Interview: Axiz executive Traci Maynard on ethical leadership

Loading player...
In this episode of the podcast, TechCentral speaks to Traci Maynard, an executive at technology distributor Axiz, about the important of ethical leadership and good corporate governance in South Africa’s IT industry.
In light of the various scandals that have erupted around several high-profile companies in the past 18-24 months, Maynard talks about how corporate South Africa allowed itself to be caught up in the state capture narrative, the risk to corporate reputations and the need for solid governance controls to ensure wrongdoing isn’t allowed to flourish.
She explains the types of governance checks and balances that need to be put in place to ensure companies aren’t found wanting -- and looks specifically at some of the controls Axiz has in place to prevent corrupt and unethical practices.
Axiz, part of the JSE-listed Aviva Holdings, is a major player in the complex South African IT distribution market. It, along with other distributors, work with multinational vendors to supply technology products and services into the public sector and into corporate clients. With many parts to the chain, Maynard explains how ensuring ethical behaviour at all levels can sometimes be quite challenging.
In the podcast, she talks through a scenario of where and how unethical behaviour might creep into a big tender, for example, and how companies should determine what amounts to good business and what doesn’t. What red flags should companies be looking out for?
It’s a great discussion on a crucial topic -- don’t miss it!
24 Oct 2019 English South Africa Technology · Business

Other recent episodes

TCS | Frogfoot sees bigger fibre deals coming

Frogfoot plans to keep buying smaller fibre network operators in South Africa’s suburbs as the market consolidates, but CEO Shane Chorley stopped short of ruling out a sale of the business. “I’d be ignorant to say that we would ignore any offer,” Chorley said on the latest episode of the…
8 Oct 40 min

Meet the CIO | Vodacom’s Mohamed Sami on the agentic future

Mohamed Sami, group chief information officer at Vodacom, says autonomous AI agents that resolve customer problems without handing them to a human are the next big shift in customer experience – and that it is closer than many think. Speaking on TechCentral’s Meet the CIO podcast series, brought to you…
5 Oct 44 min

TCS | Norrsken22’s Lexi Novitske on how China is winning African tech

Chinese companies have built their position in African technology one layer at a time – first phones and telecoms equipment, then fintech and now the AI models that local start-ups build on. American private capital, meanwhile, is pulling back. Lexi Novitske, general partner at Norrsken22, thinks US investors will regret…
1 Oct 28 min

TCS | Dominic White and Adam Ely on AI agents going rogue

AI agents are no longer a thought experiment for security teams. They are breaking out of test environments, hacking real companies and, according to one of our guests, already going rogue inside large businesses. In this episode of the TechCentral Show, TechCentral deputy editor Fanie van Rooyen talks to Dominic…
29 Sep 1 hr 26 min

TCS | Octotel’s Trevor van Zyl on the fibre merger question

Octotel CEO Trevor van Zyl joins the TechCentral Show to talk about where South Africa’s fibre market goes next – including a potential merger with MetroFibre Networx. Van Zyl told TechCentral that Octotel and MetroFibre Networx are assessing a combination that would create the country’s third-largest fibre network operator, with…
16 Sep 25 min