Award-Winning Global Storyteller
Bruce Whitfield is a bestselling author whose work explores how leadership, economics, and human behaviour intersect to shape progress.
Known for his investigative depth and accessible storytelling, Bruce writes books that challenge assumptions, reframe complexity, and inspire more constructive thinking about how we build companies, economies, and futures. His writing is grounded in decades of journalism, giving readers a rare blend of sharp insight, real-world context, and narratives that stay with you long after the last page.
It’s About Tyme:
Banking Beyond Borders
Pan Macmillan, 2025
Imagine starting with a bold mission in 2012: to achieve financial inclusion through a multi-country bank. Within a decade, this vision becomes one of the fastest-growing fintechs in the world.
Now imagine becoming the global poster child for AI in banking and receiving an email in June 2025, informing you that your company is one of Time magazine’s Top 100 most influential companies in the world.
This incredible story unfolds within the pages of It’s About Tyme. As Roger Grobler, a long-standing investor in Tyme puts it, ‘Courage and audacity are not just bold strategies – they’re the safest. Because playing it safe is, ironically, the riskiest thing you can do.’
I am inspired by the story told so well of Tyme. Your book really strikes a chord. I’ve bought additional copies to encourage my colleagues to keep going and to learn from Tyme as our ecosystem develops.
Adam Craker, Director, Jozi My Jozi
Your decade-long rollercoaster of fintech ambition, near obliteration, multinational chaos, pandemic panic, 217 polite rejections and two eleventh-hour miracles… yeah, my heart was sweating. What hooked me most was how the story isn’t just “we built a bank.” It’s “we built a bank in the world’s hardest possible sandbox, with a cast scattered across continents, while rewriting the rules and nearly imploding a few times.” It’s courage with receipts. Audacity with a pulse.
Hammy, The Book Bloom Tribe
Available on:
The One Thing:
Small Ideas, Big Outcomes
Pan Macmillan, 2024
What is the ‘One Thing’ that, if you were president for half an hour, you would order to be implemented so it could have a catalytic effect throughout the economy? Bruce challenged over 100 smart South Africans to identify the ‘One Thing’ that they would order to be implemented so it could have a catalytic effect throughout the economy. You will hear from a host of people, including:
- Sean Summers, tasked with turning around Pick n Pay, on the first step he would take to turn around the country
- Mining CEO Mike Teke on what he learned playing football on the fields of KwaThema, and how he would apply that to the country
- Wits Chancellor Judy Dlamini on the power of education
- Chair of the Businesswomen’s Association Mandisa Nkwanyana about harnessing the power of women as a catalyst for change.
You will also hear from those who inspire us to be more than we think we can be, such as maestro Ralf Schmitt, plus a range of money managers, editors, CEOs, academics and founders of some of the country’s most successful startups.
This book isn’t about quick fixes. It’s about planting seeds, sparking discussions, and inspiring action. And let me tell you, the ideas in this book are nothing short of fascinating—some incredibly inspiring, and others wildly unconventional!
Good Things Guy
The One Thing is not just a book though. It’s a compendium of ideas, an exploration of notions and almost, an intellectual funnel of thinking that’s more relevant than ever.
The Citizen
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Genius: How to thrive at the edge of chaos
Pan Macmillan, 2023
Genius tells the stories of some of the extraordinary individuals, companies and industries whose ideas, products and raw materials solve problems and add value across the globe. Greatness comes from acting on purpose and solving problems for the future.
Learn how Pratley beat Armstrong to the moon, how a former Eskom quantity surveyor capitalised on Britain’s obsession with meerkats to create the UK’s most visible price comparison website, how to take a Mediterranean-style food concept to the Mediterranean, and how a device designed to beat diamond smuggling made it from the set of a popular US hospital drama into emergency rooms and pathology labs across the US.
Genius tells these and many more stories and lessons on how to turn smart ideas into great businesses at home and then take those ideas global. It examines what it takes to thrive in an increasingly complex, fast-paced and divisive global environment. These are lessons for anyone looking to succeed anywhere against the odds.
Genius is a page-turner of a business book. Most importantly it will inspire its readers about what can be achieved in the world.
Michael Jordaan
A refreshing departure from the day-to-day negativity.
Business Day
It is just so readable and just a joy to explore. You are an extremely confident writer and what I enjoy probably more than the actual journey of the book itself, is your quirky take on just about everything. It makes me smile with pleasure!
Jenny Crwys-Williams
What Bruce has done in this book is to remind us that we are people with great ideas that the world needs.
Ezekiel Kekana
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The Upside of Down:
How chaos and uncertainty breed opportunity.
Pan Macmillan, 2021
The proliferation of smart devices and the explosion of popular social media platforms have turned everyone into a purveyor of information.
It means our world is characterised by fake news, manipulated information feeds, and divisive social-media agendas.
Read how successful innovators assess risk, stay adaptable, and turn obstacles into momentum. Instead of being paralysed by fear, they take action, control what they can, and rewrite the stories they tell about complexity. This book shows how you can do the same by unlocking opportunity and building a mindset built for uncertainty.
It’s easy to believe that our time is the most challenging in human history, but this is just not true. The Upside of Down is an inspiring read to navigate the complexity of our times.
Steeling myself for immersion education on business, inflation, shares, bulls and bears I was astonished to find myself learning simple truths in this book. Bruce’s skill lies in cutting through the, um crap, applying perspective – and above all in storytelling. A breath of fresh thought in an atmosphere of gloom!
Nancy Richards, Country Life
Buy this book immediately and read it from the Rosling-style test in the first chapter, to Bill Clinton’s one phrase advice in the last chapter…It should be compulsory reading!
Ian Mann Reviews… in Fin24
This is what we need to hear, and the amiable Whitfield is the expert to listen to.
Business Day
Whitfield’s host of billionaires and entrepreneurial champions see uncertainty as opportunity. Problem solvers thrive in chaotic, uncertain times because they act to change their future.
Ted Keenan, Daily Dispatch
The Upside of Down is written by the king of the business airwaves Bruce Whitfield, who has the incredibly rare gift of making complex financial issues easy to understand. The world is upside down and The Upside of Down highlights opportunities during chaos.
Jonathan Ancer and Dan Dewes
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