People Dynamics March/April 2020

WWW.IPM.CO.ZA MARCH - APRIL 2020 VOL44 NO.11

BRIDGING INEQUALITY GAP

BEYOND

COVID-19 FUTURE-FIT-HRPB

MILLENNIALS

Self-Efficacy

BUSINESS CONTINUITY J O U R N A L

O F

T H E

I N S T I T U T E

O F

P E O P L E

M A N A G E M E N T

@IPMSouthAfrica /company/institute-of-people-management-ipm @IPM4PEOPLE

Ed’s Note

Ed’s Note

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People Dynamics is the official journal of the Institute of People Management (IPM). The IPM is dedicated to the effective development of human potential.

In terms of fast-emerging global challenges, it is critical to champion the strategic role of human resources and to acknowledge that both development and management are catalysts for growth. In the spirit of progress and support, the IPM provides members with effective leadership and access to appropriate knowledge, information and the opportunity to network with key local and international players.

GROUND ZERO ho knew that the following words would take a whole new meaning come 2020, when how we live, work and relate to one another has been disrupted on a whole new level.

Said Klaus Schwab in 2016, when fathoming a new revolution facing the globe: “We are at the beginning of a revolution that is fundamentally changing the way we live, work and relate to one another. In its scale, scope and complexity, what I consider to be the fourth industrial revolution, is unlike anything humankind has experienced before.”

He was referring to a combination of cybernetic systems, Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence, robotisation, 3-D Printing, and a multi-faceted integration of technology into all things work, life and thought.

Added to this conundrum is a new spanner in the works: a virus that, thanks to global connectivity and human mobility has mushroomed and touched every corner of the world in a short space of time. While this mysterious virus will eventually force laggards to catch up with new ways of doing things in the fourth industrial revolution, it also keeps all leaders conscious of their limitations and mortality. If it doesn’t stir populations and their leaders to put humanity back, centrestage where it belongs in the pursuit of all other kinds of success, I’m not sure what will.

Suddenly humans realise that not only is there vulnerability from being shoved aside by new

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industrial revolutions, but that the world can be put at a standstill by something beyond what politicians, business moguls, billionaires, men and women of the cloth can readily decipher – lest we get too carried away with silly hegemonic battles, petty financial wars or superficial stock games.

This is new ground zero for all organisations, governments, businesses, communities and families. If an entity – whatever size or form, doesn’t use this critical time to reimagine and reinvent itself for a better, more meaningful and most efficient operation, the opportunity is lost and a vital lesson loses its purpose.

It is hoped that this time, and hopefully the articles contained herein, will give you and yours a chance to think better, feel better, plan better, do better and be better in your future – however you choose to shape it, with human consciousness and wisdom optimally enabled by technology.

The articles carried in this issue serve to empower people managers, strategists, business decision-makers, worker representatives, HR consultants and practitioners in fulfilling their roles. In different ways, they are inspired by the Institute of People Management code, our Human Rights’ steeped Constitution and the quintessential SAQA Mandate, all with Industry 4.0 and the global stage in mind. We hope that you enjoy the thought-provoking debates and diversity reflected in the issue as much as we enjoyed putting it together for you.

Once again, we welcome you to Ground Zero!

People Dynamics provides a forum for debate and discussion on all issues affecting HR practitioners in South Africa, the African continent and beyond. People Dynamics is distributed to all members of the IPM and to other key decisionmakers in the industry.

To receive People Dynamics regularly and enjoy additional benefits – including discounts on HR-related services and professional networking events - contact Welile Mabaso on welile@ipm. co.za.

The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of the IPM. ISSN No - 1019-6196

AFRICAN HUMAN RESOURCES CONFEDERATION

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

CONTENTS Organisational Performance

3

Labour Law

Economic hardship and retrenchment

6

Professional Development Feature

8

The 2020 Vision to the wire

Education false-start

3

8

Personal Development

14

Talent Management

16

Human Rights Issue

18

Moving from determination to self-efficacy How to enhance the career self efficacy of South African Millennials It is not the virus that will kill us, it’s hunger

Human Rights

20

Leadership Discussion

22

Corporate Social Responsibility

25

Leadership

28

Professional Development

36

Human Capital Management

38

Mental Health

40

Hunger in the face of plenty On the way to creating a new normal

14

16

Where to focus energies to sustain jobs and healthy triple bottom-lines Leadership resilience and business continuity through a global pandemic Is the HRBP title thrown around with true meaning behind it eroded?

