Clarence Gama on Driving Digital Transformation and Innovation in Malawi’s ICT Landscape

In this episode of Humanise, Clarence Gama, Chief Executive Officer of NICO Technologies, shares valuable insights on the evolving role of technology in shaping Malawi’s digital economy. He reflects on how ICT infrastructure and digital solutions are enabling greater efficiency, innovation, and inclusion across key sectors.

He further discusses the importance of strong cybersecurity practices, data governance, and responsible technology adoption in building trust within digital ecosystems. Emphasising the need for collaboration between industry and regulators, he highlights how a well-connected and secure digital environment is critical for sustainable national development and regional competitiveness.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Hello there. Welcome to another episode on human knowledge digital transformation powered by Imperator. On this particular episode, we are looking at leading through innovation, the future of technology and digital growth in Malawi. We have a special guest, the CEO of NICO Malawi, Mr. Clarence Gama. Gamma, welcome.

SPEAKER_03 0:52

Thank you very much for having me, Rosina.

SPEAKER_01 0:55

Welcome to this special episode and to Zambia.

SPEAKER_03 1:00

It's a pleasure being here. It's a pleasure being here.

SPEAKER_01 1:03

Alright, how are you finding Zambia?

SPEAKER_03 1:05

Oh, I'm loving it. It's basically home now. You know, you you you cross the border and you wonder whether you've just gone into another district or another country. You know, Malawi and Zambia, we are almost the same.

SPEAKER_01 1:17

Okay. Yes. We're siblings.

SPEAKER_03 1:19

Very much.

SPEAKER_01 1:20

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:20

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:22

All right, Mr. Gamma, we will start with the vertex. Something personal. All right. Um, looking at your typical morning routine in an industry um with constant pressure to innovate, to ensure cybersecurity, resilience, meeting regulatory standards, and maintaining client trust. Is that at the back of your mind?

SPEAKER_03 1:48

Is your typical routine in the morning is is a very interesting one. Before I get to that, you see, as a CEO of NICO Technologies, which is a part of a broader group of companies, NICO group, I think in Zambia we have Nico Insurance here. Um, NICO group is in the financial services industry. So everything you've talked about, regulation and need for innovation, is my everyday. Uh and our clients, the ones we're serving as Nico Tech, uh, largely they're in that space. So my morning starts at 4:30 a.m. And when the alarm goes off, I'm I'm still trying to prepare myself to get out of bed, and uh I'll do a few minutes of prayer while I'm in bed. Um, I'm in the gym by five and for about an hour, and then coffee comes after that. Um, coffee before I leave for work, as I'm heading to work, by the time I hit the office, I'm I'm ready to roll. And that routine should not be broken because when it's broken, things tend to go wrong. So I try to stick to that routine every day just to bring me in the mood uh to face what's what's going to come that day. So ideally that's that's that's that's that's me, my everyday. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:09

That's interesting. Um starts at 1230.

SPEAKER_03 3:13

I'm only gonna start at 1230. And it's a 10-minute drive to the gym, so I'm I'm always there on time.

SPEAKER_01 3:20

Yeah, yeah. Okay. Take us back to the beginning. What drew you into leadership within the IT industry? And how has navigating Malawi's evolving digital landscape shaped the leader you are today?

SPEAKER_03 3:36

I I started my career uh working uh with AirTo back then, and then we were outsourced to IBM. And working for a big tech company like IBM teaches you a lot beyond tech. And that just gave me the energy to want more. But as a tech person, I was a data building administrator at the time. I felt I could do more. And then I started looking into other areas, infrastructure, software development. And I challenged my boss, or my actually, we challenged each other, you know what? You should try looking into management. And I went up to become at the time a building manager and a country service manager within that same year, actually, for IBM in Malawi. Uh, I was very young. I was 27 when I became a country service manager. And most of the people in my team were older than me. And uh I had to start thinking more strategic and more people focused than tech. And in an industry like IBM and AirTal at the time, it was a crazy busy environment. It teaches you a lot, it sharpens you. Um that history, that background, and moving into Nico Technologies that was in 2016, has just given me my the opportunity to open up my mind and explore what exactly that the industry is looking for, what the country Malawi is looking for, and being able to uh, for example, actually, maybe perhaps being able to support or being able to contribute adequately because of that uh background. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:13

Talking about your background, I'm just thinking about the tagline. Rethink, uh re-imagine, redoing. Can you tell us something more?

