#185: Leadership Lessons (from Dr Imtiaz Sooliman)
“Don’t underestimate the value of a good deed. It comes back to you in a blessing – not necessarily material, but in ways you can never imagine”
Dr. Imtiaz Sooliman
Dear Friends
A while back, Mr. Siphiwe Mpye, editor of BusinessDay’s Wanted, asked me to reflect on being human in this complex time. My thoughts are in the 1 December edition. In it, I write, “We must remember joy and create joy for without it, what is left?”
As I re-read those words, I was reminded of these, “Birds sang even during the war. Therein lies the whole horror…and consolation.” They come from Georgi Gospodinov’s, International Booker Prize-winning, Time Shelter. And then, there is Langston Hughes’ instruction, “Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly”.
On Thursday night, Manyaku Mashilo’s latest show An Order of Being opened at the V&A Waterfront’s Southern Guild Gallery. It is a magnificent body of work. Reflecting on the opening she writes “This year has been many things. But still we move. I hope this can be a healing moment for you too”.
It is with this spirit that we turn to today’s letter.
A few weeks ago, I told you I was quick (and lucky) enough to snag a few cases of Duncan Savage’s latest releases. This week, he received the happy news that South Africa’s premiere wine awards – the Platters – declared his Cinsault, Syrah and Straw Wine to be the country’s best. In addition, he won 5-star awards for the ‘Never Been Asked to Dance’ Chenic Blanc and his Touriga Syrah blend ‘Are We There Yet’. I suspect that most of his wines are now sold out (I know because typically I miss out), but if you’re looking to treat yourself, Cape Town’s Wine Cellar does a great job of curating many of the 5-star winners. If you want a quick and easy way to get them into your glass, you can buy them here.
In the Power of the Powerless, Václav Havel writes “Only by creating a better life can a better system be developed”, which takes me to the next item on my happy list, Courtney Atkinson’s Constantia Food Club, which was the global winner of Xero’s Beautiful Business Fund. Food clubs are a powerful way of linking small-scale regenerative producers directly with customers and the South African movement has been catalysed by founder Jessica Merton who built the technology and supply chains that have birthed numerous local food clubs. Each club creates a better life for the producers in the value chain and is slowly shifting how agricultural and retail systems operate.
Another award-winner is Carol-Ann Davids whose How to Be a Revolutionary has deservedly been snacking up this year’s literary awards and last week won another, this time the Sunday Times Literary Award. You can read more about her book here. If you haven’t read it, put it on the Christmas list. And then, there was this International Emmy for Best Kid’s Animation won by a South African animation company for their film, The Smeds and the Smoos.
For the last two weeks, I have promised you reflections on Shafiq Morton’s story of Dr. Imtiaz Sooliman and Gift of the Givers, A Mercy to All, here they are.
/ strategy
Founded by Sooliman in 1992, Gift of the Givers is Africa’s largest non-governmental humanitarian agency employing more than 100 people with offices in South Africa, Yemen, Somalia, Syria, Gaza, Malawi and Zimbabwe. Morton first wrote A Mercy to All in 2014. At that point they had disbursed just over R1 billion in aid. By 2021 (when Morton updated the book) the number had passed R3.8 billion.
The chapters of his book show the extent of this South-Africa founded NGO’s work – Pakistan, Haiti, Nepal, Somalia, Knysna, Khayelitsha. The breadth of the work is inspiring. They’ve worked in forty-four countries. The cast of characters who volunteer is diverse, united by their desire to help people in crisis.
The chapters also reveal painful truths. Chapter 7 “Xenophobia” tells the story of xenophobic violence in South Africa during 2008. Eleven years later, the country repeated the horror. Chapter 8 is “2009: Gaza” and here we are again. Sooliman differentiates between two types of crisis natural disasters and man-made suffering. And it is the latter that pains him most. Of course, natural disasters increasingly have their roots in our actions, but that’s a topic for another day.
Morton doesn’t tell us much about the founder nor the strategy and mechanics of how the organisation grew, it is a journalistic account that captures both generosity, bravery, and tragedy, yet throughout the book are clues of the strategy behind the success.
It is a truism of powerful strategy, ‘understand your customers’.
Shaik Safer Efendi was Sooliman’s spiritual advisor and the man who told him to start Gift of the Givers. He advised him, “Go out in the street without your coat some cold winter’s day, just to see how it is for those with no coats at all. As long as your stomach is full, you will know nothing about the conditions of the starving…”
It is a recipe not only for founding a successful NGO but for being a better human.
Dr As’ad Bhorat is a veteran of the Givers’ missions. He first heard of the organisation in an interview Sooliman gave, describing a mother pulling her child from the rubble after an earthquake. He says “I still remember the exact spot where I stopped on the road and volunteered. I was told there were enough doctors, but there was a need for anesthetists. So, I went”.
Bhorat in turn recruited an orthopaedic surgeon, Dr Johnny De Beer, who has since been on seven missions. Each connection leading to another.
It is a mark of Sooliman’s leadership. He asks. Throughout Morton’s telling, Sooliman is on TV, on radio, never for himself, always creating awareness. We can mistakenly think of leadership as a solo flight, but power rests in the ability to make requests, to connect, to collaborate. Time and again, Sooliman does that.
In the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic, Sooliman walked into a public hospital and noticed two empty wards. The officials told him they belonged to a private hospital and their completion had been halted as the pandemic paused investments. Sooliman took over and five days later there were two more wards with which to save lives.
He brings one lens to every situation – how do we help? With that clarity, he avoids being caught in other’s obstacles. Morton observes “For Sooliman it is never a question of statistics. In someone needs help, they need help. If you are starving or homeless you do not care about decimals or tipping points”.
Where the officials were caught in contracts and process, leading them to think the half-complete wards were an immovable fact of life, Sooliman saw a resource to be unlocked. Processes and rules are useful. They can also kill innovation. When process comes before purpose, you’re always going to be less effective. Clear purpose makes you move. Process should only ever serve purpose. Process for process sake is always an impediment.
// self
The aforementioned Dr. de Beer reflects that “Everyone wants to help other people. We’re born to serve. When you help people in these crises, they are just so grateful. What you do in those crisis situations is indispensable to those concerned. It’s very satisfying”.
He reflects a human truth. Whilst much may be made of self-serving success, it denies a simple truth that we all intuitively know, that is consistently revealed by psychological research and has long been encoded in our religions and our philosophies. It’s a simple framing ‘help others’. In this world, it is revolutionary.
/// soul
In September, I attended the Africa in the World Festival in Stellenbosch. It led me to revisit the Nobel Prize acceptance speeches of Wole Soyinka and Abdulrazak Gurnah, as both were speakers.
At the festival, Soyinka said, “Political morality begins when one is able to identify with any people, anywhere in the world without hedging, without fudging, without relativism”. It is an appropriate message to end this November.
Africa in the World is a special gathering with 180 participants from 23 countries. If you’d like to know more, watch this.
All the best
Karl
PS. I’m beginning to wrap up my year. There’ll be three more letters and then we’re done. I write this letter to share the work I do in deepening my coaching practice. If you’d like to work with me next year, you can book an introductory session here.