Partnership to bring international speakers to SA

Tina Schneidermann, president of Global Leaders, says: “Corporate leaders need the most current strategy and information at their fingertips, in order to make the most relevant choices for their business. We are delighted to be working with SAS to ensure executives are part of the process of creating a leadership framework in Africa.”

The first event SAS partnered with the company on was the Global Leaders Africa Summit in 2006, and notable speakers included New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani; Carly Fiorina, the former CEO of HP; Scott Bedbury, former marketing chief for Nike and Starbucks; and Wiseman Nkuhlu, former economic advisor to Thabo Mbeki and chief executive of NEPAD.

The first event this year will take place on 27 March 2007 at Gallagher Estate in Midrand, Johannesburg. Prahalad, who will be presenting Profitable Strategies for Developing New Markets, providing delegates with entirely new, effective and innovative ways of conducting business relevant to emerging economies (www.globalleadersevents.com/prahalad).

Speakers for the rest of the year will include Michael Porter, the American academic focused on management and economics, currently the Bishop William Lawrence University professor based at Harvard Business School leading the Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness; and Dave Ulrich, a professor of business administration at the University of Michigan whose teachings and research addresses the question: how to create an organisation that adds value to employees, customers, and investors.

Says Val Moodley, product and marketing manager at SAS South Africa, “Our drive among our customers is to turn data into actionable intelligence, which gives businesses the ability to make decisions based on analysed data with predictive analysis. The Global Leaders framework is an extension of this ethos. As an example Prahalad is widely acknowledged as one of the world’s most significant forces in corporate thinking, mirroring our own aim to be seen to be assisting our customers with giving them the right solutions to be able to be competitive in the global marketplace.”