PROFILE: Emma Luyt, joint CEO of JLL Sub-Saharan Africa
From chef to interior design to head of an international real estate investment firm: taking an unconventional road to the top
From cuisine to commercial real estate may seem an unlikely transition, but Emma Luyt is used to wearing many hats.When Luyt worked as a junior chef in Dublin, London and Paris in the early 2000s, the cut-throat world of commercial real estate was the furthest thing from her mind.Yet today she heads the Sub-Saharan African business of New York Stock Exchange-listed JLL, one of the largest real estate investment and advisory firms in the world. Luyt was appointed as co-CEO of JLL’s Joburg-based regional operations in April alongside Peter Harris, previously JLL’s CFO and COO. She’s also at the helm of the Fortune 500 company’s interior architecture design arm in SA, Tétris Design & Build.Luyt’s journey from working in kitchens to running JLL started 18 years ago when she returned to SA after a five-year culinary stint in Europe. A chance meeting with an interior designer friend prompted her to enrol for a three-year BA in interior design at the Greenside Design Centre in Joburg."I re...
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