VERONICA KIETZMANN-CRONJE

Background and Professional Experience

Veronica Cronje started her career as a journalist/photographer in 1993 after completing her studies at the Vaal University of Technology.  She worked for a local newspaper and also for an in-house magazine of one of the major companies in South-Africa.  In 1995 she was appointed as the Public Relations Officer for a local Community Chest.

The growth and success of the local Community Chest was recognized by United Way Worldwide in 2005 when Veronica was asked to serve on the leadership team for the development of Global Standards for United Way’s around the world. She was also asked to present to the whole network of 47 countries during the World Assembly in Melbourne Australia in 2006.  After the successful completion of the Global Standards document in 2006 the work was adopted and accepted by all the national and regional members of the United Way system.  The Global standards are now being used as a self assessment tool by national as well as local United Ways around the world.

In 2009 Veronica was asked to be one of 12 leaders identified around the world to form part of the first action leaders co-hort to work on strategies to facilitate the expansion and growth of United Way Worldwide on all 7 continents.  She was the only representative from Africa.  The action leaders group worked over a 12 month period and included travelling to various countries.  The projects and strategies of the group was presented at the United Worldwide Board.  Veronica was also asked to present to the Board of the Worldwide movement the future focus of the movement. This was done outside of the action leaders co-hort in 2010 in Washington.

In 2010 Veronica was nominated and accepted to serve on the WPC (Worldwide Professional Council).  The WPC is a working and consulting group to United Way Worldwide that has leaders from all around the Globe designing impact strategies and operational best practices for United Ways and member organisations.

In 2011 Veronica was chosen to be one of three Executive Directors to form part of a panel discussion with the official opening of the Mary Gates Learning Centre in Alexandria in the USA.  The reason for the selection was to showcase groundbreaking work in sustainable community development done in South-Africa, India and San Francisco (USA).  The Gates family commended the work showcased at the opening ceremony.

Qualifications and Accreditations

Veronica’s passion for leadership development and sustainable community programmes soon translated into Neuro Coaching.  She is a certified Neuro Coach, M Bit Coach, NLP practitioner and just completed her Post Graduate Diploma in Coaching at SACAP (South-African College for Applied Sciences).

Veronica and her team has developed many personal transformational training programmes over the years and some of these programmes are now SETA accredited.  Lusa is a Recognized training provider for Comensa and the Department of Education.  The organisation has also branched out into a Social Entrepreneurship Institute that can offer various accredited training programmes to ensure the development of Social Entrepreneurs. Their mediation course is accredited with P Seta, Nabfam and SAAM (South African Association for Mediators).