SPEAKER_03 5:26

You see, we are at Nico Technologies, we are constantly trying to challenge the status core. And technology, at some point, everyone is thinking we are there today. So we are saying, are you sure you're there or you still need to engage uh NICO technologies? Do you need to rethink your processes? Are they the same as they were five years ago? But also reimagine what you could have because technology has no boundaries. So it is about inspiring uh our stakeholders, our customers, and challenging them to want more because technology has so much power to give us so much more.

SPEAKER_01 6:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 6:10

Yeah, that's where that's coming from.

SPEAKER_01 6:13

All right, interesting. Okay. So when we talk about that perspective, what does innovation look like within Nico Technology?

SPEAKER_03 6:25

We innovation at Nico Technologies is about, you know, just coming up with a Eureka customer-solving problem or uh or solution. So our customers are constantly chasing um something better. But it is the routine that makes technology boring for others. So our team at Nico Tech, they are constantly challenged to figure out what could make whatever we're already doing better. But also, what is it that you can offer a customer who doesn't feel like they need to front load technology? So it's about an empowered team that is constantly figuring things out. And we don't think we've arrived. No matter how good we are, what we do, we never say this is the best. We are always challenging what we've done. And I've seen that just empowered staff as well. They feel meaning, they they they feel that they're contributing to customers, and it's a meaningful life. So it's it's really what we are uh we're we're excited about in our innovation space.

SPEAKER_01 7:36

Okay, yeah. Other than the innovation part, that is the only one that excites the staff and yourself, are there any other trends in technology that excite you?

SPEAKER_03 7:49

Uh well, everybody is is excited about AI. Um, and you know, when they say uh, you know, those who are not taking advantage of AI, you know, uh I don't know what they they don't say they'll perish, but basically the kind of hint that they'll be left behind. I just think it's true because I have never seen a more uh people that are so excited to use artificial intelligence for you know uh for purpose for for actually changing lives or actually transforming our customers' uh experiences, everyday experiences. So artificial intelligence is at the top, I should say. Um one minute uh you're talking about chat GPT and somebody says, oh, but I want to use copilable, but somebody says, no, no, now there's cloud. And people are also learning that AI is more than just a chat board, it's about what you can use to actually uh work out a solution that makes that brings efficiency, that makes life easier. I think AI is the ultimate making life easier solution, and I think not just us at tech, but we're seeing our customers even getting excited. So AI training is one of our most demand trainings right now because even at expo level, everyone wants to learn. So, what is what does this copylock do? How do I use it? And all that. So it's it's a beautiful trend.

SPEAKER_01 9:19

It's a beautiful trend. Yeah, somebody the other day asked me if um having AI relationships would be better than the human relationship. And of course, that's a story for another day.

SPEAKER_03 9:34

I agree.

SPEAKER_01 9:36

Okay, let's talk about people and culture and transformation. Digital transformation is often about people as much as technology. How are you nurturing this within the team?

SPEAKER_03 9:50

It is about people more uh than about technology. In fact, if you if if you empower people enough uh around the concept of digital transformation, um everything else just falls into place. Our people understand that while they hold the technical skill, it is the impact that that technical skill is going to make that matters. So it's not about a new platform, it's about what has that platform uh resulted into. If we're saving one of our customers uh within the Nico Group is an asset management company, and they are interested that their customers don't have to send statements to their customers all the time. The customers log in and they check their statements, just like we do at a bank. And that is what matters to us. That is what success looks like when we talk about digital transformation. A customer that is served much faster, a customer that can get their job done better, and obviously with high quality. So, our approach to digital transformation is that which results into uh meaningful advances in our customers' businesses. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:05

As we advance um services presented to our customers or given to our customers, and looking at the different skills that our teams should acquire. What skills do you believe are critical for the next generation of the patient?

