A Pretoria father and son, Mr Andries Botha senior and junior shared a special moment at MANCOSA’s May graduation in Durban – they were both capped with their Master of Business Administration (MBA) degrees on the same day.
Apart from celebrating their educational milestone simultaneously they also share another similarity – they both hold managerial positions within the construction industry. Mr Botha Senior, 61, is the Head of National Procurement at the Motheo Group while Mr Botha Junior, 26, is a Contracts Manager.
Both were happy to be among the graduates obtaining their MBA degrees and especially achieving this goal at the same time. “Graduating together as father and son is very special to both of us and which we will cherish for long as we live. The MBA gave me confidence at work and taught me to think at a different level,” said Mr Botha Senior.
Mr Botha Junior who researched the topic: Empowerment of employees in the construction industry described the MBA journey as a tough one and admitted that he found it much tougher than his father whose considerable experience in the industry made it less `painful’.
Mr Botha Senior found the MBA programme to be time consuming and demanding indicating it had entailed an investment of time and work after hours.
“Distance learning is difficult when you are employed fulltime and takes up all your free time. Your family and spouse must be very supportive otherwise you will fail.”
He researched: Challenges of empowering women contractors in the construction industry as he believed it would assist with his task of developing women contractors within the company.
They added: “MANCOSA is definitely worth it. The exams and the projects are of top quality and definitely tested the boundaries of our time and knowledge. They really enabled us to improve the quality of our work and were very helpful in all aspects of our studies.”