Today’s exclusive column guest is Frehiwot Tamru, Chief Executive Officer of Ethio Telecom. Back in the day, she had successfully served as Chief Information Officer and Deputy CEO in the then Ethiopian Telecommunications Corporation before she departed to run her own company.
She became a CEO of Ethio telecom in 2018 and led the company to a new path and height of success in terms of establishing strong leadership team, human and customer centricity and advancing humanitarian supports.
Recently, The Ethiopian Herald has sat down with Chief Executive Officer of Ethio Telecom Frehiwot Tamru. Excerpts are below:
What was the overall status of Ethio telecom when you took over the position as a CEO?
I was board member before I assumed the CEO position and due to that I had more information and I was aware of Ethio telecom’s overall capacity in terms of large infrastructure and investment, customers, human resources and service delivery.
Nevertheless, by the time I took over the position, Ethio telecom was facing multiple challenges to sustain and expand its operation. Particularly, vendor and partner management, foreign currency limitation and lack of empowerment were among the major limitations.
How did you get to the bottom of the problem?
My priority was to fix the partnership problems as the whole infrastructure was rolled out by the three vendors, Huawei, Ericsson and ZTE. If we fail to manage and boost our relationship with these major industry players, it would be difficult to sustain the services. Since the telecom expansion project was undertaken on vendor-financing modality, delay in loan settlement affected Ethio telecom relationship with its partners/vendors. Besides payment delay, the relationship and communication with partners lacked mutuality and trust.
For instance, Ericsson had announced in writing that they were closing their offices in Addis claiming that Ethio telecom failed to pay its loan while its projects were not finalized. Customer satisfaction and our image were negatively impacted in areas where Ericsson network has been deployed.
In addressing the gaps in partnership management, I made sure that the Service Level Agreement (SLA) we had with them gives us to have continuous support from the vendors while in the meantime we enforced our parts obligation.
In the same way, we need to have continuous support from SLA (service level agreement) to get an uninterrupted service and ensure the quality of service for expansion as well. As Huawei was not willing to sign SLA, the network was being operated without the latter. SLA is like insurance. In case some incidence happens, the overall service will be in a problem. That was the situation when I joined Ethio-telecom. Then as a CEO, I kept on figuring out what was going on in the overall activities of the company and coming up with the solution in a short period.
Having passed through many challenges, today Ethio telecom is reaping the fruit of success. I believe it is heading in the right direction; we are making history and doing the unthinkable. Following the commencement of the 2012 Ethiopian budget year, with the introduction of the company’s three-year strategic plan in outlining six strategic themes along with the yearly plan in place. Both the three years’ strategy and the annual plan target at taking Ethio telecom to a new level of success.
What is the intended target of the three years’ strategy?
Well, the intended target is to make the company a competent, competitive, and preferred telecom service provider in the country. To this effect, the company has made the following major interventions: bringing to light new organizational framework in some of its demanding operational functions, revision of working systems, and expansion of network capacity to enhance quality of service.
Similarly, the company attaches importance to ensure enhanced customer experience and satisfaction by improving access and by offering new and enhanced services, firming up an international business, instituting partnerships and collaborations in a consistent and in a manner that makes certain mutual benefit.
Moreover, the company finds it important to ensure effective property administration and resource utilization, employ new ways of doing business and deploying technology to prevent telecom fraud, enhance strategy execution capacity, interventions to empower, build leadership capacity and skill development of employees and management.
While on the subject, during the first half budget year’s business performance, effective from July 01 to December 31, 2019, the number of subscribers has reached 45.6 million which is 99% of the target. And the performance has shown a 10.9% increase from the preceding year of a similar period.
More to the point, the number of mobile voice subscribers, data and Internet users and fixed services has shot to 44.03 million, 22.74 million and 1.01 million respectively. Furthermore, we have earned a total revenue of 22.04 billion Birr which is 104% of our target and a 32% increment from the same period of the last budget year.
How is the liberalization and privatization of Ethio-telecom going?
There is no gainsaying the fact that the Ethiopian government has already decided to open the telecom market through
privatization and liberalization.
At the moment, the government is making an effort to open the market for other players. A regulatory body, The Ethiopian Communications Authority, has already been established. It is in the process to engage additional operators in the sector. According to the government’s decision to increase the engagement of the private sector, Ethio telecom will be partially owned by private sectors. The liberalization process is managed by the Regulatory while the Ministry of Finance facilitates conditions to the privatization.
There is no gainsaying the fact that Ethiopia and neighboring Eritrea have seen recently restoration of telecom services. What do you make of it?
Following the peace agreements between the two sisterly countries, Ethiopia and neighboring Eritrea have restored the services at the drop of a hat. At this moment in time, the whole thing is getting on the right track. As far as this, more than 4 million traffics have been sent from here to Eritrea. There are also traffics coming from Eritrea to Ethiopia.
Through operators, we have exchanged around 4.4 million USD. Above and beyond, the restoration of telecoms is playing a major role in bringing the two people together. It is creating integration between the two countries. Today, they have an interest to open in telecom for roaming services as well and as a result we are expanding our business for mutual business benefit.
What was your upbringing like?
I was born and raised in Addis Ababa. As a child, I was a bit serious about every little thing. I pursued my primary and secondary education here in Addis Ababa. Subsequently, I was able to attend a degree program at Addis Ababa University, a diploma program at Unity University, and a master’s program at United Kingdom (UK) Open University.
What was your dream job as a Child?
As a child, I don’t remember dreaming of becoming an engineer, or a medical doctor, or other profession. I was passionate about everything I got myself involved in. I used to love excelling in the whole lot I got myself engaged in. My life motto has always been Excellence nothing less!
What are the things that make you happy?
“It is not good to breath but not to live”… living for me is adding value in the lives of other people. Making others happy and putting smiles on people’s faces makes me happy.
Be that as it may, as I always look on the bright side of life, I always try my best and make an effort to make things possible. I love exerting my effort in the positive aspects of things.
How do you express the contribution of your parents?
My parents are blessed with three sisters and two brothers. My dad was a civil servant and my mother was a housewife. I am the second born in my family. My parents were placing emphasis on education, they havd made all the necessary effort to provide us with education.
Nowadays, my brothers and sisters are leading a meaningful and successful life. To my mind, success is not measured in the amount of a salary one earns or in the position one serves, but in what one does. Whether you are appointed as a manager or CEO what matters is doing your job in an excellent manner and delivering the expected results, ultimately adding positive value to the human lives. I would say, my educational background has helped me a lot in carrying out today’s assignment or appointment effectively.
Has your educational background impacted your career?
Yes, definitely. As I have earned my first degree in Information systems and Accounting, having business background from my master’s degree has helped me to understand both the business and the technical aspects.
Honestly speaking, having this kind of background helps one to discharge duties and responsibilities effectively. Telecom is not purely technical or 100% technical, but also business. Hence, one needs to create business technology intimacy. By the way, Ethiopian Telecommunications Corporation (ETC) is my first company to join after completing my university education. I had a very good time and also a challenging moment. But I believe it was the reason why I am here in the present day. As I have been engaged in operation, I understand both the technical and the business aspects very well.
As a final point, is there anything you would like to convey?
At this point, as Fiber cut and Copper vandalism, commercial power interruption, telecom fraud, and delay in land acquisition for new sites are some of the challenges facing Ethio telecom to expand its service and ensure quality of service, all stakeholders should work hand-in-glove to get to the bottom of the existing problem for the benefit of the nation. Also, these are important engagements to take the company to a new benchmark in a little while.
The Ethiopian herald January 31/2020
BY ADDISALEM MULAT
