Our people

"Working at Italtile has changed my life for the better. It has played a major role in improving the lives of my family and me."

CTM Sports Field Caretaker

Tshepiso was born and raised in Tzaneen, Limpopo. In 2003, due to the poor economic conditions in his home town, he moved to Johannesburg to search for better work prospects. After an extensive job search, he was offered a position in Italtile in 2007, where he started working at the CTM Sports Field in Soweto as a Caretaker. In this role he received training in landscaping, sports field management and sport practices. Not only did the training teach him new technical skills but he says since working at Italtile he has developed interpersonal skills such as communication, empathy and understanding, which are vital when working with communities and children. He says Italtile gave him an opportunity despite his limited experience, and the belief the Company had in him exposed him to a new career path he didn’t know existed. Once he had gained the necessary training and experience in managing a community sports field, his dedication earned him a promotion to Manager of the sports field facility. Tshepiso is especially grateful to the Chairman, Mr Ravazzotti, who often visits on the weekend in his personal time to check on him and the field and shares his wisdom and love for children and community. He states that this has inspired him to work hard and be a good ambassador for CTM and the Group.

Tshepiso explains how much his life has changed for the better since he started working at Italtile. He says that the Company provided him with a house at the sports facility, which gave him security and peace of mind in an unfamiliar province with a high cost of living.

He also talks about how company benefits such as profit share and the share scheme programme have enabled him to support his family, buy his first car and invest in his personal goals – something he never thought was possible.

Tshepiso says the best part of his job is working at a facility that provides so much benefit for the community. He gets joy from seeing the youth who come to the sports field to play basketball, exercise, use the skating area or just play on the swings and sand pit, in a safe and clean environment. He mentions how he loves the fact that schools or teams that don’t have access to good sporting facilities are also able to reserve the field, which enables them to host their matches in a well maintained facility.

"The support and belief that I receive from my mentors, colleagues and wife make me believe in myself and realise that I’m capable, as long as I remain resilient, humble, talk less and listen more."

Group Properties Executive

Julian grew up in Tlhabane Township, Rustenburg, as the middle child of five siblings. After he matriculated at President Mangope Technical and Commercial High School, he was employed as a waiter, and via student loans and waitering earnings, funded his studies at Tshwane University of Technology, where he graduated with a B-Tech Degree in Finance and Accounting. Julian shares that being a waiter taught him customer service at the most basic level and that if you take care of your customers, they will also take care of you. This still applies to his job today and is a key ethos of the Italtile business.

In October 2015, Julian started working for Italtile as a Forensic Internal Auditor. While in this role, he had the opportunity to work with the Group Chairman implementing effective warehouse standards and reducing stock control costs. At that time, he also started working as the second in command to the Head of Internal Audit.

Due to his work ethic and passion for property development, in October 2017 he was promoted to the Group Properties Portfolio Manager, where he was trained and mentored by the Property Director, Chairman and CEO. Julian worked in this role for three years until he was promoted to Group Properties Executive in August 2020. He has since also been appointed a director of PiViCal Panels and a trustee of the Italtile and Ceramic Foundation.

Julian reflects on the major role that mentoring and coaching in the Group have played in his career journey. He states that the people who mentored him have been strict but very caring. When he started with the Group he had no senior managerial experience but got the opportunity to work closely with the Chairman in 2017 which is when his training started. Since being promoted to Group Properties Portfolio Manager he has worked closely with CEO, Jan Potgieter, whom Julian says has believed in and cared about him. He says it’s these two qualities which made him realise that he has the best support one could ask for and as a result he pushes himself to the best of his ability. He believes the tough love and guidance he receives from his mentors at times meant the journey has not always been easy, but he always felt they believed in him and his potential and they taught him to learn from the previous day’s mistakes. He notes that the guidance received from CFO, Brandon Wood, has also helped him develop his finance leadership skills.

Julian says Italtile’s flat company structure has taught him the importance of a hands-on approach, to lead from the front, take accountability and most importantly, be genuine. He believes that it is vital to learn from mistakes and quickly move on. He says his mentors’ confidence in him encouraged him to give his best to unleash all the potential he believed he had. He says he makes it his goal to be a positive leader, encourage and identify individuals that he too can mentor. Julian shares that he is a spiritual person and that his belief in God helps him stay calm and centred.

