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Lindsey Hall: I'm Lindsey Hall, Head of thought leadership at S&P Global Sustainable1.

Esther Whieldon: And I'm Esther Whieldon, a senior writer on the Sustainable1 Thought Leadership Team

Lindsey Hall: Welcome to ESG Insider, a podcast hosted by S&P Global, where we explore environmental, social and governance issues that are shaping investor activity and company strategy. 

Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve been rolling out our special series focusing on women in leadership. This is a new approach for us at ESG Insider to celebrate Women’s History Month and also International Women’s Day, which was March 8th.

There is increasing focus on diversity in the sustainability world. But nonetheless, the number of women in top roles remains really low. And at S&P Global, we’ve just published some new research that looked at more than 5,400 companies assessed in the S&P Global Corporate Sustainability Assessment, or CSA. We found that only 4.4% of that universe had a woman CEO.

As we’re recording this episode today, my regular podcast cohost Esther is at the big CERAWeek energy conference in Houston, Texas, this week, where she’s conducting more interviews for this series. So today my colleague, Jennifer Laidlaw, is helping me out today. Jennifer is a senior writer on the Thought Leadership Team at S&P Global Sustainable1 and a regulator contributor to this podcast. She’s also one of the authors of this research I just mentioned.

So Jennifer, what can you tell me about the research?  

Jennifer Laidlaw: Well, clearly, as you said, the research shows that women represent a fraction of the total number of CEOs. The data also shows that the number of women in management has ticked up only slowly since the COVID-19 pandemic, something that could really restrain the pool of future women CEO candidates.

Our data also looks at the kind of employee support programs companies offer, such as childcare facilities, paid parental leave and breast-feeding or lactation facilities. And those are factors that could impact women’s career development.

Lindsey Hall: You know, Jennifer, on a personal note, I found it so interesting, how few companies said they offer breast feeding lactation facilities still today in 2023. And it's not just about whether they have the facilities, but it's also a question of whether those facilities actually work for employees.

I know back when I had my first son, I almost flamed out entirely of my career just because of the situation around breast feeding, I was at the time working on the third floor of my office building, and there was one wellness or lactation room up on the fifth floor, and there was one key to that room that was kept on the first floor. And so that meant that when I came back to work twice a day, I went from the third floor down to the first floor to get that key up to the fifth floor to pump, back to the first floor to return the key back to my desk and repeat. And it was just tiring and frustrating, but I almost ended up putting just sort of exhaustion and frustration. And I was really lucky in that situation to have a manager who was herself a working mom and gave me some really good advice and help me eventually get the situation changed.

But I think that's really what we're seeking to do with this series-- We know what the data shows us. This is an opportunity to talk to women in leadership roles and hear about their own personal experience. To do that, we're talking to women's CEOs and executives from across industries and all around the globe.

We’ve already heard from the CEO of European aluminum and energy producer Norsk Hydro. We talked to the CEO of consumer products company Seventh Generation. And we sat down with the CEO of US insurance company Horace Mann and the head of New York-based Amalgamated Bank. Jennifer who are you talking with today?

Jennifer Laidlaw: In this episode, I’m speaking with the CEO of South African real estate investment trust company Attacq, Jackie van Niekerk. She became CEO of Attacq during the COVID-19 pandemic. She explained to me how she navigated her way to the top in what she describes as a male-dominated industry. By the way, the S&P Global research that we discussed earlier shows that only 5.5% of real estate CEOs are women. Jackie also talks about having an integrated life. For her, that means integrating both her personal and professional lives and planning around that.

Here she is talking about her journey to the CEO role.   

Jackie van Niekerk: It's certainly been a journey, especially if you are young and a CEO. And then you top it all in the real estate industry, which is pretty much a man's world, especially in the construction industry especially. I think my journey of becoming a CEO has really been one of not being scared of making mistakes, not being scared of taking the road less traveled.

Having a lot of courage to say yes. And I think my biggest strength has always been to be underestimated by my peers, they're saying that, "Why would you want to be a CEO, you're a lady, you want to have kids' don't you?" And I said, "Yes, I want to have both. And putting up my hand and say, you know what, I can do it and then not being scared really gave me the courage to go the path least traveled, having kids, having a husband and not having it all. I think when you think that you're a CEO and you've got everything there, that's definitely a dream. But enjoying what I do, making mistakes has, has really led me to become a better person, become a better mom, a wife and also, I think, a leader that I want to be. And it's been a long and tough journey.

Jennifer Laidlaw: Yes, because I mean that's one of the challenges, I think, for all women that work, especially in somebody in your position. And I just wondered, how do you balance your life between kids, work? How do you deal with it all?

Jackie van Niekerk: I call it an integrated life and not a balanced life because a scale is balanced. And if you're the CEO, a lot of work is required. So then the scale is out of balance and sometimes my child is sick, and then the work scale is out of balance. So for me, it's really about an integrated life, integrating my personal life into my work life and vice versa and planning it.

