MOL fares well in equity stakes

'Colour and gender aside appointee must be able to do the job' Ray Smuts WAS A time in South African shipping when employing people of colour or women for any other than basic tasks was considered fanciful at best. Those once-predominantly white, largely male, bastions are slowly but surely crumbling as South Africa strives to bring about equal opportuntiy and fair treatment in the workplace by way of the Employment Equity Act. The Act seeks, under penalty of non or under-compliance, to implement affirmative action measures to redress the employment disadvantages experienced by designated groups in the past in order to ensure their equitable representation at all occupational categories and levels. Some companies may argue this is easier said than done, not so Mitui O.S.K. Lines SA, a shining example that transformation can be achieved quite painlessly - and not at the expense of tokenism such as employing improperly qualified people purely on the basis of colour or gender. Today, only two years after opening in South Africa, MOL employs 106 people throughout the country and fields a 14-member management team that includes two women and four whites. Human resources manager Carol Barends says shipping has always been an exclusive industry for the "previously advantaged" and that MOL, by uplifting its own people wherever possible, has moved "streets ahead" on equity for which she credits managing director Dave Giraudeau. In Cape Town last week to engage in a think tank before drawing up an equity plan for presentation to management on July 13, was MOL's Equity Forum, comprising representatives elected by staff from around the country. Acting as an outside facilitator was labour and employment specialist lawyer Marleen Potgieter, director of the company Equity Works. With an equity process client list of more than 20 - of which MOL is the only shipping line - she is clearly well pleased at what transpired during the two-day forum. So how is MOL faring in the equity stakes, I wonder aloud? "Very good," she responds. I would score it eight out of ten if not higher. "MOL has an extremely interactive, flat management structure that is not very authoritarian. Flatter management means that it will also invite input from employees which is very apparent here. "What the Act promotes very actively is that you cannot appoint somebody merely because of colour or gender. You have got to make sure they can do the job."