Message from the patron of The Good Governance Academy, Professor Mervyn King SC

The Second Colloquium of The Good Governance Academy was held on 28 November 2019. As with the first colloquium there was input from universities and business schools on a critical governance issue, namely Effective Corporate Leadership.

The Academy aims to hold at least two colloquia per year and provide attendees with exposure to current critical governance issues. Speakers from around the world will present thought provoking content and engage attendees to discuss the practicalities of these matters. The Academy aims to ensure that the best of thought leadership is imparted to educators and influencers for the benefit of future corporate leaders.

The second colloquium was themed “Effective Corporate Leadership” and brought together thought leaders in this area. The speakers provided the thought leadership context and the attendees were able to ask questions of them. Following these presentations, a panel discussion was held, inviting questions from the audience.

The theme of the colloquium was based on the premise that the company is an artificial, incapacitated person and that its mind and conscience is that of its individual corporate leaders. The essential question in our resource constrained world is whether these individual corporate leaders are steering the business of the company to be at the junction of the three critical dimensions for sustainable development, the economy, society and the environment. How the company makes its money is critical in the 21st century. To make a profit but with such an adverse impact on the environment that holistically society is losing value, is not good leadership.

The vision of the GGA is to act as a catalyst between educators internationally so that the Sustainable Development Goals 17 and 4 are achieved. Goal 17 records that the 16 goals cannot be achieved without collaboration and goal 4 is the achievement of quality education. The GGA has support members across the globe and attached hereto marked A is a list of the support members who distributed the memorandum of the first colloquium to over two million of their members.

As with the first colloquium I am confident on the reading of the precis of the presentations that you will learn about effective leadership and be motivated to practise mindful, outcomes based governance and conscious corporate leadership. The attached memorandum of the presentations on effective corporate leadership will be both instructive and informative for you, the reader.

Carolynn Chalmers assisted me in finalising this memorandum on the presentations done at the second colloquium on a voluntary basis. Her bio is attached.

I have accepted a professorial appointment at the Wits Business School in Johannesburg with effect from the beginning of 2020. The third colloquium on integrated thinking will be held at the Wits Business School Auditorium.

I record the GGA’s thanks and appreciation to Regenesys Business School for making its infrastructure available to make it possible for the two colloquia during 2019 to be held. Without its assistance the colloquia would not have taken place.

Mervyn King
December 2019

Speakers at the second colloquium were: 

• Prof. Pedro Tabensky (Allan Gray Centre for Leadership Ethics)
• Prof. Jill Atkins (Sheffield University Management School)
• Dr. Abhinanda Gautam (Regenesys Business School)
• Rekgotsofetse Chikane  (Wits Business School