Mohinani Group is a leading third-generation, family-owned business, employing over 3 000 people in multiple sectors across various industries. Their activities range from manufacturing of packaging and plastics to trade and distribution in chemicals, polymers, consumer durables and others. The group has a key position within a number of respective business segments across several countries on the African sub-continent from Ghana to Kenya, as well as in international trading and service centres such as Hong Kong, London and Mumbai.

As a growing business with a board consisting of family members, non-family executives and a non-executive director, Mohinani Group felt that they required more input from external stakeholders who were both familiar with both the business and good governance.

Mohinani looked to Sirdar for guidance to help them improve business practices and various aspects of governance.

Sunil Mohinani shares, “The value that Sirdar has added has been immense. One of the most important tasks was helping us to separate operational and strategic issues… This has allowed the management team to concentrate on the operational elements of the business, while the board has become end-goal driven, focusing on strategic outputs.”

The result is that discussions around business units are frank regarding good and under-performing areas, irrespective of who the division/unit is run by. Having non-family members around the table allows for impartial input and pressure was taken off various family members in terms of managing the communication challenges.

“One of the most valuable impacts that the board has had on the company, has been the formalising of our reporting and governance processes, so that succession planning and leading the company forward, can be handled in a structured manner.”