Who We Are | TSIBA Elevate

Meet our Team

Gia is a TSIBA co-founder, who pioneered TSIBA’s fundraising and sustainability initiatives from the beginning and conceptualised TSIBA’s Entrepreneurship Curricula. Gia holds a Bachelor of Information Technology (Bond University) and a Postgraduate Diploma in Enterprise Management (University of Cape Town).

Gia Whitehead

CEO TSIBA Business School

Karien started her career in HR and Recruitment, decided to change direction in order to follow a dream of working in TV production and, in another 180 degree career pivot, held Exco positions in both Operations and Business Development in the ICT sector for 7 years until she joined TSIBA in 2016. She holds an undergraduate degree from UNISA with Contract Law and Language majors, as well as an Advanced Diploma in Labour Law. “I have a great passion for contributing both operationally and strategically to the growth of SMEs, and am grateful to be living this purpose in my work”

Karien Cloete

CEO TSIBA Ignition Academy

Dylan is currently finishing his postgraduate degree in Greek and Latin Literature at Oxford, having completed his undergraduate in English and Classics at Edinburgh in 2023. After studying for a few too many years, he is looking to learn the skills needed to embark on a meaningful professional career, and wants to help others do the same. With experience living in South Africa, the UK, the USA, and Switzerland, he enjoys building global experience and connections.

Dylan Taylor

Elevate Sales [Co-Founder]

Greg is a Zimbabwean living in Switzerland and spending as much time as possible in Southern Africa. He attended University of Natal and qualified as a Chartered Accountant in 1995 before leaving to pursue a career in finance overseas. He obtained his CFA certification in 1999 and has worked for a variety of investment banks and fund managers in structuring and sales roles around the world. Since 2010 he has been raising capital for funds from Swiss based investors. He is passionate about rugby and people in that order and subscribes to the "pay it forward" philosophy.

Greg Taylor

Friend of TSIBA and Elevator

Paul is the Co-Founder of 30Nine Solutions, a strategy & corporate innovation partnership business. During his 19 years in the corporate world, which included working across sub-Saharan Africa and in China, Paul observed that corporates and entrepreneurs both have something the other wants. He left the formal financial services world to work with organisations to bring about strategic change and delivery. Paul works with teams and people to take ideas and concepts and to build them into rapidly developing strategies. This includes working with startups and scale-ups, right through to board levels of large organisations.

Paul Nel

Curriculum Design and Facilitator

Heather’s first career was in media, and for over 10 years she has been consulting, independently and through EY, on stakeholder relationships and communications, purpose, business improvement, culture change and leadership development. She holds an MBA on the executive level from the University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business (UCT GSB) and continues to contribute to that school through delivering seminars, and through moderating on the EMBA programme. She is a design thinking facilitator, holds a coaching diploma and is an Enneagram practitioner.

Heather Parker

Curriculum Design and Facilitator