Chioma Ogbenna

Chioma joined Grant Thornton in 2014. She is a Senior Manager in the Business Process Solutions team with over 14 years of work experience.

Experience

Chioma joined LKC in 2009 as a Bursar after completing the Association of Accounting Technicians (AAT) qualification. She thereafter pursued the Association of Certified Chartered Accountants (ACCA) qualification and was promoted as the Accountant in charge of the preparation of accounts and supervision of 2 Accounts Assistants and Bursar. Upon completion of ACCA in 2012, she continued as the Accountant at LKC until 2014 when she joined Grant Thornton as an Executive Trainee.

Chioma’s experience includes secondment as an Accountant at BOFINET for a year, as Finance Manager at Corbett electrical for 3 months, and as Finance and Admin Manager at HATAB for over a year. Chioma was part of a team that we engaged by Debswana to review a newly implemented BHAG scheme. She anchored the introduction and implementation of a new accounting software called Xero and conducts the trainings on the use of the software.

At Grant Thornton she is responsible for:

Review of annual financial statements, preparations of budgets and management reports for different organizations and industries including NGOs, corporates, parastatals, and mines.

Enhancement of financial accountability of the team by periodically conducting internal audit on files.

Chioma Spearheaded the introduction of Xero accounting software which saw an increase in the efficiency of staff and increase in client base. She regularly conducts trainings for client on the use of the software.

Training the team in full IFRS and IFRS for SMEs and other applicable standards and processes relevant to the day-to-day work. This led to improved quality of financial statements and reduction in time spent in preparation of financial statements. This contributed to about 30% increase in revenue for the team.

Computation of taxation for various tax types including Company Income Tax (CIT), PAYE, VAT and OWHT.

She has done some tax planning for couple of clients including Systronics, Blooms and Flounder Investments

She has Performed several reviews of internal control for different clients including review of the BHAG scheme of Debswana, review of inventory management for Debswana, overseeing the process of metre reading on frontline vehicles for Debswana and issuing reports on the same.

She has 12 staff members reporting to her.

Sector experience

Chioma has been involved with the preparation of management accounts, finalisation of accounts for audit purposes, bank reconciliation, general ledger reconciliation and company and individual tax computation for clients from various sectors such as telecommunication, hospitality, architectural, mining, trading etc

Professional qualifications and memberships

Chioma has completed her Association of Accounting Technicians (AAT) qualification. She is a member of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) and a Fellow Certified Professional Accountant (FCPA) member of the Botswana Institute of Chartered Accountants (BICA).

Technological Proficiency

Chioma has extensive experience operating various software to execute accounting methodology, such as XERO for cloud-based accounting, PASTEL for general accounting and CaseWare for finalisation of accounts. Furthermore, he is proficient in using Microsoft Office applications to bring quality to different assignments.

Community involvement

Chioma participates in Grant Thornton’s CSR initiatives such as recently supporting Government’s Digital Transformation Strategy within the education sector by sponsoring a state-of-the art imported tech panel – a first for public schools in Botswana. Over the years, Grant Thornton has supported various local communities such as Learn to Play Bontleng community (2021), SSVP Christ the King Cathedral in Gaborone-west (2021/20), COVID-19 National Relief Fund (2020), Tswaragano Primary School in Old Naledi (2022/19/18/17).

In her personal capacity, Chioma works closely with less privileged students of Bophirima Primary School and Philip Mosotlhe Primary School. She is also a donor at Child line, and regularly buys groceries for the poor in the inner cities.

Presentations and publications

Chioma was a member of Grant Thornton’s corporate Toastmasters club, which has facilitated development of communication and leadership skills. She served as Sergeant-at-arms in 2017/18, Vice President Education in 2019 and President in 2020/21.

Languages spoken

English, Setswana, Igbo.