"I hope that Italtile will continue its great work of giving back to the community because it makes an important contribution to society and a phenomenal change in the lives of many disadvantaged individuals and their families.

Coming from a poverty-stricken family, my circumstances were inspiration enough for me to seek a better life and achieve my goals through education. Education was my only way out of poverty and Italtile made that possible for me."

General Marketing Assistant

Portia Mathe was born and bred in a small village near Mahikeng in the North West Province. She was raised by her grandparents while her mother went to work on a farm in Brits. Portia shares that growing up in a very under-developed village was tough; she remembers walking to school on cold winter mornings with no shoes and nothing but a shirt and an old pair of trousers. There was no motivation or role models around her as everyone would drop out of school to go and work on the local farm to make a living. At 11 years old, she moved to Soweto. Johannesburg was a different world to what she had known but in a good way. Adjusting to her new school was difficult as she was previously taught in purely Setswana, but it did not take long to become a top achiever in the school.

When in Grade 12 at Forte High School, she was presented with an opportunity to apply for a bursary from the Italtile and Ceramic Foundation. At that time, she knew she couldn’t afford higher education and had no plans for post matric. At first, she was hesitant to apply for the bursary and thought she wasn’t bright enough to receive it, so she decided against applying. Fortunately, she received a second chance to apply and decided to take the chance. A week after interviewing with the Foundation, she got news she had received the bursary. She could not believe that a company like Italtile would invest in her potential.

The bursary from Italtile covered her tuition, laptop, textbooks and meals. Portia shares that this really helped her because her family could not afford to cover those costs. The bursary afforded her the opportunity to spend three years in university without any financial distress, which enabled her to fully focus on her studies and give her family peace of mind knowing that all was taken care of by Italtile.

After graduation, the world was faced with a pandemic and Portia was unemployed. The Italtile and Ceramic Foundation project manager, Thoko Phakathi, remained in contact with her and assisted Portia with job hunting. In October 2020, a job opportunity arose to work on contract as a sales consultant at Italtile Bryanston for three months. Once her contract ended, she was offered the opportunity to join the marketing team. Portia shares that when she was in university, she would visit the Italtile head office and tell herself, "This is where I belong". This dream came true when she joined the Italtile Group marketing team as a General Marketing Assistant on a permanent basis in 2021.

Portia states that working at Italtile has been a phenomenal learning experience, because she works with great individuals who inspire growth and leadership. She says working at Italtile has encouraged her to believe in herself and her dreams, to always work to be the best she can be and most of all, it has taught her to always give back after she has received.

Portia is the first graduate in her the family, and says that from her generation moving forward, things won’t be the same for them. She says if it wasn’t for Italtile she would have never been able to break the cycle of poverty in her family and that her siblings now have someone they can aspire to. Portia’s goal is to be at management level in the next five years. She says she will always strive to make a great contribution to the Company that believed in her potential and turned her dreams into reality.

"As a person who believes in turning every challenge into an opportunity to learn something new, I am so grateful to be part of an organisation where individuals are trusted and work independently to achieve the team’s goals.

Working in a flat structured organisation has also been a blessing because you get support on every level, especially from the passionate and dedicated Group Chairman who wants to see his partners in the Company excel and take the business to the next level."

CTM Store operator

Zanele is a mother of one, who was born in Newcastle, KwaZulu-Natal. Once she completed matric, she attended Mangosuthu University of Technology and obtained a National Diploma in Information Technology. Before graduation, she also completed a learnership with a technology company for a year where she acquired a NQF level 5 qualification in Systems Support.

Zanele started working for the Italtile Group in December 2015 when she joined CTM Pretoria as a sales consultant. She achieved over R1 million in sales in her first month. Due to her tremendous contribution and positive impact on the team, she received a permanent contract in her fourth month and subsequently became a full-time employee in the business. As a sales consultant, she took a training course for Business Maturity Optimisation (BMO). Upon completion, she was given a chance to run three stores (CTM Menlyn, CTM Montana and CTM Pretoria) which she managed successfully. In 2019, she completed the OTP and also became one of the Trainee Managers on a programme initiated by CTM Executive, Paul Isaacs, where he taught them detailed information about running a successful business. Zanele is thankful to him for believing in her and grooming her to be the leader she is today. Zanele shares that the Group CEO, Jan Potgieter has always emphasised the importance of having a clear personal goal and working hard towards achieving it. She says she always had a dream of being a joint venture partner one day and that encouraged her to take up an opportunity at CTM Westgate as a trainee manager, where she was able put all the learnings from her training into practice. In December 2019, she was promoted to CTM Northriding where she is currently working as a store operator. Zanele says at Italtile she has learnt the importance of believing and investing in people as you can never walk the journey alone.