SPEAKER_03 11:24

Yeah, that's an interesting question. I once had an intern come to my office. She had just done her, finished her bachelor's degree, and she had done the same one I'd done at school. She said, you know, that course is so intense uh because our bachelor's degree program had electronics, obviously, software programming, everything, uh, Linux, Unix, and all that. And it's all out of all those, what skill do you use the most as a CEO of the tech company? And I said, Oh, the one that I use the most is communication. And I think that a tech scale will have its lifetime. And over time, that tech scale will be replaced by another tech scale. What we are teaching our employees uh is that they must be able to get their point across. And I think that is going to be very important because most tech people are so much focused on the tech scale, they forget what that it translates to. If there's a skill that I would want to see our tech professionals become masters in, it would be the skill of communicating, the skill of public speaking, this the skill of convincing an audience. Because once you've mastered that, explaining what AI is is a piece of cake. Explaining what uh you know analytics and what big data is, what security is, and what zero trust is becomes a piece of cake. Because I've also seen that in boardrooms it becomes tough for those, especially for us tech professionals. I had the privilege of uh delivering a workshop uh in partnership with the ICT Association of Zambia last year on how tech professionals can transform into or transition into being boardroom executives. So we want even the youngest uh entry-level tech guy to learn that it's about how whatever the skill they have is translating into a customer um benefit. So that is really an area which we want. But over and above that, AI is here today, um blockchain is here today. They may not always be there, there'll probably be better technologies come in the future. But our our tech teams should learn how to talk to the customer, they must learn how to address the stakeholder.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

Because the stakeholder also has to appreciate what you have to offer. And if you don't explain it, it doesn't exist.

SPEAKER_03 14:10

And I've seen that if you don't get your point across, it doesn't matter how good your solution is.

SPEAKER_01 14:14

Yeah, okay. Tell us a bit more about what advice you would give to the young professionals looking to build careers in technology, other than the aspect of them being cognizant with communication.

SPEAKER_03 14:31

Wow, um, that's a good question. You see, and there are a lot, today a lot of people that are excited about technology. Um I think the first piece of advice uh which I learned earlier on is that technology doesn't exist in isolation. Um and they should always know that uh as long as there is no someone at the end of that chain to benefit from the technology, uh, there is not going to be value. So what is the chain, what is the circle which technology is going to feature in their careers? Uh the second aspect would be that uh learning never ends in technology. It's unfortunate that I have personally seen a drop in skills development. I've seen a drop in certifications. You know, in my time, I remember when I was, by the time I left IBM, I had 17 certifications, attained over four years. And IBM is very good at that. But those really built my career. Now, today, after your bachelor's degree, uh most of them they feel relaxed, they feel now I deserve a job at Nico Tech. But when you come to Nico Tech, we hire professionals. We don't hire graduates. You know what I mean? Is being a graduate gets you in, but being a professional gets you that uh network engineer job, gets you that software developer job. So is that the learning never stops and that they should continue learning? I think those are the two pieces of advice I'll give.

SPEAKER_01 16:16

Yeah. Thank you so much. So, from your experience, trust is fundamental in the digital economy. It is. How can leaders move beyond viewing cybersecurity, data protection, and compliance as technical requirements and instead treat them as strategic pillars of customer confidence and long-term sustainability?

SPEAKER_03 16:44

Precisely. Um you see, yeah, when you speak about the digital economy and the fact that leaders are actually at the forefront of driving our digital economy. In Malawi, it's a big conversation about how we want to leverage our digital economy. We have a digital economy strategy that we are following. But what I want to stress is that as a leader, um technology should at first should stop being seen as a cost and more of an investment. Because most people will, and this is what most CIOs and IT managers there struggle with. My budget was not approved, my budget was cut. When that happens, it just means that somewhere in leadership, they're not seeing the value of technology. They're seeing the cost of technology, but the value. So, first is every leader's appreciation of the investment, maturation of technology. It's an investment. When is it going to mature? What will it look like when it matures? The second thing is that for leaders to be able to adequately see the benefit of security, the benefit of digital transformation, is that it's very vital for every leader to keep themselves learned. We as leaders tend to also feel like we've done our part and we should leave the IT or the technology to IT. But what is slowly happening in the world is that almost every business is transitioning from traditional to digital. And if as a leader, I'm just waiting on my IT guy to tell me, oh, so how are we gonna do this digital transformation around here? It's not going to work. Every leader must take some time to learn a little bit about, so what's digital transformation? How does that look like in my organization? And I'm not saying go get a Coursera course or something. I'm just saying you go on Mackenzie, you read uh Mackenzie articles, Deloitte articles, you read the Gardner articles, uh, which are brief and really made for executives. They're very informative and they keep every leader up to date in what role they'll play. But technology is no longer digital transformation, it's no longer for the tech guys. It's now become a leadership and a board-level conversation.

