Jhb - Our World Class City

Two areas that I hoped to be learning about in this course were project management and marketing. These are two areas I have never been exposed to at university and was looking forward to learning the basics.

Both Brian Orlin and Tshepo Nkosi from the Johannesburg Development Agency (http://www.jda.co.za/) sparked my interest in these fields. I’m not yet ready to head in these directions because I first want to settle in the areas of my personal interest, namely corporate foreign policy. However, once I’m in there I would like to broaden my expertise to be able to tackle projects where marketing is needed and project and programme management is essential.

It is amazing how many people are needed in completing a project. That is why I think the Constitution Hill project is so inspiring (http://www.constitutionhill.org.za/). A lot of hard work has definitely paid off. Aspects such as functional performance, time and money are difficult aspects to juggle and to balance it is even more challenging.

There is always extra help needed in the funding and strategic management of projects. Thus organizations like Blue IQ (http://www.blueiq.co.za/) is there to help. Blue IQ, like Brian and Nkhosi said, is part of the projects involving smart industries like Gautrain, high value-added manufacturing like the Gauteng automotive cluster, and Tourism, like Constitution Hill.

I think its fantastic that the Gauteng Provincial Government started this initiative to develop economic infrastructures for these specific areas. It will promote the increase of growth in this province and also private sector investment in certain areas. It is great to know that there are organizations like the JDA and Blue IQ together with the Provincial Government that care about striving towards developing the Gauteng area. It is a opportunity for Johannesburg to push up its popularity as a world class city. Here is the Gauteng Provincial Government website for further information (http://www.gpg.gov.za/).