Keeping your talent

Faced with challenges both unique to the continent and familiar the world over, Africa’s accounting firms are struggling to retain their best talent.

In reality, Africa’s retention challenge is perhaps starker and more nuanced than elsewhere, mainly because professionals across the continent have their eyes set on emigration, or at least moves to the local offices of multinationals, which are perceived as offering structured career paths, better benefits and international exposure.

The toughest demographic to hang on to are the qualified and experienced. James Obogwu, managing partner at BBC Professionals in Lagos, Nigeria, recently lost seven qualified staff to Big Four firms in one fell swoop. To stem the tide, his firm has substantially increased salaries, promoted top performers and promised quick paths to partnership.

Money talks

‘Our main challenge in retaining staff is money. People want big salaries, but you can’t give what you don’t have. If we assure an employee that they will be made a partner or director, they’re much more likely to stay,’ he says.

Felix Kukuia, a partner at DKF Professionals in Ghana, is taking a similar tack by offering quarterly bonuses to reward hard work and performance, and flexible working to alleviate the pressure on qualified staff, while also seeking to encourage loyalty by fostering a sense of ownership and a positive work environment. This includes investing in training and funding certification, providing clear career paths, encouraging open and transparent communication between management and teams, and involving staff in key business decisions.

Mazars has also taken steps to revise reward and bonus schemes for mid-to-senior level staff, including introducing regular industry benchmarking. Beyond this, the firm’s South Africa HR lead Susan Truter espouses a holistic approach to retention, which includes working collaboratively with individuals to develop clear career and learning paths, while building a culture of overall balance, wellness and communal purpose.

‘Clearly communicating the firm’s strategic objectives and values resonates with people and provides them with a “why”,’ she says. ‘We’ve also implemented a programme focusing on the development of women in the business, which has shown to improve retention of talented women at all levels.’

As members of large international networks, firms like Mazars can offer global mobility and cross-service line opportunities. However, while certainly a strong recruiting hook, this can be a double-edged sword, with local offices losing talented staff to firms overseas.

Steady drain

Over the past 10 months, Kreston Zimbabwe has lost 10% of its experienced staff, says partner Tinashe Murerekwa FCCA. ‘The moment they qualify, they’re attracted to greener pastures. We can’t meet their salary demands, so we’ve accepted that we’re a conveyor belt and have to find other ways of retaining people.’

This has led to a thorough rejigging of its hiring and retention strategy. ‘The UK, Australia, Canada, the US and the Middle East want post-graduates, so we’re going after A-level finishers,’ says Tinashe. ‘We’ve synchronised our in-house training with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Zimbabwe (ICAZ), which requires three years’ work experience for post-graduates or five years for A-level students. This gives us the chance to train them and get them running clients quickly, potentially within three years.

‘We currently have 55-60 students on either ICAZ or ACCA, and this will give us continuity. We accept we might not be able to keep 95% of our senior staff, but of the current 55-60 trainees, at least some will stay, and we’ll invest in them to become seniors.’

A potentially positive turn comes from PwC Zambia, where partner Malcolm Jhala FCCA says that while the firm is plugging gaps left by people venturing overseas, some are also returning. ‘Recently, we had a staff member return after two years in Europe doing transfer pricing with a competitor – he actually asked to come back. It’s such a nice story to tell. Let them go, experience new work cultures, then bring that learning back to us. Being part of a global network of firms helps us; our secondment policies are working very well.’

Wellbeing concerns

It’s not only for money that people seek moves away from the continent. Mental health, wellbeing and career development are high on the list too. South African chartered accounting firm Accensis now provides wellness and team-building days, and birthday leave and religious leave. It has also started running personal finance workshops to help people make good financial decisions.

‘Enhancing the work culture, improving work-life balance, flexibility, perks and benefits, special leave, increasing team building activities, running more social events, generous salary increases, motivation, encouragement, and praising good work – we as a firm and leadership must do all of these if we’re to curtail high staff turnover,’ say Accensis HR consultant Kuresha Subramony and director Umar Karim.

BDO in Cape Town employs a confidential in-house counsellor who provides free sessions to staff, as well as an external coach who provides sessions on career planning, and even 10-month leadership and self-development programmes.

‘Wellness and mental health are important to young people, especially since Covid-19,’ says chief people officer Jenny Gonsalves. ‘So organisations must allocate a lot more time to this, be it through talks or other initiatives, such as counselling.’