Optimising human capital

18 PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

25

Manage your productivity dips

Organisational Performance

3

THE

2020 VISION TO THE WIRE

V

ision is the destination that one visualises and wants to achieve, but the path is unknown. This is where goals come into play… setting the path for the rightful achievement of your vision, acting as milestones. – Sromona Bhattacharyya Back in who knows when, we all dreamt our big dreams and coined our big vision for year 2020.

If your Vision committed you or your organisation to a specific envisioned position “by 2020”, then you should be basking at your achievements because, strictly speaking at 12:00:01 January 2020, you would have attained your vision. Our team has been doing rounds finding out who’s celebrating big and who’s not.

We found quite a few who told us that year 2020 was, in fact, the target delivery year. So, we are here to work with all those as we all chase hard at bringing vision2020 to full life by 23:59:59 December 2020!

As they read this, some might be feeling some dejection or trepidation about bringing their (personal/organisation’s) vision to reality. It could be because the vision suddenly seems too ambitious and unachievable. And they might console themselves with the fallacy that “visions are motivational statements and aren’t always attainable.”

With that, they may give up on the urge to chase the vision.

Some of our respondents say they’ve been disheartened by visions that seem no longer relevant as “events have overtaken” them. Needless to say, to be able to motivate people into pursuing a vision, you must believe in its importance, relevance and attainability.

Let’s take turns reviewing the different challenging scenarios. You can pick up some strategic insights or get to revive your own creative thinking towards your vision, giving it life and selling it to the rest of the team who will bring it to reality.

When the Vision is “Daunting”

If a vision seems too big, too ambitious and intimidating, it is important to embrace the sentiment behind it and identify a way that the organisation can express or live out this sentiment in a series of short-term, specific, attainable goals.

Martin Luther, Jr advised wisely: You don’t have to see the entire staircase, just take the first step. For instance, if the vision was “To be the biggest recruitment agency in Africa by 2020”, this may prove a challenge. You may not see the end of the staircase, so to speak.

Confining your interpretation

Big may indicate the size of the operation. It could also mean the size or number of clients on the agency’s books. It may mean the size of billings; the number of personnel; it may mean continental representation through a spread of offices or networks; it may also mean “biggest” as recognised by industry partners or the market through a combination of achievements, such as negotiation clout, reputation or the quality of clients that it attracts.

Confined targeting

In whatever aspect that management believes the organisation can prove dominance, that’s where it should focus the organisation strategy for the period remaining towards the Vision ‘deadline’.

To drive this, management needs to formulate or articulate goals with clear targets, making sure that not only are there organisationwide programmes to drive towards the demonstration of dominance in the selected leadership-specific aspect, but there should be a credible and transparent way to verify the leadership claim.

Credible Industry or Market Data

The organisation must be able to prove attainment of dominance in the aspect that qualifies it to be “the biggest recruitment agency in Africa in 2020”. It stands to reason that one cannot claim a superior position in a market or industry from an internal perspective. One should have sufficient information to compare themselves against the competition.

A tracking process that links to undisputed data is important to back the status.

Some industries cooperate and share data freely via a central bureau or institute, others have to rely on pure market intelligence, observations and deductive conclusion. With competition agencies on the watch, it would be prudent to ensure that not only can superiority claims be tested, but that any industry cooperation on figures doesn’t put the players at loggerheads with regulating authorities.

When it comes to audacious visions, then, one can see that no matter how big the industry grows, the executive can always find space to live up to the vision – and prove itself “the biggest” in some significant aspect. It is a statement that constantly inspires and drives the organisation toward greatness or leadership, if not of the entire industry, it could be “the greatest” in certain important niches.

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

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Mental Health

When the Vision is “Knotty”

If the vision is abstruse or unclear, there is an opportunity for the executive to give it a rider or qualifying statement(s) to give a much clearer direction aligned towards the vision – if for a specified period.

disrupted – hence the need to keep finding relevance by re-visioning and adapting service models to meet new markets and new demands.