Zanele shares that when she was told about the Company’s profit share scheme, she saw her dreams coming true. Growing up in a disadvantaged background she always had one wish – to build a proper home for her mom, who unfortunately passed on two months after she started working at CTM.

Zanele believed she still had to pursue her dream regardless. Zanele looks at the profit share as a way in which the Company helps its partners to save for their dreams. She says she will forever be grateful because through this amazing company benefit, she managed to build a home for her siblings. Knowing that she will receive super profit share, she is excited to have bought herself a beautiful car and is looking forward to paying a deposit on her own house, while also investing in a future of her son. Zanele looks up to the senior leaders who made this possible over the years. Zanele would like to become a JV partner two years from now and a franchisee in five years. She is committed to taking on all the training offered by the Company so she can achieve these goals.

"If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets as passionately as Madiba participated in politics or Baby Jake fought with his knockout right punch. He should sweep streets so well, that people will pause to say, 'Here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well'."

TopT Regional Manager: Eastern Cape

Siyabonga, more popularly known as Siya, grew up in Uitenhage, Eastern Cape. His journey with the Italtile Group commenced in 2004 when he started working at CTM Port Elizabeth as a packer. He shares that for him, this new position wasn’t just a job, but an opportunity to start building his career. Siya says he took his passion for the job and translated it into hard work. He made it a point to learn as much as he could and after three months he was promoted to the sales department. While working for the Group, Siya has completed his Bachelor’s degree, Honours degree and Masters in Business Administration. A journey he explains that was tough and required long hours of work, but thanks to the support of his colleagues, he was able to successfully complete. He is also grateful for the technical training offered by the Company, including various courses in customer service, SAP, merchandising, material management, home and décor finishing and supply chain business optimisation.

Siya was mentored by Brandon Polley, a long-standing franchisee of the Group, who invested time in teaching him about leadership and the retail business. Siya’s hard work and dedication led to an opportunity to join the Gauteng team in 2011, where he worked as an assistant manager at CTM Boksburg, a store operator at Strijdom Park and Birch Acres and a caretaker manager at Dobsonville. The Group Chairman identified Siya’s drive and talent and offered to mentor him; once Siya moved to Gauteng, Mr Ravazzotti dedicated time on Sundays to teach Siya how to run a successful business and develop the leadership principles needed to excel in the retail environment.

After the TopT brand was established, Siya was offered an opportunity to return to his home province and join the TopT team as a franchise partner in 2014. He is now a regional leader in the Eastern Cape where he manages and oversees multiple TopT stores, at all times prioritising excellent customer service. This role has given Siya the chance to transfer all the skills and knowledge he has gained over the years through mentoring his new team.

Siya says the Company profit share scheme made an immense impact on his life, not only enabling him to pay for his own studies, but also the education of his siblings – they have since completed their studies and become professionals and leaders in their fields.

Siya is driven by the ability to make a difference in other people’s lives. He is passionate about giving back to the communities where the TopT stores are based. As a region, they assist local schools with learning resources; they donate paint, toilets and food parcels to a number of non-profit organisations, and they recently assisted a local community family with materials to rebuild their house after it burnt down. When new stores are opened, Siya and his colleagues always prioritise employing people from the community first.

Siya shares that being a part of the Italtile Group has been an incredible experience in which the leadership team has challenged him to grow personally and professionally. He enjoys reading in his spare time, and shares that one of his favourite books, The Leader Who Had No Title, by Robin Sharma, taught him that regardless of who you are, what your past or current circumstances are, or what you do within your organisation, everyone has the ability to show leadership in their individual roles. Siya looks up to his mother, whom he says has been his source of inspiration. He admires the way she raised their family and fondly refers to her as ‘imbokodo’, which roughly translated refers to a woman who is resilient and shows strong leadership.