Arts@work profile — Marianne Roux

Marianne Roux holds a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Johannesburg, majoring in communications alongside psychology. She then went on to do honours in organisational psychology at Stellenbosch University. Later in her life, she fell in love with leadership and returned to South Africa to complete her Master’s degree in human resources and organisational psychology. She also got a PhD at the Swinburne University of Technology writing about leadership in the fourth industrial revolution.

She is currently working as a Director on the Board of Hagar International and Hagar Australia in addition to owning and operating her own consulting practice, Roux Consulting.

Read more about Marianne’s career journey below.

What did you study and what inspired you to pursue this path?

At first, I wanted to be a journalist because I grew up in South Africa under apartheid and it was very important for me that the truth be told. We didn’t have freedom of the press and I loved writing, and so I wanted to be a journalist. The problem was that as I was studying, journalism was still being suppressed and you really couldn’t write in the country. So, I decided to study psychology alongside communications and journalism, and I ended up doing an honours degree in organisational psychology. After, I took a break to work in Germany for a year on a leadership program with Siemens, and I fell in love with leadership. I later went back to South Africa and did a Masters degree in human resources and organisational psychology. And later, I completed a PhD in leadership in the fourth industrial revolution.

What is your current occupation?

I run my own consulting firm, and I am a professor of practice at business schools in Melbourne and in South Africa. I also am a not-for-profit board director and I just started writing books, so an author as well!

What aspects of your role do you enjoy the most?

I spend 80% of my time doing my consulting work, and 20% of my time doing free work. My consulting work for me is the achievement part of my life – that’s where I enjoy hitting big goals, impacting big organisations. I do leadership development with very senior leaders and I do organisation transformation, working very strategically and systemically. I enjoy that very much, but if I didn’t have that 20% of fulfilment work to balance that, it would all have been about making companies wealthier and that’s not the thing that drives me. I enjoy seeing the leaders develop, I enjoy seeing the organisation thrive – but I love my not-for-profit work.

The board I’m on is HAGAR, Australia and International, and we work with people who have been traumatised by slavery, trafficking and severe human rights abuses. We mainly deliver our work in Afghanistan, Vietnam, Cambodia and Myanmar and I’m more inspired by women in these countries who have been able to deal with their trauma and restart their lives than I am by world leaders, to be honest.

I also work with female social entrepreneurs in Africa and they inspire me every day because they save lives and do amazing work in very, very difficult circumstances: refugee camps, or hospitals with no equipment or medicine. So, for me, that part of my work is incredibly important.

Thinking back, what was a highlight of your tertiary study?

To be honest, I found the studies interesting, but I think I enjoyed the actual work I did in Germany in between my honours and my masters. I think doing practical work made my Master’s degree a lot more relevant. I also worked part-time as a consultant at Price Waterhouse Coopers. So, to be able to apply your learning is critical, and doing my PhD much later in life was also very helpful because it lined up with the work I’m doing.

What I enjoyed more about my masters and my PhD than my earlier studies are that it’s been informed by a lot more of the real world. This just makes that learning a lot better than just sitting in a classroom as a more passive learner.

Were there any co-curricular activities you found particularly valuable?

I’ve always been really interested in fitness and social justice work. I taught aerobics on the side of my undergrad to make money and I did French on the side to learn another language. It was important to me to have a life outside of university where you’re building other skills and interests and meeting other people. You’ve got to travel, you’ve got to work outside, you’ve got to volunteer for things to really build much broader skills than just having book knowledge of topics.

I’ve also always been involved in not-for-profits and entrepreneurship accelerators. I love reading and travelling, too – travelling is critical, and I love visiting other cultures. I never want to make a judgement about another culture or another person if I haven’t personally experienced them. I really stretch myself to go into places that other people often won’t go, because for me, it’s really important to not have those stereotypes that other people have.

How do you think your humanities education has shaped you personally and professionally?

I think that I’m very strategic, but I always look at things from a human behavioural lens and I think so often in the world we don’t do that. I think the strength of my humanities background is thinking about why humans do what they do. There’s no way we can do without humanities. We can try solving climate problems with science, but if humans don’t change their behaviours, we are not going to solve it.

Whatever I do, I look at it through a human behaviour lens and I understand that humans are complex and are made up of assumptions, emotions and mindsets. And I think that scientists don’t get that, and economists don’t get that. Human problems are much more complex than science problems – with science you can keep doing experiments and say X + Y = Z, but with humans, it’s not like that. It takes a tiny spark for something truly unexpected to happen in the way we behave or respond. I think that the humanities are critical in understanding this.

What career advice would you give to current students or recent graduates?

I think that people focus too much on what they’re actually studying. I think young people put so much pressure on the choices they make – I think you just have to start and do something, get a degree and then start working and learning more about your strengths and your interests and your passions and what you enjoy and don’t enjoy. Then, follow the paths of what you enjoy – learn more about the thing you’re interested in and look for opportunities in there. And don’t wait for opportunities to come to you – create them for yourself. When you’re young, you just have to get some experience and you’re doing to have to do some things you don’t enjoy, but that’s fine.

I’d also say: don’t think small! At 25 I was managing huge consulting projects, at 29 I was an executive in a large organisation. So, don’t think small! You are capable of so much more than you think.

Finally, what book have you recently read that truly captured your attention?