CEO lessons:

Herman Warren is The Economist Corporate Network’s Network Director for Africa. Herman works with corporate clients to provide insight and analysis on a range of topics related to the broad and specific African context, helping clients to prosper in one of the world's fastest growing and most dynamic economic zones. He regularly chairs and moderates events and delivers custom briefings to senior executives. Herman is the author of a number of white papers on infrastructure, financial and commercial developments in the region. Herman has previously worked as a management consultant with Bain & Company, started and run a successful mobile technology company and has held senior posts in both public- and private-sector corporations. Herman holds a BBA degree in Finance from Howard University.

Prior to joining Cell C, Zaf was Chief Financial Officer at McDonald's and Ellerines Holdings and Finance Director at Johnson & Johnson. Zaf has more than 20 years of finance and business experience across major industries, multinational and listed companies and worldwide brands in multiple industries ranging from manufacturing to retail, financial services, real estate and property, food, medical devices, hospitality, mining equipment and FMCG. He spent 10 years of that time in various senior roles with JSE listed Tongaat Hulett and is currently the CFO of McDonald’s South Africa.
Zaf has a wealth of multinational finance experience with particular expertise in mergers & acquisitions, strategy development, property management, investor relations, change management and business turnaround in addition to being a skilled negotiator.
He is a qualified Chartered Accountant (SA) with a Masters in Business Leadership (MBL) from the UNISA School of Business Leadership. Zaf also holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Natal and a Honours Bachelor of Commerce degree from UNISA.

Mark Barnes graduated from the University of Cape Town in 1983 with a Bachelor of Business Science degree in the special field of Actuarial Science. After Two years in at Alexander Forbes, an Actuarial consulting firm, he joined Standard Merchant Bank (SMB) in corporate finance, a division he subsequently led for a number of years. During this period SMB was widely recognized as a leading player in M & A, public listings, public group restructurings, cross border deals and management buy-outs. Transactions in which Mr. Barnes played a leading advisory role would include the R 3.5 billion merger of certain Anglo American Free State mining interests to create Freegold (now Anglogold), the disinvestments deals of General Motors, Rank Xerox, American Home Products, Standard Bank Investment Corporation and the management buyouts of Darling and Hodgson Transport Services and Puregas. A number of significant advisory mandates were also completed, in particular within the then Barlow Rand group of companies. Numerous public listings and capital raisings were also undertaken.
Mr. Barnes then took responsibility for SMB’s Treasury operations and, in 1991, on returning from attending the PMD program at Harvard Business School, he was appointed to the board of directors of SMB. SMB later merged with the corporate areas of the Standard Bank Group to form SCMB and he was appointed as Deputy Managing Director of SCMB with operational responsibility for the Standard Bank Group’s Treasury and Project Finance Divisions – involved in significant asset based financing structures (e.g. 747 Boeing fleet). Mr. Barnes led the implementation of the two biggest ever gold producer structured funding deals in the word, for Beatrix and Western Areas mines respectively. When South African Breweries raised R1 billion of fixed rate funding by issuing the first ever listed seven-year fixed rate corporate bond in the local market the advisory team was led by Mr. Barnes.
Mr. Barnes was a member of the Standard Bank Group’s Executive Committee until he resigned in November 1996 to take up the position of Group Chief Executive of Capital Alliance Holdings Limited.