I think my team hates me because I always say, guys, you need to plan the year ahead. We need to plan to make our strategy. We need to plan things. And with my husband, it's our business, we plan our lives, I'm open and transparent with him when things get really tough when its results season, and this is when I need you to pick up the load and help me make food and get the nanny involved. And similarly, so with my ExCo, especially, I always say integrated life comes from the top and my staff and the leadership around me looks at how I'm handling situations. And for us, recorded at a take an integrated life policy because life happens. -- kids childs get sick, you need to be at a funeral. You need to take a day to take care of yourself. And with Attacq, we have really embraced that, especially coming out of COVID and making sure that we don't balance, we integrate because if you try and balance the scale will always be out of sync. And that's how I do it.

Jennifer Laidlaw: Okay. Well, congratulations, sounds like you're doing a good job anyway.

Jackie van Niekerk: I did say covered with a lot of mistakes.

Jennifer Laidlaw: I'm just interested as well in your position as a woman on that where you've taken to increase gender balance and diversity at Attacq? And do you think being a woman actually influences that more?

Jackie van Niekerk: So let's start with a stat, I love stats. So were 52.6% women in Attacq. So we're definitely a company that leads not only with a female leader, but we've got ladies throughout the business and women throughout the business that from exco leadership all the way through in our business that's part of our business.

How do we address it? And I think it comes back to what I've said previously, it's really understanding that everyone has got a life, and we need to give our all at work, but we also need to give all at home. And being a female leader definitely encourages other ladies to say, "You know what if she can do it, surely, I can also do more." So for me, it's largely about at Attacq how do we approach policy? Do we allow people the flexibility in their life and how their lives should be managed better? And then also, again, being a leader that has got humanity and the ability to listen and understand what is the needs of the women in my business?

And also I think about single dads, similar needs to what a mom has, and it's hard to address that and create an environment for a mom to have the courage to say you know what, what I want the promotion. I want to be the next leader and how do we build a mentorship around that and also promote it.

But unfortunately, a lot of women today I think ... that we lose a lot of moms that go back and want to be the primary caregiver of the kids and career second. It's not a perfect science. But we really try to encourage that you can be a mom, you can be a wife, you can be a partner and you can still have a beautiful career.

Yeah, I started 6 years ago at Attacq as COO in the midst of COVID in the middle of COVID to the CEO role. We definitely have brought in over the 6 years journey, an element of we need to look at our values, we need to look at policy changes, flexiwork policy, integrated life policy and encourage it more. And I think also having more female leadership within our business have encouraged women to sta in the business. And we've definitely seen that 52% as has grown from a very low base, up to an equal porting with our peers.

Jennifer Laidlaw: Would you say like education, or government policies and flexible working or quotas, strong role models, executive leadership, what are the things that maybe help women the most?

Jackie van Niekerk: Yes. I think it's a combination of everything that definitely will help women achieve more and saying that we've already had this amazing global leaders that's shown women, what can be done.

I mean Indra Nooyi was CEO and Chairman of PepsiCo, I just look up to what she's achieved. And she's definitely been my North Star of it can be done. So all of that is, I think, a combination of really uplifting the gender equality.

And then -- maybe tongue-in-cheek -- also having a great partner and a great husband. I certainly sit here in my journey having a husband that really said to me "No, you can be more, you've got the ability." So I think it's all of that plus a partner or a family that supports you in your journey and in your aspiration.

Jennifer Laidlaw: I also ask Jackie what role diversity plays in her day-to-day job and in the company's overall strategy.

Jackie van Niekerk: Diversity for me, it's about gender, it's about race diversity and also about a different generation of diversity. So it's only a multilayered diversity that we look in at Attacq. And what we've seen is we've got a staff complement that potentially brings in a high level of energy. We've got a staff complement that also has a lot of millennials, and we started to see the Gen-Zs sort to enter into the job market. But then we've also got the older folk.

And that combination works really well to understand and influence our business of the future. I always say, if you don't understand all walks of live, you cannot -- and then we're in the real estate industry, we've built buildings, we build shopping centers. I need to understand the shopper of the future. I need to understand generations and how they're going to spend their money. I need to understand what's my future investor going to look like.

And I think that combination of having a female voice, having different walks of life, different race really brings a better package of building a business for tomorrow and future-proofing your business. So day-to-day role, it definitely brings a different level of energy into the business.

Lindsey Hall:  So Jennifer, Jackie mentioned racial diversity. And South Africa obviously has a long and difficult path in terms of race given its history of Apartheid. Did she say anything more about that?

Jennifer Laidlaw: Yes. So I ask Jackie what steps Attacq is taking to ensure it is inclusive of all races.

Jackie van Niekerk: So we've got, which we call employment equity targets, and I'm really proud of what we've achieved in our business over the last 6 years. We've transformed our employee base and also how we procure our business and our services through employment equity and good employment policy. And we've achieved -- and we -- it's still a journey, it's not perfect, but we're achieving this through good policy, I think good discipline, and initially, it was a very slow change. But once you start changing and the company culture grows for the better, it becomes so easy to implement. So it's been a long journey, but through I think strong policy and discipline, we're starting to achieve a diverse company that represents our country.

