medical chronicle | September 2011 | page 11

PIASA - Piasa Page

A3 - strip ad with ed & pics *pool quotes

Upfront in news

With the amendments to the Preferential Procurement Policy Framework Act set to change the way tenders are

evaluated as of December 2011, and the increase in B-BBEE targets due in February 2012, the Pharmaceutical Industry Association of South Africa (PIASA) recently met to explore the latest thinking and ideas around transformation.

Reporting back on the transformation benchmarking surveys conducted with PIASA members since 2008, Robin Woolley of Transcend Corporate Advisors noted that progress continues to be made, but that much of it remains quantitative rather than qualitative in nature.Make BBBEE sustainable, meaningful and profitable

Picking up where Woolley left off, Bruce Rowe from Mpowered Business Solutions told the audience to forget about the scorecard. “The scorecard isn’t the end goal,” he maintained. “It’s purely a catalyst to help drive transformation.”

“BBBEE is here to stay,” Rowe explained, “and the companies that have embraced this and started assessing it from a strategic perspective are discovering that it can add value back into the organisation.”

According to Rowe, the winners are the businesses that have introduced sustainable transformation initiatives: “... companies that have shifted from monitoring, analysing and reporting on transformation to actually doing it.”

Rowe is enthusiastically emphatic that companies can do more with their Enterprise Development contributions than simply play ‘the good corporate citizen’ and can actually use these funds to stimulate long-term growth and future profits. “Transformation is not just a cost and compliance issue,” he declared, “but a way of unlocking future value and deriving direct business benefits.”NPO one way of using ED funds to empower not enrich

Guest speaker Johnny Klopper, an attorney at KMG & Associates Inc. outlined an exciting, novel way of using a nonprofit organisation (NPO) to extract maximum value from socioeconomic development and enterprise development (ED) contributions, while simultaneously creating real, sustainable empowerment.

“The first advantage of setting up a Section 21 or ‘not-for-profit company’ as your B-BBEE partner is that you can make communities or groups your partners, not just individuals,” Klopper explained, “and achieve true broad-based empowerment.”

Passionate about using B-BBEE to uplift those most in need, Klopper explained that this approach enables companies to avoid the trap of only enriching a handful of individuals and seeing most of the intended benefits of the transaction lost in servicing associated debt. “In the same way, the dividends don’t go to individuals, but back into the NPO and towards its ongoing transformation goals,” he added.

A great way of helping those communities

that financial institutions shy away from, this approach can also be a way of maximising the value of ED contributions since the NPO can also qualify as a ‘public benefit organisation’, which makes the funds tax deductible.

Dawie Marais then demonstrated how DCD Dorbyl has successfully implemented the approach outlined by Klopper. The nonprofit organisation established by the company is the beneficiary of an interest-free loan. The established purpose of the NPO is the education of company and industry candidates alike. The directors, drawn from the mother company, administer this investment for the sole purpose of expanding skills within the company as well as the industry. Expertise has been drawn into the nonprofit organisation and the intiative has been so successful that it is now also a shareholder in an independent training company that provides accredited training to the engineering industry across the country. Profit and social responsibility are not mutually exclusive

Heidi Grimmer from ABBC C o n s u l t i n g challenged the industry to grow

‘Forget the Scorecard, Use Projects to Unlock New Value and Prosperity’ Delegates Told at Transformation Breakfast

Thornhill Office ParkBuilding No 594 Bekker StreetVorna Valley, 1686South Africa

Tel: +27 11 805 5100Fax: +27 11 805 5105

Website: www.piasa.co.za

Heidi Grimmer, ABBC Consulting

Shawn Theunissen, innovation expert from GrowthPoint

Properties

Members of the Pharmaceutical Industry Association (PIASA) Exco for 2011/2012:

Back row/left to right: Pierre Bosch, General Manager, Alcon Laboratories; Kobus Venter, Managing Director, Janssen.

Middle row/left to right: Laura Engelbrecht Joubert, General Manager, Abbott Laboratories; Magriet de Wet, Managing Director, Key Oncologics;

Amanda Wilde, Managing Director, Umsinsi Health Care.Front row/left to right: Ashley Pearce, Managing Director, MSD (PIASA

President); Jenny Wright, Managing Director, Galderma Laboratories; Dr Guni Goolab, Chief Executive Officer, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals; Dr Jonathan Louw, Chief Executive Officer, Adcock Ingram Healthcare.

Exco members not included in picture above:Steve Speller, Chief Executive Officer, Servier Laboratories

Richard de Chastelain, Country Div. Head, Bayer Healthcare Pharmaceuticals

Klaus Boehm, Managing Director, Merck Timothy Kedijang, General Manager, Novo Nordisk

PIASA Welcomes 2011/2012 Executive Council and PresidentAshley Pearce, Managing Director of MSD, has been

re-elected as president of the Pharmaceutical Industry Association of South Africa (PIASA) for 2011/2012 at its recent Annual General Meeting (AGM).

Pearce has over 27 years’ experience in the pharmaceutical industry, having worked for multinational companies in South Africa, the United States and the United Kingdom. His experience within the multinational pharmaceutical industry includes Sales, Marketing, Clinical Research, Production and Business Development.

Joining Pearce on the industry body’s management council is Dr Jonathan Louw (Adcock Ingram Healthcare), Pierre Bosch (Alcon Laboratories) and Steve Speller (Servier Laboratories).

Other members on the executive council for 2011/2012 include:• Laura Engelbrecht Joubert,

Abbott Laboratories.• Guni Goolab, AstraZeneca

Pharmaceuticals.• Richard de Chastelain, Bayer

Healthcare Pharmaceuticals.• Jenny Wright, Galderma

Laboratories.• Kobus Venter, Janssen.• Magriet de Wet, Key Oncologics.• Klaus Boehm, Merck.• Timothy Kedijang, Novo

Nordisk.• Amanda Wilde, Umsinsi Health

Care.

PIASA President:Ashley Pearce,

Managing Director, MSD, has been re-elected President of the Pharmaceutical

Industry Association of SA for the 2011/2012

year.

the mini research and development sector in SA. Inspired by initiatives that are helping entrepreneurs and small businesses to flourish in the most unlikely of settings, such as the street hawker franchise, Grimmer asserted that profit and social responsibility should not be seen as mutually exclusive.

Drawing on her experiences in the beverage industry, Grimmer suggested that the isolated, independent way most organisations implement transformation projects was also a barrier to innovation and success. “It can be extremely difficult to bring the right funders, service providers, beneficiaries and ideas together,” she observed, “and many opportunities are missed simply because the necessary people didn’t know about them at the right time.”

Grimmer suggested creating an online industry ‘transformation portal’ to solve this challenge.

“The Social Enterprise Development Exchange would be a place where requests for transformation ideas, expertise or resources could be posted and discussed,” she explained.Collaborate with outsiders to get new ideas

The last guest speaker of the day, innovation expert from GrowthPoint Properties, Shawn T h e u n i s s e n , outlined the concept of ‘open innovation’ and how it could help the industry to discover new and exciting t r a n s f o r m a t i o n possibilities.

Central to the concept is the idea of collaborating more openly with stakeholders traditionally viewed as being ‘external’ to the organisation; that new value can be unlocked by including more ‘outside’ people in the discussions and initiatives happening within the company. As Theunissen spelt it out, “if the boundary of your organisation remains the boundary of your thinking, it will become a barrier to your success.”