Full Name: Claude Baissac

Position: CEO of Eunomix, since 2009

Main Activity of the Company: Providing advisory and consultancy services in country risk, strategy and sustainability for mining companies

Date and Place of Birth: Tripoli, Libya, September 1969

Education: MA (economic geography), Réunion; MPhil (political science), Northern Arizona University, US; an incomplete PhD (political science)

First Job: Substitute high school geography, history and economics teacher, Réunion Island, 1991

Size of First Pay Packet: 10 000 French francs a month

Value of Assets under Your Control: Goodwill

Number of People under Your Leadership: A core team of juniors working with senior collaborators

Management Style: My team struggles to secure meetings with me – I just run away, hide and draft proposals. I do not know what my management style is – chaotic, perhaps

Personal Best Achievement: My children

Person Who Has Had the Biggest Influence on Your Life: My maternal grandfather, Jean Baissac de Boucherville, an extraordinary man – he was a polymathic scientist, humanist, lay minister, philosopher and former British army major

Person Who Has Had the Biggest Influence on Your Career: Richard Bolin, who established the world’s first special economic zones. I was doing my master’s degree on economic zones and small islands and he invited me, aged 24, to a conference in Malaysia and then offered me a job in Flagstaff, Arizona, and sponsored me to do a PhD

Person You Would Most Like to Meet: Barack Obama

Businessperson Who Has Impressed You Most: Mark Cutifani, and I am watching the rise of Mike Teke with great interest – he most likely represents the future, or a form of the future

Philosophy of Life: Be true to yourself

Biggest Ever Opportunity: Being offered the position of deputy CEO of Air Afrique at the tender age of 30 – one day, I was at university and the next day I was making $24 000 a month

Biggest Ever Disappointment: Myself

Hope for the Future: That people wake up and start changing individually

Favourite Reading: Gabriel García Márquez

Favourite TV Programme: I do not watch television

Favourite Food/Drink: A good French duck breast with a lot of fat properly roasted, chips and a good mayonnaise with lots of salt and butter. And then a very good glass of Chablis wine

Favourite Music: Jazz and classical

Favourite Sport: Squash

Hobbies: Squash, swimming with my children and jumping on the trampoline, and I have this guilty little pleasure of playing Battlefield 3 online for four to five hours a week – I am one of the world’s top-ranked players

Car: A classic 1967 MG, which is my Sunday car, but I do not really like cars – I do minileases with Avis for my business cars

Pets: Dogs and cats – for the children and me

Miscellaneous Dislikes: Stupidity, intellectual laziness, lack of moral courage and mediocrity

Married: Separated

Children: Alice, 13; Luc, 9

Clubs: Johannesburg Country Club, Parkview Squash Club, the Institute of Directors in Southern Africa and the Institute of Business Advisors Southern Africa