Ross Wilson, Chief People Officer: Corporate and Investment Banking at Absa Group, lead a delegation in Mauritius in February. The aim of the visit was to “strengthen our relationships, deepen our understandings of market dynamics, and identify opportunities for collaboration and growth, ensuring that Absa’s Corporate and Investment Banking division remains at the forefront of serving our clients’ evolving needs across the continent and our international operations.” In an interview to Le Mauricien, Ross Wilson insisted on being a force for good in the communities in which Absa Group operates.
Q: In the first place, what is the object of the visit of your delegation in Mauritius?
A: As the Corporate and Investment Banking division of Absa Group, we operate a Pan-African business. This means the success of the business relies on many teams in different parts of the continent (and in our global locations) working together to serve our clients. As the Executive Committee, we are committed to getting closer to all our businesses and understanding the local perspective in each market. Our aim with this visit is to spend time with clients, colleagues, and local stakeholders to understand how we can help take the Absa Corporate and Investment Banking business to the next level. In doing so, we aim to strengthen our relationships, deepen our understanding of market dynamics, and identify opportunities for collaboration and growth, ensuring that Absa's Corporate and Investment Banking division remains at the forefront of serving our clients' evolving needs across the continent and our international operations.
Ross Wilson, Chief People Officer CIB Division of Absa Group, lead a delegation in Mauritius recently. The aim of the visit was to “strengthen our relationships, deepen our understandings of market dynamics, and identify opportunities for collaboration and growth, ensuring that Absa’s Corporate and Investment Banking division remains at the forefront of serving our clients’ evolving needs across the continent and our international operations. In an interview to Le Mauricien, Ross Wilson insisted on being a force for good in the communities in which Absa Group operates.
Q: What is the role of the Group Chief People Officer within the context of the CIB sector of Absa?
A: At our core, CIB is a talent business. We differentiate ourselves through the quality of our people, who are our most important asset. The services and solutions we provide to our clients are differentiated based on a unique combination of the skills, experience, and creativity of our people. As a bank, our view is that all of our people are talent.
As the Chief People Officer, my role is to lead and direct the Human Capital function for the Corporate and Investment Bank across all of its operations spanning Africa and our International Corridors. I am responsible for setting and directing the execution of a Human Capital strategy for CIB that enables the bank to meet its strategic priorities through its people. I lead a team of Business Partners who interface with and advise the various CIB Business Lines, and Human Capital Centres of Excellence, which provide specialist advice and services to the business, including Talent Acquisition, Learning and Development, Talent Management, Employee Relations, and Reward.
At its core, my role is to enable the business to define and meet its talent requirements at a tactical and strategic level, which is achieved through our core practices, including Talent Acquisition, Learning and Development, and Talent Management, focused on succession planning and enabling our people to develop and advance through their careers. Through these practices, our intent is to build and maintain a talented and diverse workforce. At Absa, we intend to be a leader in diversity and inclusion and are taking deliberate steps to increase our diversity, including the representation of women in senior management, so that we are representative of the markets in which we operate. We believe that this diversity is a competitive advantage fostering greater innovation through diversity of thought and sustaining high performance over time. These activities are underpinned by a focus on our organizational culture, particularly enabling an engaging, inclusive, and supportive CIB culture that delivers a unique and compelling colleague experience, inspiring and sustaining high performance.
Q: Where do the human resources within the Absa Structure in Africa come from?
A: We employ talent from all of the markets in which we have a physical presence, which includes our operations across Africa as well as our International Corridors in the UK, USA, and China. We have an international mobility strategy that enables us to move talent across these markets to support the commercial needs of the bank as well as to develop our talent through exposure to different products and markets in alignment with their personal career development plans, contributing to their long-term success within Absa.
All of our roles within Absa are advertised within the bank to provide our people with the opportunity for career advancement and mobility. Within CIB in 2023, 35% of our vacancies were filled by talent already working for Absa, including instances of colleagues taking up opportunities in different countries across the markets we operate in. In this regard, we have successfully relocated colleagues from Africa to the UK, USA, and China.
Given that we operate in a highly regulated, scarce skill, and complex environment, we do occasionally source talent with niche skills that are not readily available in our key international markets.
Q: Can you elaborate on your strategy? Do local banks get their local resources locally? Do you provide for training etc?
A: At its core, our People strategy is to create and sustain a diverse, deep, and market-leading talent pool.
We focus on being a force for good in the communities in which we operate; therefore, most of our talent needs are met by sourcing talent locally. To enable this, a key priority for Absa is to be a top employer in the markets in which we operate. We are proud to have maintained Top Employer in Africa accredited status to enable this.
We invest generously in learning and development across the talent pool, from graduates to experienced colleagues. Where talent needs cannot be met locally, we source talent from elsewhere across the Absa Group, leveraging our International Mobility offering. This allows talent to be deployed on a short- or long-term basis to different markets across our operations, and by hiring talent internationally.
In addition to fostering a diverse talent pool, we are dedicated to cultivating an inclusive and supportive workplace culture where every individual feels valued, respected, and empowered to contribute their unique perspectives and talents.
Our intent as a bank is to be a leader in Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging. In many of our markets, we have under-representations of women in senior roles, and we want to be an example in the industry by actively promoting and championing women in our organization. We believe that this diversity is a competitive advantage, leading to diversity of thought and innovative solutions for our clients.
Q: How do you proceed to recruit your human resources? What are the qualifications or talents needed to be qualified for a job within the Absa Structure?
A: We are focused on maximising career mobility opportunities for our talent; therefore, every vacancy is advertised internally within Absa.
In addition to this, we source talent in the external market leveraging various channels including our Absa careers pages, social media platforms, recruitment agencies, and talent search companies. For key and hard-to-fill roles, our Talent Acquisition teams are proactive in mapping and engaging talent in the market.
A key focus for us is on building talent pipelines, particularly young talent pipelines, for which we have a Young Talent Team responsible for acquiring graduates from universities via our Graduate Development Programmes.
Within the Corporate and Investment Bank, our roles require at least a university degree. We recruit talent with various degrees including Commerce, Finance/Accounting, Law, Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Social Sciences. It is the unique combination of these qualifications together with on-the-job experiences that enables creative solutioning for our clients.
Furthermore, we are committed to providing ongoing learning and development opportunities to our talent, ensuring they have the necessary skills and experiences to excel in their careers and contribute effectively to the success of the Corporate and Investment Bank.
Q: How do Mauritian talents fit in the growing CIB segment in Africa?
A: Mauritius is key contributor to our franchise through its diversified product offering, and as a result, the island has a strong collection of CIB talent to grow the CIB Franchise pan-Africa wide. The business itself, contributes significantly to the revenue of our Regional operations, and this is delivered through the calibre and unique combination of skills that the talent in the market possess. We have been impressed by the depth of the local talent many of which have gained experience internationally, including in Global Financial centres and across Africa. Further to this, the frictionless immigration regulations enable Absa to deploy and attract high skilled talent to the island. We see opportunity to leverage Mauritius as a hub to which we can deploy international talent to enable our operations across Africa.
The Mauritian market continues to be a growth region for us as a Bank and our ambitions can only be realised through the acquisition, development, management and retention of the skilled and diverse workforce, who have deep expertise navigating the complexity of Corporate and Investment Banking. For us, as Absa, Mauritius represents more than just a regional operation, it is a core part of our growth strategy, and these ambitious goals that we have set can only be achieved through the Mauritian talent pool, leveraging their diverse skills, regional knowledge, language proficiency, networks, and innovative mindset.
