Property manager dominated by women
Manager of Wernhil Park shopping centre, Helen Bosshart switched on the Christmas lights last week. The shopping complex is managed by Broll Namibia and Bosshart is one of five senior female managers working in this traditionally male environment.
Broll’s management team is dominated by women where five of the seven senior managers are women. Managing Director, Marco Wenk said that women clearly dominate the departments within the company from finance to HR, leasing and administration.
Karen Keys runs the finance department while Pascale Poultney is the head of the leasing department and Adri Genis can be found at the head of the admin division. Helen Bosshart, the newest addition to the Broll team runs the property management department, while Liezel Andrew is the Head of HR.
Broll Namibia has a staff complement of twenty of which only six are men.
When employing people, Broll looks at two vital criteria, namely capability in terms of the job function and responsibilities; and the ability to fit into the team.
Wenk said “The fact that mostly women have met the above two criteria can be purely coincidental but could also mean that women have stepped up and are challenging men for positions which have in the past been mostly awarded to men.
Property Management has evolved.
Today this is no longer about running the operational part of the property i.e. maintenance, cleaning, security and the like, but the focus has now fallen more on attention to detail, relationship-building with customers and consumers, creativity in terms of marketing and customer attraction, amongst others.”
Wernhil employs a sophisticated closed-circuit monitoring system to count exactly how many feet cross its alleys every month.
