Chris.Barker@FutureForesight.com | +27 83 625 8249 | Johannesburg, South Africa
Summary
Mechanical and Industrial Engineer with the Wits faculty medal, ex-McKinsey and Deloitte Director, and a 34-year record of overlapping builds: Unilever operations, McKinsey modelling, Right to Care, Neotel, MTN, Africa Weather, turnarounds, Deloitte COVID/Vaccinate SA/Gigs, and current AI executive training.
2023-present: Founder and GenAI training lead at Imagineers.ai and Future Foresight, training 600+ executives across 60 courses in applied GenAI, advising boards, and serving in fractional Chief AI Officer roles including Curro.
2008-present: Delivered B2B Critical Thinking training for more than 15 years. Clients include SABMiller, Allan Gray, Standard Bank SA, ACSA, Deloitte, EPPF, GIBS, UCT, and Henley Business School. Deloitte was a client for teaching consultants to consult, and Chris continued to run quarterly courses internally part time. Critical thinking is positioned as the management discipline underneath effective GenAI adoption.
Lead Consultant, Africa Pharma On-shoring | Health 4 Development
Aug 2023 - Dec 2023 | Johannesburg, South Africa
Led a USAID-funded project evaluating the possibility of on-shoring pharmaceutical manufacture in Africa. Work focused on African pharma manufacturing feasibility after the Deloitte chapter.
Director, Head of Innovation & Growth | Deloitte
Jan 2018 - Jul 2023 | Johannesburg, South Africa
2018-2023: Director and Head of Innovation & Growth at Deloitte Africa, meeting sales targets every full year despite targets 50% above peer directors, achieving R300m in sales over five years, and personally leading delivery of every project sold, including COVID response, Vaccinate SA, Deloitte Gigs, Project Sky, and API monetisation.
Founder & Principal | Future Foresight
Jan 2001 - Jun 2018 | Johannesburg, South Africa
2015-2018: Active investor in Vizier eMaths, working with the founder to build South Africa's first Singapore Maths-based e-learning system, proving impact in private schools, and exiting through a content sale to PSG.
2007-2015: Co-founded and led Africa Weather, the first business to sell weather in Africa, serving 400 South African clients across insurance, mining, and rail, expanding into five countries, building a top-grossing SA-developed iPhone app, reaching R40m turnover and 38% EBIT, and exiting across 2017-2022.
2013-2015: Led the Stutt Brick turnaround and sale for the National Empowerment Fund, saving 800 rural Bhisho jobs, completing a difficult rescue, and selling to Corobrik by demonstrating the strategic importance of the deal.
2012-2013: Led TopTV turnaround and sale work for the National Empowerment Fund, persuading institutional funders to invest R1bn more, cutting costs by 30%, managing creditors through deep distress, and holding the business through sale to StarTimes.
2003-2012: Co-founded RightMed Pharmacy, at one stage South Africa's third-largest retail pharmacy by cost of sales, focused on HIV drugs for NGOs and pharmaceutical clients, reaching R450m turnover in 2012 money.
2008-2012: Startup reflected in the fundraising table with R5m raised including R2m personal money. Project ultimately closed. 2012: Supported Seacom's business build by helping place the MD role and dismantle South African ISP monopoly economics sustained through interconnect pricing, contributing to a 90% price drop over six months.
2006-2007: Supported MTN's Investcom acquisition by using a telecoms model to value 17 networks across Middle Eastern markets including Iraq, Afghanistan, and Cyprus.
2001-2006: Co-founder and USAID Board Representative of Right to Care, helping build what became Africa's largest NGO, with R1.7bn in FY21 funding, more than R7bn ethically dispersed, 1.5m HIV patients treated through a 400-clinic network, and pioneering work in workplace HIV treatment.
2005-2006: Worked with the CEO of Onderstepoort Biological Products, the state animal vaccine institute, to turn the organisation from loss to profit.
2004-2005: Took over management of Aquarius Platinum's Marikana pit, replaced the mining contractor, and moved performance from a R20m/month loss to a R10m/month profit with substantive impact on share price.
2004: Led MTN's Iran bid and entry work during final GSM licence auctions in Africa and the Middle East, spending months in Iran and Dubai and being entrusted by the MTN board with the confidential $27bn bid envelope.
2002-2003: Co-founded Neotel by building a national fixed-line telecoms model described by British Telecom as operator standard, working with BEE leads to structure a 1.4m-beneficiary deal, raising R2bn in what was then SA's largest BEE deal, and helping win the licence against international operators.
2002-2003: Helped CSIR design the BioPad biotech incubator. Served on the panel to screen starting initiatives and hire the first CEO.
Turnaround and Sale Lead | Turnarounds
Oct 2004 - Jun 2015 | Marikana, South Africa
2013-2015: Led the Stutt Brick turnaround and sale for the National Empowerment Fund, saving 800 rural Bhisho jobs, completing a difficult rescue, and selling to Corobrik by demonstrating the strategic importance of the deal.
2012-2013: Led TopTV turnaround and sale work for the National Empowerment Fund, persuading institutional funders to invest R1bn more, cutting costs by 30%, managing creditors through deep distress, and holding the business through sale to StarTimes.
2005-2006: Worked with the CEO of Onderstepoort Biological Products, the state animal vaccine institute, to turn the organisation from loss to profit.
2004-2005: Took over management of Aquarius Platinum's Marikana pit, replaced the mining contractor, and moved performance from a R20m/month loss to a R10m/month profit with substantive impact on share price.
Contracted Engagement Manager | McKinsey & Company
Jan 2000 - Dec 2000 | Johannesburg, South Africa
Contracted back by McKinsey as Engagement Manager for an SAA project, in what Chris was told was the first time McKinsey Global had contracted a consultant, let alone a manager.
Associate | McKinsey & Company
Jan 1998 - Dec 1999 | Johannesburg, South Africa
Associate at McKinsey & Company delivering strategy projects across sectors, developing a reputation as the office modelling expert, and leaving to found a startup with two other McKinsey managers.
General Manager, Lipton Teas | Unilever
Jan 1990 - Dec 1997 | Durban, South Africa
General Manager of Lipton Teas at Unilever, running the most profitable unit in Unilever SA with 1,200 employees across two factories, improving the factory from #16 to #2 in international benchmarks, and gaining McKinsey's attention through workforce management and industrial relations work.
Education
BSc Mechanical Engineering, University of the Witwatersrand (Jan 1986 - Dec 1989)
Graduate Diploma in Mechanical Engineering, University of the Witwatersrand (Jan 1990 - Dec 1990)
MSc Industrial Engineering, University of the Witwatersrand (Jan 1991 - Dec 1991)