Executive Day 2026 brought together South Africa’s leading finance, IT and HR executives to explore how organisations can navigate AI adoption, leadership challenges and accelerating change without losing sight of their people.
Executive Day 2026, held at The Venue Melrose Arch in Johannesburg on 3 September, brought together South Africa’s leading financial experts and their C-suite IT and HR colleagues for a day of conversations focused on AI, leadership, organisational change and the human side of transformation.
The day opened with Executive Communities’ Speed Networking session, setting the tone for an event centred on connection, collaboration and the exchange of ideas among senior executives.
One of the morning’s key discussions, titled ‘Bubbling Blindspots: What’s missing from the conversation on AI adoption?’, featured Thabile Makgala, CHRO of Sasol and Ravi Bhat, AI officer at Microsoft.
Thabile cautioned against viewing artificial intelligence primarily as a technology implementation.
“One of the things that we are not getting right is that I think we are treating AI as a technological programme instead of it being a fundamental organisational problem,” she said.
She argued that organisations need to look beyond deploying AI tools and instead reconsider how work is designed, highlighting the importance of behaviour, leadership and organisational culture.
“The organisations that will win and succeed are the ones who not only adopt, but adapt and redesign how we work,” she said.
Ravi similarly argued that AI is less about an organisation’s ability to scale technology and more about its ability to change.
He said companies need to move beyond simply using AI tools and focus on building organisational intelligence around their unique ways of working, customer data and capabilities.
“People don't change, even if you tell them, because we're creatures of habits and organisations need to create psychological safety as employees navigate a rapidly changing workplace,” he said.
What makes a strong CEO?
Leadership took centre stage in the session ‘CEO Tells: Green flags, red flags, and everything between’, featuring Paul Norman, group CHRO of MTN, and Celiwe Ross, group chief human capital and corporate affairs officer at Old Mutual.
Paul said one of the defining qualities of an effective CEO is the ability to acknowledge their own weaknesses while creating an environment where the expertise of others can flourish.
He argued that CEOs increasingly need to create adaptable organisations built on trust, where employees and experts are empowered to challenge leadership and contribute to collective intelligence.
Celiwe identified courage, candour, curiosity and caring as important qualities in leadership. She said effective CEOs need to balance purpose with commercial outcomes while remaining accountable for strategy, culture and leadership.
Moving fast without breaking trust
The human impact of organisational change was explored further during the breakaway session ‘Change Fatigue: Moving fast without breaking trust’, featuring El Kope, Cell C CFO, Norbit Williams, general manager: group IT at Eskom, and Steven Teasdale, chief people experience officer at Discovery.
Steven said organisations need to deliberately build their capacity for change as they grow, while maintaining discipline around which initiatives enter the business pipeline.
He also highlighted the conflicting emotions employees can experience during transformation, from excitement about new possibilities to fears about job displacement.
El reflected on her experience at Cell C, where she said leadership clarity, communication and execution were critical to bringing people through a period of change.
She emphasised the importance of creating a moment of truth for leaders and ensuring that employees feel “seen and heard”.
“As AI changes how information is accessed and work is performed. AI is democratising information availability, but you still have a person behind it,” El said.
She also highlighted burnout as a reality for organisations navigating sustained change, stressing the importance of staying close to employees and supporting them through the journey.
Rethinking what organisations reward
Lauren Odell, CFO of Eqstra, challenged executives to reconsider how traditional financial hurdles can sometimes prevent organisations from experimenting and innovating.
Speaking during ‘A look in the mirror: What are we incentivising that we claim to dislike’, Lauren questioned whether organisations should always wait for a business case to meet conventional hurdle rates before testing an idea.
“I can do anything on Excel. AI can do it for me even faster and for a greater willingness to fund minimum viable products, test them and then decide whether to scale,” she said.
The inaugural ‘Bullshxt Bingo’ session, followed and it featured futurist and economist Bronwyn Williams and business transformation specialist Sharon Pearce, explored the gap between AI hype and its practical impact on the future of work.
Bronwyn challenged organisations to look at employee and customer experiences as interconnected journeys rather than isolated tasks.
She warned that breaking work down into individual activities simply to determine what can be automated risks focusing on the activity rather than the outcome.
“If we are breaking work into tasks to determine what we automate, we are automating the activity and not the outcome,” she said.
Leadership beyond the boardroom
The event concluded with ‘Human too: Leading while navigating personal challenges’, an interactive session featuring Jacques Rikhotso, CEO of Bridgestone, and Jonathan Muthige, CEO: Growth Markets at Alexander Forbes.
Jacques reflected on the importance of vulnerability, sharing and being present both at work and at home. He described how opening up about personal challenges helped him build trust with colleagues and encouraged other leaders to speak more openly about family and fatherhood.
Jonathan shared his experience of being diagnosed with stage-three prostate cancer in 2023 and navigating an intensely challenging 12 to 18 months while continuing to manage his professional responsibilities.
The day was made possible by Principal Partners, Cassava Technologies, Entelect, iOCO, MakwaIT, Old Mutual South Africa Corporate ,Regenesys Corporate Education, Executive Partners, BDO South Africa, Discovery Limited, Deel Local Payroll, powered by PaySpace, HCLTech, Hyland, ITR Technology, Jem, Kaspersky, LRMG, Marsh, Ninety One, STANLIB Asset Management, Wits Plus and Workday
