After the Bell: Capitec’s Gerrie Fourie and the power of family in producing extraordinary people

One of the absolute joys of my chosen profession is that I get to speak to people who have managed to either occupy or create a really important position for themselves.

When I meet such a person, I often wonder what went into making them extraordinary.

Usually the most important factor is the person themselves, whether they have the maths skills, or the EQ and, most importantly, the sheer ambition and drive to succeed where others have not.

Even the ubernerd Bill Gates, blessed with a middle-class upbringing and in the right age and the right place at the right time, had a huge amount of drive. He was prepared to do things other people did not do.

I was reminded of that when I spoke to Capitec’s outgoing CEO, Gerrie Fourie, on The Money Show on Wednesday.

While researching his background for our conversation, I noticed that his full name is Gerhardus Metselaar Fourie.

I’ve always found that for many South Africans, their middle name will tell you more about them, and their family, than the name they normally use. It’s where many of us, myself included, carry our family history.

So I started our conversation by asking him about it.

Out came the most interesting story, about how his grandfather, who was from the Netherlands, was actually “Gerhardus Metselaar”. And that “Metselaar” means “builder” in Dutch. 

More than that, he had been to visit his family’s company in the Netherlands. Gerrie being Gerrie, he had even gone through their books from the early 1900s and could tell you how they did during World War 1.

I read once that producing really standout people in business, people who are extraordinarily successful, might require more than just two parents and a village. It requires their parents’ parents too.

It can be about the conversations and the life experiences that your grandparents had that can help you succeed. 

I think there is something to this; families that are able to pass down experience and wisdom, and perhaps skills in managing money or farms, or even a cricket bat, might be able to produce extraordinary people.

Quite often I will be speaking to someone and be suddenly reminded of someone else in public life. When I ask if they are related, sometimes they say yes, sometimes no.

In our society we have also seen the most extraordinary social mobility in the past 30 years.

People who are the children of security guards and domestic workers and miners and maybe police officers have become important business leaders. 

Our previous and current presidents are the sons of a police officer and a domestic worker, respectively.

While they have done it without the benefit of a comfortable middle-class upbringing, they have also often had to do it without the continuity of a long-term family.

Jacob Zuma did not know his father, Cyril Ramaphosa has spoken of how his communities were broken up by forced removals during apartheid.

As a parent, I feel it is a duty to pass on as much as I can to my two children. 

The fact that private schools can charge what they charge is proof that just about everyone else also believes this.

Now, one of the biggest problems facing our country, and many others around the world, is that finding jobs for younger people is getting harder and harder.

Even China, the big economy we are told is taking over the world, cannot find work for about 15% of its young people.

I think what people are trying to do now is create jobs for their children. Often in their own family companies, or whatever service it is that they provide.

Quite recently I’ve noticed billboards advertising estate agents that are clearly mother-and-daughter establishments. Fathers help their children take over their trade.

And in a good example of why middle-class networks still really matter, some parents will be finding ways to get their kids internships in law or accountancy firms. 

Others will keep their children in higher education for as long as possible. When I finished school a simple degree was considered enough. Now people are studying for years and years, as their parents encourage them to become as qualified as humanly possible.

One of the consequences of this is that having young adults as children has become much more expensive. You now need to educate them into their mid-twenties.

You can’t blame them; as a parent, you will do anything for your children.

And, from what I can see, grandparents will do anything for their grandchildren too. They really want to see them succeed.

How often have you seen older people getting together and discussing their children and grandchildren? I’ve sometimes come across an older person who knows my parents and discovered they know an awful lot about me.

I’m sure that friends of Gerhardus Metselaar, wherever he may now be, know an awful lot about his grandson too. DM