While the corporate world is eager to flaunt its BEE compliance credentials through excellent scorecards, it seems that does not reflect a true picture of progress made on the ground in the economic transformation of the country. This is highlighted in the latest Sanlam Gauge Report, which has unearthed trends which have been overlooked in previous reviews.
The report was compiled by gathering information from people closely involved with black economic empowerment (BEE) in different sectors who expressed a strong elements of frustrations in their sentiments on transformation. “Many people interviewed believe that while companies may perform well on the scorecard, that does not reflect the underlying reality,” the report bemoans.
Worryingly, companies have been using the tick-box approach to doing just enough to score highly on the scorecard, without effecting meaningful underlying transformation. This is regarded the easy way out. Worse still, there has been a malpractice of scorecard manipulation going on.
The report acknowledges, that businesses are working hard too transform their business. Nonetheless, the progress made has not been good enough to make a mark in the economy. Quoted, the MD of rating agency, Empowerdex, Lerato Ratsoma, sums up the situation: “From the numbers in the research results we can see there has been improvement but in terms of a sustainable shift – we’re probably not at the level we would have wanted to be.”
The report has been compiled by Arena Holdings, Andile Khumalo of Business Times (Sunday Times) and Intellidex. Scores of 3,154 business were attained for the inaugural report. The ultimate goal is to derive a B-BBEE scorecard for each sector and a national one for South Africa.
