Pegg Seeks to End Business Administrative Burden

> Thandisizwe Mgudlwa

Business owners could have their work cut out, at least as far as administration requirements are concerned.

This is thanks to Pegg.

Pegg, is the personal trainer for business owners.

"Pegg will log your expenses and file your receipts for you, with no fuss at all. Pegg can tell you what you’ve spent or earned for the month and remind you instantly who owes you money."

The most remarkable thing about Pegg isn’t the financial skills and super-sharp memory, but the fact that it is a smart bot that lives on your smartphone or computer. The chat bot is the first in the accounting industry and allows you track expenses and manage finances through messaging apps such as Facebook Messenger and Slack.

Anton van Heerden, Executive Vice-President, Africa & Middle East at Sage, speaking ahead of Africa’s first ever BotCon , which was held in Johannesburg on 18 November, 2016, said, “The arrival of bots like Pegg, machine learning and ever-more sophisticated forms of artificial intelligence is all about ways to make technology more approachable, fun and powerful for the entrepreneurs and business builders of today and tomorrow.”

Also revealed is that Pegg hides the complexities of accounting and lets entrepreneurs manage finances through conversation, making the process as simple as writing a text. By digitising information at the point of capture, it takes away the pain of filing receipts and expenses, eradicating the need for paper and data entry.

Van Heerden says, “Smart bots, alongside the affordability of cloud-based business applications, is one of the trends that we can expect to dramatically change how business builders work in the future. These bots are not about replacing human beings like accountants or bookkeepers, but rather about making it easier for them to get the most from technology.”

"In South Africa and across the rest of the continent, we can expect to see bots pop up in applications such as education, healthcare, customer support and personal financial management, adds Van Heerden. For example, a mathematics tutor bot could provide schoolchildren with after-hours help when they’re struggling with their homework."

A South African support network for pregnant women, MomConnect, uses Facebook’s Messenger bot to answer specific questions relating to maternal healthcare.

Kriti Sharma, Sage’s 27-year-old VP of Bots and Artificial Intelligence, and the mastermind behind Pegg comments: “Users can say ‘spent R50 on post-it notes at Game’ to enter expenses and can ask questions like ‘how much money did I make last year in October?’ or ‘who is my best customer?’. Some of the most dull, unexciting administrative functions can be the best use cases for bots.”

Van Heerden concludes: “There are more than 50 million active Facebook users in Sub-Saharan Africa. This is an exciting time for entrepreneurs and their accountants. Smart technologies are simplifying business applications and they make it possible for organisations to focus on the things that truly add value to the business.”

SA CEOs Worst Fat Cats

> Thandisizwe Mgudlwa

The rich are getting richer across the globe.

While the world's poor are getting poorer.

But in South Africa, the situation in much more severe. 

South Africa already duped as the most unequal country in the world.

News that South African CEOs topped the list of fastest earners in the world, are highly disturbing and unacceptable, to say the least.

In the latest study released by Quartz this month. It is revealed that South African CEOs not only do they top the rankings of the fastest earners globally, but they are taking just over seven hours to earn the average South African’s annual wage.

Quartz combined British think tank High Pay Center’s data, which monitors pay at the top of the income distribution.

Along this was the Bloomberg’s Global CEO Pay Index and average worker pay in several countries in order to arrive at the result.

Aamna Modin, author of the report noted, “While CEOs in South Africa make far less on average than their American counterparts, their salaries were 541 times more than the average income in their own country." 

“It took CEOs in South Africa just over seven hours to make $13,194, which is the country’s average yearly wage. Assuming Monday, Jan. 2, was a public holiday and they started work at 7:30am on Tuesday, Jan. 3, CEOs in South Africa clocked in the annual average wage by 3pm that day”.

SA was also the only African country to make the list with the rest of the top 5 comprised of economic heavyweights including the UK, Canada, Switzerland and the USA.

WEF's Global Shapers Platform for Youth to Lead

> Thandisizwe Mgudlwa

Zamantungwa Khumalo, a Global Shaper from Tshwane, South Africa, will form part of the 26 Social Entrepreneurs, 50 Global Shapers and more than 100 Young Global Leaders who will participate in the Annual Meeting in Davos-Klosters.

