requirements which led to members holding fewer positions. According to Sandra, this translates to “…only really professional board members that will hold more than one, but if you’re in an executive role or senior role, then you would not take on more than one, and that in turn has opened opportunities for new people.” In South Africa, we also have the unique

situation of BEE requirements, so what we find here is that very often BEE partners or representatives would be sitting on the board. Now your governance requirements for independents means that the more involved your directors are, the more independent directors you need to have. And therein lies the opportunities for women because all boards are having to put in more first-timers on their boards. Even though opportunities for women

About Landelahni

Established in 1997, Landelahni was the country’s first black-owned and women-owned executive search company. Today, the Landelahni Recruitment Group consists of a number of companies offering recruitment and coaching services across all levels of employment in both the public and private sectors.

have grown significantly, Sandra still believes that women executives need to step up to the plate - historically, women have not positioned themselves well to be ready for the board or a top job in South Africa. She says, “This is largely because of the traditional networking, such as playing golf, or going to very particular places where one might find executives getting to know one another outside of a formal process. I think that that has shifted, but what has also changed quite radically is a much more transparent process for appointing board members, so it’s not really about the social networking anymore. It’s about having a whole set of skills to function as a board”.

The group consists of:

• Landelahni Business Leaders (part of the global Amrop group) – executive recruitment and executive search

• Landelahni Leadership Development – Board and executive coaching and mentoring

• Landelahni Assessments – Executive and management assessments to identify leadership skills

• Landelahni Professional and Technical Appointments – large project professional and technical recruitment

• Landelahni Workforce Management – on-site managed staffing

Since inception, Landelahni has built a substantial track record in the appointment of black executives, and more than 40% of the executive appointments made by Landelahni are black women.

August 2011 | Management Today 57