become
more senior, it is about being able to work through people and its about
your ability to influence others. In life, and in whatever you do you need
to be certain in what you believe in,” she notes.
“We had to make significant changes to systems and processes. We
had to challenge and convince senior members of the organisation to
adapt to change. That means doing the hard work of being up to date
with what is happening and educating myself. You need to find other
mechanisms of fighting your fight and different avenues of influencing
the people that you are trying to influence.”
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