Leading global firm of engineers and scientists SRK Consulting has appointed Marius van Huyssteen as general manager in its South African practice.
As partner in SRK’s Durban office since 2019, Van Huyssteen has 17 years of experience in Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) and has been a principal environment scientist at the firm since 2014.
The newly created position of general manager at SRK would be to support SRK SA’s managing director, Vis Reddy, with the coordination of various day-to-day operational tasks while providing management oversight of SRK’s support departments. This restructure of management responsibilities seeks to improve operational efficiencies and implement company-wide strategic initiatives related to internal business processes.
“This will allow the managing director to focus on strategy, risk, production and client related aspects of the business,” he said. “As general manager, I will work within the integrated company structure to facilitate communication, influence and support across all departments.”
He highlighted that the role required a person with a solid understanding and appreciation of SRK’s business, culture and core values.
“Coming from an ESG consulting background, I have extensive experience in managing multidisciplinary project teams,” he said. “I have always had a keen interest in the managerial side of SRK’s consulting practice, and have been afforded opportunities to gain hands-on management experience over the past 10 years.”
Van Huyssteen emphasised that carefully planned and clear communication is central to the success of most endeavours, and that he will promote collaboration, mutual respect and good communication within technical project teams, management teams and support teams.
His academic foundation is a BSc in microbiology and biotechnology from the University of Cape Town and a BSc (Hons) in environmental management from the University of KwaZulu-Natal. He holds a range of other qualifications in fields including environmental auditing and project management and is a practicing Environmental Assessment Practitioner (EAP).