SPEAKER_01 19:10

Yeah. Thank you. I think to a certain extent, the leadership appreciation of the digital space could be a gap in the digital ecosystem. Could there be anything else?

SPEAKER_03 19:35

So um leadership in the digital uh ecosystem specifically is something that needs to be built. Yeah, is it a gap? Yes, but definitely one that can be can be revealed. Um but one thing that's missing in the digital ecosystem is trust. Um, you see, for us to be very um for us to actually show value, we must uh put faith or have the trust that technology will make things better for us. And there are still others out there that still look at technology as that which I don't want to touch, that which is monitoring my emails, that which you know somebody's listening to my calls. I don't know, yes, fine. I don't know if it's true or not. But I like what the uh the president of Malawi, His Excellency, Arthur Peter Mutharica, did recently. In the State of the Nation address, he specifically uh instructed all public officers to have or to put a focus on digitization. And what that did, uh, and we saw it at Nico Technologies, it was just a skyrocket level of interest from the public officers. And I'm not talking at junior level, I'm talking at senior level. So I had PS and CEOs and calling people that I also sit as president of ICT Association of Malawi. But I saw a demand in requests and says, How do we how do we start this journey? How can you help? And that is that that was very exciting for me, and it gives me hope to say, I even know the country we're going far. So the leadership aspect will be will be there, it can be developed, but I think another area which needs us all to appreciate is that you must learn to trust that you need or that we need as a nation, we need as a region, as a as a continent, we need technology.

SPEAKER_01 21:42

Yeah. Talking about the leadership, um request from the point of view of the president that we needed to digitalize. Of course, I think it's across the region. We we all have to digitalize if we have to. Make that or deliver that effective and patient service is as we get to the end of the conversation. Is there anything else that you want to encourage or put across to those that have yet appreciated the digital effect?

SPEAKER_03 22:23

See, we and it's a very important point because appreciation of digital transformation is also not going to happen on its own. And at tech companies, we also have a big workplay. I want to share a story about a big client which we had been eyeing for a very long time at Nicole Tech. They're in the public space. And what we did was we offered them for Bono what we called an ICT environment assessment. So we signed in DAs and we said we bring our experts to assess your environment. And it was a long four or five-week exercise where we spoke to the IT teams, we assessed their local area network, their wide area network, their co-systems, everything. And we did a very comprehensive report, which just gave everybody at high level what's going on in the organization. Because let's also appreciate the fact that they at high level, they may not have time to go into the detail. But an independent assessment gave them a very big eureka moment, says, oh, so this is where we are. And what happened as a result of that was that they said, look, let's work out a plan. We jointly worked out a plan with the internality team. And coming out of that, we they they signed up a contract with us to help them through the implementation journey. And what we've seen is that the principal officer himself is the one that is on a monthly basis, just in the steering committee meetings, is tracking everything. He's developing interest to learn how do we get there. So it's okay to not know, but it's who are you, who are you trying to engage to know? Yes, I know AI is taking up a lot, but in addition to your IT team, my view is that where leaders feel that they don't know, they should engage the IT professionals. They should engage the infratels of this world, the new technologies of this world, and say, how can we get started? And I think I just want to reiterate that it's okay if a leader has no clue on where to start. And there are all these channels of where you can engage and save and learn how you can get it done. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:56

Thank you. In your journey of digital transformation, digital um implementation, are there any risks that you're in our risks and challenges.

