To new beginnings

Monique Adams





Etuhole Ingo was born in the Omuthitugwalwani village in the Elim constituency of the Omusati Region. She attended primary school at Kampelo Combined School and completed grade 12 at Nuuyoma Secondary School.

She pursued her tertiary education at the then-Polytechnic of Namibia, now known as the Namibia University of Science and Technology.

Ingo has more than 20 years of experience in the agricultural sector as well as diverse expertise in agricultural finance, agronomy and strong analytical sales skills in the agricultural industry.

In the early years of her career, she worked with the Community-Based Natural Resource Management project in north central Namibia (Oshana, Omusati, Oshikoto and Ohangwena) with the environment ministry.

Later on, she worked for agriculture ministry’s rural water supply department as an extension officer.

Moving on up

Prior to joining AgriBank, she worked with the Namibia National Farmers’ Union as a programme coordinator for the agronomy sector, responsible for coordinating agronomy activities in the north central regions including Kavango and Zambezi, where she coordinated marketing of grains and advocate issues related to farming.

In 2009, she then joined AgriBank’s Mariental branch as a branch controller, and by the end of 2011, she was transferred to the Otjiwarongo branch in the same position.

Ingo feels well prepared for her new appointment because she has been a branch control officer for 12 years and this stretches her experience in middle management and advanced knowledge on managing daily operations of the branch, which includes tasks such as sales, farm inspection, recovery, valuations, security, safety and custody departments to ensure that all the bank’s goals are met.

“I had an opportunity to be part of the 2019 branch awards as the winner of the interest income and surpluses category and was the second runner-up in loan disbursement.

“The Otjiwarongo branch is the main branch of the bank, which holds almost 40% of the bank’s loan book value. It was my privilege to work at this branch and earlier this year, I was nominated to go through the succession plan. I could not believe that the programme could take me where I am today.

“I appreciate the bank’s career development programme to grow its own timber as well as to give opportunity to women to be in leadership,” she said.

Blessed

Apart from feeling extremely blessed with her new appointment, in five years, she hopes to be seen as someone with deep expertise in the agriculture financing sector and she knows working with AgriBank that is possible. She also looks forward to take on more managerial responsibilities.

Conflicts come up every day in a working environment and how Ingo deals with them is she sticks to the values and principles every employee in the organisation is meant to strive for – embracing teamwork, cooperation and fairness.

“I listen to each side of the story and ask each employee to obtain more information to assist in solving the conflict. I value their perspectives and help each party understand their viewpoint of the each other. Before reaching the conclusion, I guide each participant to offer viable solutions. The suggestions from employees are reviewed, modified and discussed until an agreement can be reached between both employees. I lead employees into an implementation plan of the suggested solutions after a week’s follow-up process, where progress can be monitored and reviewed.

“During conflict resolution, I apply soft skills to achieve good results,” she said.

Word of advice

Advice Ingo would give to someone who wants to follow in her footsteps is to be productive every day and deliver results. “Be honest with yourself as well as everyone in your circle, serve clients with a good heart and let your client have a smile on their face after leaving your office,” she said.

She also advised others to be calm and patient in tough situations.

“And lastly, if you believe in God, pray and ask Him for help in all your needs, which includes daily guidance,” she said.