Staying calm under pressure says a lot about a boss.
By all accounts, Serame Taukobong was confident as he calmly went through media interviews soon after being announced as CEO-in-waiting for Telkom.
Taukobong, the CEO of Telkom Consumer Business for the past three years, will be taking over from Telkom’s outgoing boss Sipho Maseko.
Last week, Telkom announced that Maseko was leaving the company after eight years at the helm. Maseko’s departure was stated as for June next year, but Taukobong could take over the hot seat sooner.
The handover plan will be several months long and is expected to be a smooth transition. Listening to Taukobong and Maseko, one gets the impression both executives are level-headed enough to pull off the transition smoothly.
Investors and customers have been spared the drama last seen at Telkom when former CEO Sizwe Nxasana left without completing his handover to his successor, Papi Moletsane.
Confirming his readiness to hand over the reins, Maseko said: “I feel now is the right time for me to step aside and make way for a new leader who will take Telkom to even greater heights.”
Commenting on his elevation to the top job and whether two bulls could be in the same kraal, Taukobong, speaking on 702 Talk Radio, said: “Absolutely, I think the kraal is big enough, and second, there are lessons to be learnt from that bull (Maseko).”
If his answer does not reflect a confident executive, nothing will.
However, Taukobong must be concerned that “network failure” abruptly ended his interview on The Money Show with Bruce Whitfield. The network failure was a disservice to Telkom customers who were waiting for Taukobong to unpack his plans on Whitfield’s show. This anomaly could be an accurate reflection of SA’s ICT industry that promises a lot but fails to deliver on customer requirements.
Taukobong must find better ways to make Telkom’s infrastructure reliable. I also hope the “drop call” phenomenon nudges Taukobong to create data solutions purely for users to call radio talk shows without interruption.
Taukobong could also develop data solutions for remote work services such as Microsoft Teams and Zoom. Such data solutions could be suitable not only for Telkom but for its rivals too.
Industry professionals describe Taukobong as cheerful, approachable, level-headed, a strategic thinker and a collaborative executive.
Out of curiosity, I decided to check the meaning of his surname Taukobong. While researching, I came across a text from trailblazing interior designer Nthabi Taukobong which caught my eye.
Nthabi was born in 1970 at Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto. I also found out that the Telkom boss-in-waiting was born in the same hospital in the same year.
I didn’t want to explore the similarities but wanted to know the meaning of his surname. Nthabi translates Taukobong as meaning “Let there be calm”. In Setswana, the direct translation of Taukobong is “a lion in the blanket”, she explains.
“A peaceful lion at rest. When the lion is asleep in his blanket, there is a sense of calm in the jungle ... Because when the lion is in a state of natural rest, all animals in the kingdom are safe and content,” explains Nthabi.
So after rereading Nthabi’s take on Taukobong’s surname, I assume that maybe Telkom is moving away from its tumultuous years and entering a period of calm.
For the past eight years under Maseko, Telkom has faced several challenges such as collision with the trade unions on strategy.
In addition, Telkom faced a challenging competitive environment as users migrated from legacy fixed-line telephones to new players in the fibre and LTE space.
Maseko has streamlined Telkom and reduced headcount by close to 60%. He managed to steady the ship as promised and has since sailed away from rocky waters.
During his tenure, Maseko turned the company around from a traditional fixed-line business to a portfolio comprising mobile, IT, wholesale infrastructure, and a masts and tower portfolio.
The company is due a period of calmness with a strategy that will genuinely unlock shareholder value, perhaps through separate listings of the various parts of Telkom. Alternatively, Telkom could bring in outside investors in some of these units.
Challenges are still there, but some business units — Gyro, Openserve and BCX — have the potential to do well.
Gyro is Telkom’s wholly-owned subsidiary that manages its masts and towers, property development, and property management services. It has the potential to be floated on the JSE or to attract investors.
Telkom also has one of SA’s biggest property portfolios that started being acquired under the apartheid state machinery.
It is believed Telkom may announce a strategic investor in Gyro in the next few weeks.
Furthermore, BCX has about three out of four tier-4 data centres on the continent and has invested in the modernisation of the 10 data centre locations. Therefore Telkom may create a co-location and carrier-neutral data centre infrastructure business with BCX as one of the anchor tenants, bringing new investors.
The new company could target huge opportunities for cloud computing, virtual reality, artificial intelligence, 5G and edge services, driving the growth of data centre demand. So an investor could help Telkom and BCX strategically invest in new large-scale data centres for enterprise and hyperscale requirements.
Openserve also stands an excellent chance to be floated on the JSE as a stand-alone business.
What Telkom will do with these businesses is anyone’s guess. However, Telkom’s strategy coined by Maseko must succeed because the company is a lifeblood to the country’s banking industry as it enables Absa, FNB, Nedbank and Standard Bank to operate automatic teller machines (ATMs).
Asked by Business Day TV whether he is ready for the next chapter, Taukobong said: “I have been with Telkom for the past three years running the mobile business and exposed to the broader group. So I think there is readiness, and we are ready to go take action.”
It looks like Taukobong is inheriting a winning horse, and his job is to ensure the strategy developed by Maseko delivers shareholder value. That said, his immediate task is to work with Maseko to ensure that a proper replacement is urgently found for Telkom Consumer Business.
I think Taukobong will be able to identify a replacement. There are plenty of younger executives with relevant skills. I believe he should go for an executive with skills in financial services.
Telkom Consumer Business will need someone with digital expertise to create new solutions to compete with bigger rivals Vodacom and MTN. These big telcos are diversifying their businesses into adjacent revenue streams, especially the lucrative financial services sector.
The appointment of the Telkom Consumer Business boss will indicate to the market where Taukobong wants to take Telkom’s growth engine.
Taukobong has been chosen by history or, more importantly, has been preparing himself for the enormous task ahead that requires a calm person with the stealth of a lion.
• Lourie is a former correspondent for Thomson Reuters, Business Report, Fin24 and Finweek magazine. He is also the founder and editor of https://www.techfinancials.co.za or TechFinancials
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.