Lindsey Hall: So we heard Jackie mention at the beginning how the real estate industry was very much a man's world when she started out. Jennifer, how does she say she dealt with that?

Jennifer Laidlaw: Well, she had a few interesting anecdotes to tell me. Here she is again. You hear her mention the JSE. That's the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.

Jackie van Niekerk: Yeah, so I was 32 when I was the only women's CEO of a previous company that we listed on the JSE and another person asked the Chairman, is he crazy of trusting a young lady spearheading a company. And he just said to them, "Easy, she can do the job." So a lot of times in my career I've been going into a meeting and it's "Oh this is the minute taker, or this is the lady taking the coffee order." And I'm like "No, no, no, I'm the one doing actually doing the presentation to you." So I've had it all. People say I'm ostracizing.

It's been an incredible journey. But to the balance of that, I've also had incredible mentors which has been males saying "You know what, we see what you do, we believe in what you do. Don't be discouraged." So with a lot of strong mentorship, I think I've pierced through the veil of the naysayers and you know people thinking you're the minute taker that's pitching up for a meeting. And I think the performance of what we had to achieve as a company has also showed that it is not just the males environment, it is an any-person environment that can do the job. So a lot of ups and owns, but definitely, I think strong mentorship has helped me a lot believing in myself and getting the job done.

Jennifer Laidlaw: Right. What were people's reaction when you said, no, no, it's not me, that's the minute taker what was their reaction?

Jackie van Niekerk: Firstly shock -- and I think we sat down and once we've presented a compelling business case, they were like: "Okay, we hear you. We've listened to you, and we believe in the business case so we will definitely invest." Yes. So it's been remarkable to see faces and reactions when your corporate advisers introduces this is the CEO, and she will be doing the leading the presentation. So quite interesting conversations and situations.

Jennifer Laidlaw: I bet it must have been very interesting to see people's reactions. Apart from mentorship, is there anything else that's been helpful for you in advancing your career? You mentioned your husband before had been very supportive, are there any other factors maybe that you can think of?

Jackie van Niekerk: When I started out my career and again, being a young CEO, policy there was not such things. So I really can't say that I had integrated Flexiwork policy. We had to be 7:00 at the office. You go home at 6 at night. So I definitely delayed having children as a young adult, we had children later on, which you regret sometimes in your lives, but I've got 2 healthy beautiful kids now.

So again, the pros and the cons definitely were different. Mentorship and my upbringing was really hard. I had to pay from my own university fees, lost my mom when I was 15, dad had no money. I literally had to get myself and my brother through school and through universities. So I was quite tough. I had a very, very tough upbringing. And the one small opportunity I got I really took with both hands. And there was no no to me. I just said to make it work, and it did, brought me great success. And then with great mentorship enough phenomenal that's how I achieved where I'm at today.

Jennifer Laidlaw: Yes, that's great. I mean, really difficult challenges early on in your career and your life right that really set you on the road to this career. It's really interesting. In terms of your leadership style, how would you describe it? And did it change at all during the pandemic?

Jackie van Niekerk: Oh yes, absolutely. Going into the pandemic, I was COO and coming out of the pandemic, I was CEO. I've learned that leadership is about creating better people around me. It's not about me. It's not about my accolades. I've learned that my job as a leader is to send better people back home. And that's my philosophy. That's how I want to lead my company and how I want to lead people, it's difficult, especially if in the South African context, we sit in a perfect crisis as it is at the moment. But really, I've learned it's about listening, it's about understanding and then it's about implementing. And throughout COVID, we were all sitting at home, your forced to be online. I really started listening to my people, to my clients, understanding what are you actually going through, learning how to pause and then implement. And that's the greatest thing I've got out of COVID and it's really, really helped me become a leader that's for the people and not just for the numbers.

Jennifer Laidlaw: What advice would you give to an aspiring female CEO?

Jackie van Niekerk: Advice I would say is to first to believe in yourself, then to take the road less traveled, be prepared to make mistakes and pick yourself up, don't have the imposter syndrome, because I get that a lot by myself as well. Pick yourself up and learn and continue. We might not always become the CEO but be the best person that you want to become. And along with that is trying to enjoy the journey and don't put things off, don't put kids off, don't put marriage off, don't put the trip off, try and integrate it. And if you stand back, you might have a beautiful life that had missing parts but at least you've had the courage to do what job you wanted to do. And then hopefully, you get to your own top.

Lindsey Hall: I love the way Jackie described how being prepared to make mistakes really helped her in her career.

Jennifer Laidlaw: Yes. And I think her comments really inspiring, especially when she says women don't need to put different parts of their lives on hold to have a career.

Lindsey Hall: Well, thank you, Jennifer. And to our audience, please stay tuned as we continue to bring you interviews with women's CEOs and executives for our special women and leadership series.

Thanks so much for listening to this episode of ESG Insider and a special thanks to our producer, Kyle Cangialosi. Please be sure to subscribe to our podcast and sign up for our weekly newsletter, ESG Insider. See you next time.   

 

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