While working as a development executive for a grain farm in Mozambique, with the business needing additional investment, Chishamiso Mawoyo reached out to contacts in the Norwegian development finance firm Norfund. It so happened that the CEO of the fund was in Africa, and was aware of one of their investee farming entities nearby with complementary strengths: it farmed more land and had the same crop portfolio, and was willing to grow their production. Norfund proposed a merger. It was, recalls Chishamiso, “the simplest M&A transaction in the book.”
There was a problem, however: Norfund and their investee wanted majority ownership, and the American owners of the farm Chishamiso ran would not cede control – so the deal fell through. Chishamiso left such a great impression on the Norwegians, however, that he found himself being headhunted.
“I got a call two weeks later. The Norwegian fund said to me, ‘We felt you have a skill set that we don’t often have. We have people who understand the spreadsheets and the financial analysis which you clearly have, but few understand project risk on the ground and have the operational capacity that you possess.”
Becoming an investment professional was the second significant evolution in a career that began with him training with the chartered accounting firm Ernst & Young, later qualifying, and working initially as a financial controller for a diversified tourism company in his native Zimbabwe.
In respect of his masters’ studies, he had opted for an EMBA to complement his existing business education. He therefore wanted to study at an institute of international standing, with a broad-based business curriculum. Many of the schools that he had considered stressed the teaching on finance, an area in which he was already accomplished, so one of his contacts suggested IMD. He identified the IMD EMBA qualification as one where all the essential elements of business management came together. He felt that: “This has got to be the school for me, and so I didn’t apply to any other business school.” The employment offer from Norfund came shortly after graduating from IMD.
“An ‘Aha!’ moment for me was that sometimes the answers come as you go”
The learning on strategy at IMD made a lasting impression. On a Discovery Expedition in India, he was in a group that had aced its assignment on setting up a bank there, where Chishamiso’s knowledge of finance helped. In China, however, they hit problems. “We had to redo our assignment because we just didn’t get it right at first.” It was in the automobile sector, and part of the learning was understanding how the business operates throughout the product life-cycle: “The car companies don’t actually make money from selling the car. They make money from selling spare parts and other services.”
A distinctive feature of the Chinese economy is the huge scale of the internal market. The contrast with the horticulture or fruit business model in agribusiness in Africa, strongly orientated towards export, was sharp, helping to understand each context through comparison.
The pragmatic focus at IMD extended from the expeditions to the teaching, and he cites Professor Phil Rosenzweig’s lessons on strategy as being particularly influential; on how the test of strategy is in the execution, not the quality of the presentation. Throughout his career he has been asking himself: “If I want my bosses to be happy at the end of all this, what must I deliver? What will success look like? So Phil’s teachings on strategy were invaluable.”
Allied to this is the understanding that market and commercial reality can be ambiguous, especially in a startup phase, and that often you do not have the answers. “An ‘Aha!’ moment for me was that sometimes the answers come as you go.”
This is similar to a learning he has retained from working in agriculture: appreciating the value of practical wisdom. Someone who has grown up in the region and worked as a farmer for years will know the right time for planting. “Sometimes, what we call intuition is not quite intuition, but it’s the capacity to be able to efficiently analyze a wide array of varying data sets that you’ve lived through, that you’ve experienced.”
After five years with Norfund, he took up a role in the Lagos, Nigeria office of the International Finance Corporation, specializing in the health, education and manufacturing sectors in Africa. Much of the learning from the EMBA is directly relevant, he finds, in particular how to “understand industry structure and competitiveness and what drives success”.
IFC is actively supporting private sector development in Africa, even as market dynamics continue to evolve. “We are moving further up the value chain to engage with earlier-stage businesses and those with elevated risk profiles, particularly where projects have yet to fully demonstrate proof of concept. We recognize that without early-stage development finance and project development support, many promising and impactful business ideas may never reach their full potential.” Chishamiso leads IFC’s Upstream and Advisory function for Health and Education in Africa, focusing on early-stage projects within these sectors.
A career is often likened to a journey: this one still has a long way to run. Remarkably, for someone who has successfully undergone two significant career shifts – from finance specialist to business development executive to investment professional, he does not rule out a third one – but is understandably circumspect regarding which direction. Watch this space.
“If I want my bosses to be happy at the end of all this, what must I deliver?”