Khumalo submitted the winning essay in the 2016 Global Shaper essay competition on this year’s theme Responsive and Responsible Leadership.

The 47th Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum will take place on 17-20 January 2017 in Davos-Klosters, Switzerland.

According to the World Economic Forum(WEF), Global Shapers, is a community of young people under the age of 30.

"Global Shapers will give a voice to 50% of the world’s population that is still under-represented in global affairs, while Social Entrepreneurs and Young Global Leaders highlight the need for social innovation to correct the shortcomings of capitalism." 

The World Economic Forum is bringing more 200 millennials, social entrepreneurs and young leaders under the age of 40 to the Annual Meeting in Davos-Klosters to share views on the meeting theme Responsive and Responsible Leadership. 

These are members of three foundations operating under the World Economic Forum’s umbrella: the Young Global Leaders, the Global Shapers and the Schwab Foundations for Social Entrepreneurship. 

 

The Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship has invited 26 leading social entrepreneurs to Davos-Klosters to highlight the need to better service and support communities that are on the margin of society. Social entrepreneurs are advancing new models of sustainable social innovation. With capitalism in its current form under scrutiny, social entrepreneurs’ use of cutting-edge market analysis and management to achieve social good can provide a much-needed impulse for long-term thinking and business practices.

 

The community will be represented, for example, by Yasmina Filali, whose Fondation Orient- Occident provides job training and social support to refugees in Morocco or Jordan Kassalow of Vision Spring, who has provided 2,750,000 pairs of eyeglasses to the poorest populations in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

Katherine Milligan, Head of the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship said, “As business and government leaders seek innovative solutions to many of the systemic issues they face, social entrepreneurs are called upon to contribute to these solutions. These entrepreneurs are role models that bring to the Annual Meeting the passion, vision, boldness and experience that are essential in a world that is undergoing a leadership crisis.” 

 

Moreover, the Global Shapers Community is a network of more than 450 city-based Hubs developed and led by young people who are exceptional in their potential, achievements and drive to make a contribution to their communities. Currently, the Global Shapers community has over 6,000 members.

 

Meanwhile, Shaping Davos, a series of sessions that feature local solutions to global issues, connects citizens in 20 cities on every continent to conversations taking place at the Annual Meeting. 

These interactions are led by Global Shapers in Abuja, Baku, Bangalore, Beirut, Belfast, Bhopal, Budapest, Chennai, Gaborone, Kyiv, London, Monterrey, Muscat, Paris, Portland, Quito, Seattle, Tunis, Vancouver and Yaroslavl, thereby enabling youth and others active in their communities to join the conversation with leaders from business, the public sector, international organizations and academia. Discussion topics cover education, unemployment, social inclusion, innovations in cities and the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

 

In meet the leader sessions, Global Shapers will discuss pressing issues with heads of state or government, global business and civil society leaders.

 

In the run-up to the Annual Meeting 2017, millennials will share their expectations of the meeting through a social media campaign under the #WorldWeShape.

 Adeyemi Babington Asaye, Head of the Global Shapers Community, noted, “Young people have an essential role to play in shaping the future. Global Shapers in Davos-Klosters bring the voice of youth as well as that of the communities and cities in which they are active,”

 

The Young Global Leaders, a community of more than 800 leaders from over 100 countries, will be represented by 173 members at the Annual Meeting. This group includes human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, the mayor of Quito, Peru Mauricio Rodas and the Pakistani documentary filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy, the first artist to serve as Co-Chair of the Annual Meeting.

 

“Young Global Leaders are entrepreneurial and inspiring leaders who arrive in Davos at this pivotal moment to accelerate the impact of their organizations and YGL collaborations, and use the Forum’s platform to join their diverse talents to achieve more together than they could separately,” said John Dutton, Head of Foundations Team and Head of Young Global Leaders. 

With more than 3,000 participants from over 100 countries are to meet and take part in over 400 sessions, during the 47th Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos-Klosters, Switzerland, under the theme 'Responsive and Responsible Leadership'.