In rugby, it doesn’t matter how many metres you gained, how strong your pack was, or how well you passed—if no one puts the ball down behind the try line, you haven’t scored.
That’s the mindset I carry into every transformation I lead.
And here’s what I’ve learned: transformation isn’t a solo sport. It’s a team game. A hard, tactical, emotionally demanding, physically exhausting team game. And if you don’t build the right team—or if your team doesn’t trust, commit, and cover for each other under pressure—you’ll lose. Even with the best playbook in the world.
The teams I’ve led that achieved the most—whether at Old Mutual, Absa, or in large-scale platform transformations—didn’t win because we had rockstar individuals. We won because we built unity, trust, accountability, and purpose into the DNA of the programme.
This is how we did it.
Lesson 1: You don’t recruit players. You recruit fit.
Skills get the CV through the door. But what makes the team work is emotional intelligence, cultural awareness, and energy alignment. Especially in pan-African or cross-regional contexts, this becomes non-negotiable.
When we built the leadership team for Old Mutual’s Finance & Data Transformation Programme—across 12 countries and dozens of cultures—I was intentional about fit. It wasn’t just about qualifications. It was about team dynamics. How will this person operate in a high-pressure environment with a diverse, fast-moving group? Will they lean in when someone struggles? Can they lead without ego? Can they take feedback in stride?
I spend a lot of time on recruitment. Not just at the exec level, but across every layer of the team. Because when you get the right mix of personality, purpose, and capability—something special happens. You don’t just build a team. You build a movement.
Lesson 2: Onboarding is where culture begins
Once the team is selected, the real work begins. And I don’t mean sprint planning. I mean deliberate onboarding—not just into the what, but into the how and why.
For every major programme, we run a team induction. Not a corporate welcome pack—but a genuine, grounded session where we share:
The spoken and unspoken rules of the programme
The culture and tone we uphold
The expectation to focus on the problem, not the politics
A walk through the Tuckman model (forming, storming, norming, performing)—so that when things get bumpy, people understand this is normal, and more importantly, this is how we move through it
We talk about professionalism, listening to understand, respect, and resilience. We set the bar high—but we also commit to supporting each other to reach it.
It’s in those first few days that we define what kind of team we’re going to be. And it sets the foundation for everything that follows.
Lesson 3: Set the level—From Local League to World Cup Final
One of the key messages I share with every new programme team is this: you’re not playing a Sunday afternoon league game here. You’re playing in the Rugby World Cup Final.
It’s become something of a signature story. I use it to help people visualise the expectations—not to create pressure, but to elevate their mindset.
Here’s the framework:
At local club level, the stakes are low. Turn up, have a run, maybe a beer afterwards.
At national level, you’re representing something. There’s structure, pride, accountability.
At international level, you’re performing on a global stage—against the best, with real consequences.
At Rugby World Cup level, you are in a globally televised arena with enormous expectations.
But in the World Cup Final, there are no retries. This is delivery day. There’s no substitute for execution.
In these major programmes—especially those that are high-profile, high-pressure, and C-suite sponsored—this mindset is everything. It signals that you’re part of something bigger, more visible, and more demanding than business-as-usual.
And just like rugby, success isn’t about the star player. It’s about collective execution. Everyone must perform their role, adapt under pressure, and trust the system—and each other.
Lesson 4: One team. One scorecard. One outcome.
In every programme I’ve led, the entire leadership team shares one scorecard. Whether we succeed or fail, we do it together.
It sounds simple, but it’s rare. Too often, workstreams have their own KPIs, targets, and narratives. That breeds silos. And silos breed blame.
When everyone shares the same scorecard, there’s no incentive to protect turf—only to protect outcomes. If one workstream is struggling, the others step in. I’ve seen team leads jump on calls, unblock dependencies, support delivery, and lift each other up—not because they were told to, but because they believed in what we stood for, and in the way we worked together.
That’s when you know it’s working. That’s when it becomes more than a programme. It becomes a squad.
Lesson 5: Trust is built on shared experience
The most powerful outcome of a high-performance team isn’t the deliverables. It’s the trust. And trust isn’t built in stand-ups or retros. It’s built in the in-between moments: the long nights, the tough meetings, the unglamorous fixes, the mutual respect that forms when people see each other show up.
We had a massive programme team at Old Mutual, and yet the culture felt personal. People supported each other. They looked out for each other. They challenged each other with respect. There were no sacred cows. No politics. Just a commitment to the outcome, and a belief that we’re stronger when we’re aligned.
And that’s not accidental. It comes from clear values. We led with respect, trust, integrity, and a commitment to excellence—but most importantly, we built around lasting relationships. Because when you build for lasting relationship, you set the tone for how people treat each other. You don’t just manage conflict. You prevent it through shared intention.
The outcome: When it works, it’s magic
There’s no better feeling than watching a high-performing team execute under pressure. It’s like a great rugby team in flow—every player in position, anticipating, supporting, trusting. No shouting. No scrambling. Just rhythm, cohesion, and outcomes.
We saw that at Absa, when we scaled our shared service centre to 800+ people and still delivered market-leading customer service. We saw it in a high-impact BPO technology programme I led, where a lean team built an end-to-end service platform for complex client delivery. And we saw it at Old Mutual, where a 3.5-year transformation programme still had Weekly Wednesday forums full of energy, curiosity, and commitment right through to the end.
That doesn’t happen by chance. It happens when people feel safe, seen, and part of something bigger than their task list.
Final reflection
Transformation is never just about systems or structures. It’s about people—how they work, how they show up, and how they carry each other when it counts.
But none of it happens by accident. It starts with the leader.
As the leader, I knew I had to model the culture I wanted to see. That meant showing up with respect. Listening first. Treating every role, every contribution, as valuable. It meant creating space for people to challenge ideas—not me personally, but assumptions, designs, directions. I didn’t want yes-people. I wanted thinkers, collaborators, problem solvers.
You can’t talk about trust and excellence and then interrupt someone mid-sentence. You can’t ask for accountability and then hide from hard conversations. The team watches the leader—and the standard you walk past becomes the standard you accept.
So I set the tone. And I held it. Because I knew that what we were building wasn’t just a deliverable. It was a culture.
Build your team like a squad you’d trust in the final five minutes of a cup match. Pick for character. Onboard for culture. Lead with trust. Make it safe to win together. And most importantly— lead by example.
Because when you do, the results won’t just show up in dashboards. They’ll show up in relationships that last—long after the programme is done.