T-Systems receives multiple honours at Gender Mainstreaming Awards

Issued by Evolution PR for T-Systems
Johannesburg, 28 Aug 2014

T-Systems awards

T-Systems in South Africa has received multiple accolades at the Gender Mainstreaming Awards celebration. The awards aim to give public recognition to organisations for good practice and excellence in tackling various gender mainstreaming issues. T-Systems walked away with three first place awards, a second place award and the overall Gender Mainstreaming Champion Award. This highlights the company's success at embracing diversity and championing gender equality as part of its dedication to inclusive and sustainable transformation.

"As part of our nation-building journey, we want to create a culture that embraces all elements of diversity, including, among others: race, gender, age, culture and religion. Embracing our differences will ultimately enable us to ignite innovation, strengthen the trust in relationships and result in a high performance culture and team. Gender diversity is a particular focus for us during August, as August is women's month. The recognition we achieved at these awards speaks to the commitment of the entire T-Systems organisation towards inclusivity and diversity," says Gert Schoonbee, Managing Director of T-Systems in South Africa.

After being shortlisted for four of the five categories the company entered, T-Systems was announced the winner of the Women on Boards, Investing in Young Women, and Gender and Poverty Alleviation categories. The company also placed second in the Empowerment Initiatives category, and was awarded the overall Gender Mainstreaming Champion award as a result.

The Women on Boards award aims to recognise and acknowledge companies that have successfully transformed their boards while ensuring that aspiring female directors are judged on their corporate governance skills and experience, not their gender. As part of T-Systems' internal transformation process, bringing women onto the board was a deliberate decision. Since 1 February 2014, the five-member Board of T-Systems now includes three women: Mpho Letlape and Mardia van der Walt as Non-Executive Directors, and Khangekile Simelane as Independent Non-Executive Director.

The Investing in Young Women award recognises and acknowledges organisations that have strategies in place to allow for future education of young women or have implemented initiatives with the objective of addressing social inequities by educating and empowering young women leaders from diverse economic backgrounds. T-Systems was recognised for its part in spearheading the ICT Academy in 2003, an initiative that has produced more than 1 500 certified IT graduates, of which 44% were women.

The Gender and Poverty Alleviation Award recognises and acknowledges organisations that have implemented sustainable initiatives around poverty alleviation, which have enhanced skills and provided income opportunities that have positively impacted the lives of women and poor communities. As part of its commitment to skills development, T-Systems was instrumental in the creation of the Hazyview Digital Learning Centre (HDLC) in Mpumalanga, providing critical skills such as IT, tourism and English to the community. Women make up 83% of all non-paying students and 80% of paying students at the HDCL. In addition, 75% of the permanent staff, 66% of the temporary staff and 100% of the consultants are women.

The Empowerment Initiatives award recognises and acknowledges organisations that have strategies in place to allow for future empowerment or self-reliance of women or that have successfully used skills development as a mechanism to empower them. Since 2006, T-Systems has offered an internship programme aimed at assisting graduates with real world work experience. The programme saw an intake of 135 interns for the 2014 programme, with 45% of those interns being female.

"Achieving recognition in so many different categories is testament to the success of our transformation strategy across the board. We were also proud to receive the Gender Mainstreaming Champion award, a huge achievement considering the stiff competition we were up against. We look forward to continuing our efforts and achieving new levels of gender equality in anticipation of the 2015 awards," Schoonbee concludes.

Deutsche Telekom

Deutsche Telekom is one of the world's leading integrated telecommunications companies with over 142 million mobile customers, 31 million fixed-network lines and more than 17 million broadband lines (as of 31 December 2013). The group provides fixed network, mobile communications, Internet and IPTV products and services for consumers and ICT solutions for business customers and corporate customers. Deutsche Telekom is present in around 50 countries and has approximately 229 000 employees worldwide. The group generated revenues of EUR 60.1 billion in the 2013 financial year - more than half of it outside Germany.

T-Systems

Drawing on a global infrastructure of data centres and networks, T-Systems operates ICT systems for multinational corporations and public sector institutions. T-Systems provides integrated solutions for the networked future of business and society. The 50 000 employees at T-Systems combine industry expertise and ICT innovations to add significant value to the digitisation strategies and core business of customers all over the world. T-Systems generated revenue of around EUR 9.5 billion in the 2013 financial year.

Since the inception of T-Systems in South Africa in 1997, the company has cemented its position as one of the most successful T-Systems companies outside of Europe. A leading ICT outsourcing service provider locally, T-Systems offers end-to-end ICT solutions in both the ICT operations and systems integration markets. Its extensive portfolio of services covers the vertical, horizontal, IT and TC space. T-Systems South Africa's head office is located in Midrand, with another major office in Cape Town, and 20 further representative offices in locations throughout southern Africa.

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