We are SurgeAdvisory
“We were seeking a relationship-based advisory service focusing on a small clientele,” Ms Zahra, the company’s managing director told The Business Observer. “We are thinking more on long-term relationships; less transaction-based and thus, more relationship-based. We believe in partnering with businesses and always aim at being open, transparent and genuine in the way we work with them.”
After co-founding one of Malta’s leading training, recruitment and market research firm, and serving as its managing director for nearly 34 years, leading business personality and economist Joseph F.X. Zahra has sold his shareholding and has taken up a new challenge.
Over the past three months, Mr Zahra and his daughter Maria Zahra have been busy setting up SurgeAdvisory, a new boutique consultancy company.
Mr Zahra has occupied prominent positions including that of Chairman of Bank of Valletta, Middle Sea Insurance and GO plc. He is also one of five members on the International Audit Committee of the Holy See and the Vatican State. In July 2013, Pope Francis named Mr Zahra the President of a new Pontifical Commission, the Pontifical Commission for Reference on the Economic-Administrative Structure of the Holy See, chartered to investigate current accounting practices among Vatican offices and bodies, and to help devise new strategies for greater fiscal responsibility and transparency. Renowned for acting as a consultant for a large number of leading businesses in Malta, especially family businesses, Mr Zahra has teamed up with his daughter Maria – who also left the company– to set up a new consultancy agency.
“We were seeking a relationship-based advisory service focusing on a small clientele,” Ms Zahra, the company’s managing director told The Business Observer. “We are thinking more on long-term relationships; less transaction-based and thus, more relationship-based. We believe in partnering with businesses and always aim at being open, transparent and genuine in the way we work with them.”
With Mr Zahra’s wide-ranging expertise in issues related to economics, corporate management and directorship, and her own 15 years of HR and business advisory experience, Ms Zahra says that there is a lot of complementarity in the two directors’ capabilities. “This includes finding solutions to complex issues of organisational restructuring, change management, succession planning and the strengthening of governance in family business and SMEs where you need a strong competence in processes and performance which are both HR-led.”
What Surge offers includes strategic and business planning, transformation management, succession planning, organisation restructuring, corporate governance advice, human resources and capital advice. With SurgeAdvisory, the focus has shifted towards a more targeted and personalised approach.
“Advisory services need to be customised according to the challenges and situations our clients are facing, therefore whilst committing to offering services areas, there is no menu of services that we provide. Each organisation has its own complex challenges and it is our responsibility to understand each business and the context in which it operates and give insight and advice according to what is required. Consultancy services are not a ‘one-size-fits-all’,” says Ms Zahra.
Mr Zahra has said that his new role will allow him to dedicate more time to his directorships in Malta and abroad, which include Medserv Malta, United Finance, Curmi & Partners Limited and Pendergardens Development. He is also one of five members on the International Audit Committee of the Holy See and the Vatican State, and a board member of the Vatican-based Centesimus Annus Pro Pontifice Foundation.
About this article
This article featured in The Business Observer on 27 April 2017.