Francois van Niekerk – a co-founder looks back over 25 years

Atterbury is 25… a milestone that compels one to take a moment to breathe, reflect and take stock of the path that has been covered and the lessons learnt. We asked co-founder Francois van Niekerk for his insights.

Without your investment 25 years ago in backing a young man named Louis van der Watt, we might not have had an Atterbury the way we know the company today. Can you still remember what it was that attracted you to start a property company with Louis at the time?
I had just branched out into property, Zahn Hulme was our Deloitte audit manager, and Louis was a junior audit clerk on her team. He expressed a strong interest in property, and I had a good feeling about him. Somehow I was inspired to go the whole distance and offered him a partnership deal. Louis won’t mind me saying that partnering with a very inexperienced articled clerk is really pushing the boundaries of the entrepreneurial unknown! The “investment” therefore was more in Louis as a person than anything else. I am also quite aware that Louis and his wife, Celeste, placed unqualified trust in me.

Back then, what were the first steps and what were your expectations? What future did you imagine for the company?
I seldom have a lofty vision beyond giving your all to the present. If you do, the future looks after itself. When Louis joined, I had completed two developments and had a pipeline of Menlyn auto dealerships and the Atterbury Value Mart site with initial construction imminent. But higher-level property development was basically uncharted waters for us. The first five years saw only fledgling efforts as Louis and I tried to find our feet with almost no capital in an industry essentially unknown to either of us. I still treasure the memories of successfully surviving some hard lessons as we came to understand and enjoy the acknowledged risk/reward nature of a particularly unforgiving high-roller industry.

And looking back now, what do you consider the most gratifying aspect of the growth of the company over the quarter of a century since?
The material success we all are, of course, very thankful for. But deep down and most gratifying for me is to have seen how Louis exponentially enhanced the founding principles and standards and how he rapidly established himself as a leading figure in the South African property industry. How he eventually crafted a business with a full house of all the qualities required for enduring greatness. Louis is widely respected and his style is probably best described by a quote from Alan Greenspan, former Chairman of the US Federal Reserve: I have found no greater satisfaction than achieving success through honest dealing and strict adherence to the view that for you to gain, those you deal with should gain as well.

Can you remember a point where you realised that the business had turned a corner and was now on a path to big success? Can you tell us more about that?
It must be Atterbury Value Mart. Louis became progressively involved with later phases and the development led to lasting outside associations with respected industry figures like Louis Norval, Gary Steinberg, Neno Haasbroek, Dirk Henzen and Nedbank’s Ken Reynolds and Frank Berkeley. These associations and the collective confidence we gained from the extremely challenging completion of the Atterbury Value Mart led to the development, in quick succession, of a further three major shopping centers in Pretoria, Johannesburg and George.

At the same time, we renamed the company “Atterbury Property” and some years later control deservedly started shifting to Louis as he emerged towards becoming the logical CEO.

More than anything else, the success of these four initial shopping centres, together with the many acknowledged attributes of Louis and his growing team, fuelled Atterbury’s eventual advance towards unqualified recognition as South Africa’s premier property developer with an ever-increasing global footprint.

Forbes honoured you as Africa’s biggest philanthropist after you transferred 70% of your equity in the company you founded, the Mergon Group, to the Mergon Foundation, an independent charity trust. In terms of Atterbury, what do you see as your personal legacy within the company?
I’m not much of a legacy person. What could I gain by a skewed interpretation of any presumed legacy contribution? What Atterbury eventually became cannot be seen as my doing. It is more than enough for one’s life to have been enhanced by the recognition and appreciation of magnificence achieved by younger generations.

What do you believe is Louis van der Watt’s most important contribution to the success of the company, if you look back over 25 years of working together?
Louis is Atterbury. He is the acknowledged architect, rainmaker and driving force of the company. My exposure to many business partners over a period of 40 years provides a comparative perspective. In this context, the association with Louis simply stands out. It is a distinct career highlight to have seen Louis develop into a business executive widely acknowledged for moulding Atterbury into a premium international property group.

I have the highest regard for his uncompromising values and his unassailable credibility quotient. I admire the way he reproduces and extends these qualities into the Atterbury family of employees, business partners and even contractors – and how it pervades the Group’s ever widening theatre of operation. Anyone would consider it the privilege of a lifetime to have Louis as a business partner.

South Africa has gone through big changes over the past 25 years and is a very different place today to where it was when you and Louis launched Atterbury. What do you think were the most important perspectives you gained over the past 25 years, and what do you consider to be the biggest challenges for business going into the future?
Yes, it is very different. We all had to learn about political adaptation and geographical diversification. However, the real challenges facing the business sector are mostly to do with political undercurrents and ruinously bad governance. The question coming to the fore is what we can do to support our Government?

My walk with God in business reinforced my own belief in the dire need for SA business and our civil society to start focusing on sharing and forgiveness. The Gini coefficient and “hate index” are both at breaking point. What is required is resolute progress with imaginative sharing models, pronounced communal forgiveness and reciprocal acceptance of both our diversity and the persistent historical hurts.

I believe business should shift its values from a singular profit focus to caring for people, communities and the planet. Richard Branson redefines success as “doing good at a profit”. The growing belief is that for capitalism to prolong its shelf life, we need to explore the new concept Bill Gates calls “Social Capitalism”. The business game has changed. Now, to succeed, you need to make a profit while you do good; and the latter way beyond the odd charity handout.

There is a mounting realisation in corporate circles that communal goodwill and maximising profit are mutually exclusive only in the minds of those who are not able to grasp or acknowledge the current direction of these two socio-political imperatives.

What is your take on the role of the private sector in South Africa today? The opportunities are very different; can you single out one opportunity in the business landscape today that excites you?
Our economic and political realities are inextricably entwined. The country’s present outlook is almost fatally endangered by the entire SA governmental construct, by fiscal devastation and generally by inequality, poverty, the promotion of hatred and consequent threat of populism. We face a structural shift in our society. Whether this shift will have a constructive or destructive outcome will depend on our civil society and Government finding each other on the universal fundamentals shared by successful nations.

This requires inspirational leadership with an honest “country-first” ideology, the balanced recognition and involvement of all sectors of society and, of course, the basics of economic growth, anti-corruption, crime, education and so forth.

Businesspeople are the epitome of the “haves” and are under severe pressure. But it excites me to firmly believe that SA business has it in them to galvanise a unified civil-society campaign in support of the SA Government reaching the true high ground that all South Africans deserve.

If you were to do it all over again, starting a property development company along with the many other businesses that were founded within the Mergon Group, would you do anything differently?
It is an immense privilege to say no, I have complete contentment. It needs to be recognised that Mergon’s progress is shared by all present and past associate organisations. Atterbury’s sustained high-road performance – and Mergon’s decreasing shareholding – presented the Mergon Group with several cash-realisation opportunities. It certainly was the major source of capital that enabled Mergon’s widespread diversification programme. In context, it makes Louis and the entire Atterbury family significant contributors to the Mergon quest for serving the expansion of the Kingdom through business.

What is your future dream for Atterbury in a new era where Louis van der Watt is no longer operational head in South Africa?
Given the acknowledged quality of the company’s senior management and staff, it can certainly be expected that the Atterbury reputation for unabated progress will be upheld. Despite Louis being the almost overwhelming dominant force and “long shadow”, he also meticulously developed and nurtured a substantial number of descendant ‘dominant forces’. In time this will emerge as a significant part of his legacy and I have not the slightest concern about where Atterbury is headed.

Louis is also an established mega-farmer and it will be just compensation for him to eventually enjoy from afar the experience of Atterbury even accelerating the “above and beyond” made possible by his footprints.