SPEAKER_03 25:11

Um I think uh my biggest risk is that I'm uh I'm always fighting to get the best people, and there's always somebody who's waiting for me to train those people and get them. So skills retention is a key one for me. Uh but what we do uh over and above competitive packages is to keep our team engaged. We talked about innovation. We talked about making them feel that they're part of uh the company and the contribution they are making to a client. And there's so much success when a client gives us a very positive review because it goes down to the business analyst, the software developer, the project manager, and everybody else. But a challenge I've encountered, which has really shaped the way I look at digital transformation, is that um in 2018 at uh at NICO, we had a fire in one of our buildings where our data center was, and there were three uh offices in that building, three companies in that building, and that fire wiped out everything to the ground. And I remember it was in October. Uh uh we had our Diara site, and now we had to get back online. But when we started prompting the Diara site, we learned of the shortfalls that the Diara site had, and that it wasn't plug and play. And then we we were up three to five days straight, literally. Like the team were working hard day and night. And for the five companies that were affected, actually, because the data center was hosting five companies at the time, they had to go about three days without serving customers. But on the fourth day we were up. And what that took to recover from what I could call at the time an underinvested backup process or a backup uh facility, uh, that we were up and running in four days, for me, it's still a miracle. So that challenge uh taught me one thing is to say that as we invest in technology, these are machines, right? As we invest in technology, these are not people. And at some point, a technology may fail or will fail. When it comes to security, um this is Robert Moeller, the ex FBI director, actually said that there are only two types of companies, those that have been hacked and those that are yet to be hacked. So, as we invest in digital transformation, resilience is a must. Business continuity is a must. You cannot say you've reached there until you have systems and platforms that are resilient. That when one site goes down, the other one takes up. And it goes the same when you are recruiting people in technology, when you're setting up your IT teams, there are still organizations that believe they can run on one resource. But why not just engage, as I say, the professionals and find yourself, find ways to have redundancies and backups so that your system will keep working. As we all transition to a digital economy where there will be no, where everything will be digital, you can't afford an outage. And the level of investment in technology. Since that incident, NICO at NICO Group, we have invested to ensure that always up and running and we have significantly reduced our downtime because we can't have a situation where somebody is saying, oh no, I can log into my bank account, or I can do this, I can't do this. And that's where digital transformation actually provides value to the customer. That's where digital transformation actually doesn't no longer become something for people to fear, you see, or something people to say, oh no, uh, how do I access my data and things around that? So I think that's one challenge I experienced, which has taught me a lot. And again, on risks, just how do you retain your people because they are at the core of the service that you're offering.

SPEAKER_01 29:23

Yeah. I've enjoyed the conversation. As you're explaining your story about what happened, I relating, like now that makes sense why Nico believes that they have to do every day so that they ensure they rebuild.

SPEAKER_03 29:44

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 29:45

Okay, now you're tagging. Now it makes sense. It makes a lot of sense.

SPEAKER_03 29:50

Really? Okay.

SPEAKER_01 29:51

Yeah, then you find a word as we close the conversation.

SPEAKER_03 29:55

I would just like to say that it's a very exciting time in technology right now. Um, from a Malawi perspective, from a Zambia perspective, from a global perspective. In Malawi right now, uh we have a leadership that's so eager on digital transformation, and already that gives an opportunity for tech companies. And everywhere in the world, customers want more. And they want convenience. And I think that that solution sits in technology. And it's time that we, not just as tech companies, but everyone who's running a business, everyone who knows they need technology, they should just jump on it. But not to jump on it blindly, but to ensure that you're engaging the right partners and taking advantage of technology to transform your business, uh, to rethink your business, to reimagine the possibilities that your business could have. And uh that can only be achieved if you are indeed leveraging on technology but with the right uh partner. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 31:01

Thank you very much. Well, we've come to the end of our conversation on this one leading through innovation, the future of technology and digital growth in Malawi. I'm sure we have learned that even as we look at digital transformation, it is not only technology, but we're looking at the humans behind it that are making the decisions. This has been Rosemary Kaluani on humanized digital transformation powered by infrared. Until next time, goodbye.

SPEAKER_02 31:41

The digital migration continues, and Africa is at the verge of the new digital price.