Lincoln Mali

For over 25 years, Lincoln Mali has been a notable leader in the Banking and Fintech space.

A highly-regarded speaker, his core expertise lies in Leadership, People Management, Strategy, Culture, Customer Experience and Business Performance.  Lincoln has addressed many local and international conference audiences and was the class speaker at his AMP graduation at Harvard Business School in 2013.

Enormously passionate about leadership and people development, Lincoln spends much of his spare time mentoring and developing young leaders.

He was a pathfinder and palpable presence at Standard Bank, where he can be credited with major contributions to development of the banking sphere across the African Continent. Until April 2021, he was the Head of Group Card and Payments at Standard Bank Group, having served in many different roles within that organisation since 2001.

Lincoln has been a board member in a number of organisations including being the Chairman of the board of Diners Club South Africa and a member of the Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa Business Council for Visa.

Lincoln joined Lesaka Technologies Inc.(formally Net1 U.E.P.S. Technologies Inc.) in May 2021 as Chief Executive Officer, Southern Africa where he is also a member of the board of directors.

He has an impressive academic record where he holds various qualifications including Bachelor of Arts (BA) and Bachelor of Laws (LLB) degrees from the University of Rhodes and an MBA from Henley Business School. He has also attended various advanced management programmes in South Africa and internationally including programmes at Duke, INSEAD, Thunderbird, MIT and Harvard university. He was proudly recognised for his leadership role and achievements by his alma mater, Rhodes University, when he became the recipient of the Distinguished Old Rhodian Award in 2015.

Lincoln is also a prolific writer and maintains a blog – ‘Conversations with Lincoln’ – where he shares his thoughts about topics he is passionate about, including Leadership, Ethics, Transformation and Social Change.

In 2022, Lincoln published his best-selling book, ‘Blazing a Trail: Lessons for African Leadership’. Proceeds from the sale of the book go towards the initiatives of the Lincoln Mali Leadership Foundation (a not-for-profit focussing on school sports development in townships and rural areas, feeding schemes in informal settlements, bursaries, mentorship, leadership, and youth development).