So, while one may perceive a vision as being overtaken by events, the executive can stay true to the vision with the least of adjustments, or graduate to a less confining or less rigid expression.

Putting Meaning to the Vision

This can be achieved by expressing high-level priorities which form strategic focus in the line of the vision, so to speak. Let’s take IPM’s vision, for example: “To be a global portal of thought leadership for HR and people management”. Executive members go on to expatiate on the vision by indicating ways in which the Institute will prove itself a portal, platform, source or channel for global thought leadership.

It demonstrates how members can always tap into its resources to expand their people management knowledge and voice- thus gaining access to share or draw from the Institute what they need, as and how they need from the Institute.

Hence, as one thinks of the institute’s strategic focus having evolved from being a pioneer voice for welfare and humane conditions in the workplace, to a collaboration platform to professionalise personnel management, then to a strategic advisory body and an authority on professional development and educational evolution on diverse aspects of people management. In 2020, IPM fulfils the role of a stately sage for people management and leadership as well as a professional haven for people managers of all designations, levels and backgrounds.

This demonstrates that the vision had always been put on track through the decades and in different phases of the institute’s existence. One could argue that the more abstract a vision statement is, the more it has legs to carry through generations without the need for restating.

When the Vision is “Dwarfed”

Where a vision has been dwarfed by the organisations’ own achievements, there is no point in basking in the glory of the achievement, thinking you have arrived. While the vision may have been conceived as what the founder ‘saw on the horizon’, if the company gets to the horizon ‘too quickly’ than the founder anticipated, it is time to extend the vision and stretch the organisation to new heights or fresh challenges.

When the vision is “Irrelevant”

The only way a vision could be irrelevant is if it were narrow to the point of the organisation having no room to play. If the vision was “To supply the fastest-holding ink for top-end writing instruments in the South African market”, the organisation may no longer supply ink for fountain pens.

Product/Market Extensions and Diversification

As an alternative to divesting, who is to say it wouldn’t find new uses for the ink it produces? There is still demand for ink, albeit not for fountain pens. Staying with the top-end ‘writing instrument’ functionality, the company could make a play at the office printing sector and look at attributes of their ink that could lend themselves to more modern processes such as jet-printing or well-printer technology.

School art, illustration books or corporate branding material are examples a reputable ink company could diversify into – maintaining a fair measure of its operational processes and absorbing negative threats on human resources.

Drastic Measures

Organisations faced with a vision dead-end (legislatively prohibited or environmentally threatening) may have to consider more drastic measures. One thinks of the asbestos industry, for instance. If a company aimed “To be the leading asbestos roof supplier in highdensity areas”, chances are, they not only abandoned the vision and closed operations, but they are busy fighting law-suits and a longdrawn class action brought by sufferers.

For companies who can continue operating, a dead-end vision calls for an overhaul of operations. This might mean entering new sectors, facing new risks to fulfil the shareholders’ financial ambitions and secure other stakeholders’ interests – employees’ in particular.

Industry diversification comes at a major cost, and new operating models may require huge sacrifices all round, in the interest of the parties’ shared future and security.

Arbitrary example

For instance, let’s say a Damelin-like institution, at inception had aimed to be South Africa’s leading correspondence college for Junior and Senior Certificate.

A revised vision could well have been “to be the leading institution for distance learning” when they began including vocational studies courses in their mix. A further revised vision, when they were able to offer weekend and week-night classes for both vocational and professional studies, might have changed to “… the leading provider of flexible education and career development”.

This vision would have carried well as the group opened learning campuses and full-time classes for undergraduates. It would have sufficed even where the mix grew to encompass live-streamed, digitally-aided interactive classes or on-site management development programmes. In other words, no further adaptation would be needed.

While a vision is meant to be aspirational and long-term, it may not always be possible to foresee market changes, particularly given the rapid acceleration experienced since the third industrial revolution.

Not only have product life-cycles been cut short, but industry lifecycles have similarly been prematurely obliterated or significantly PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

Vision longevity and sustaining factors

So, with all challenges that a vision poses – whether due to perceived over-ambition, vagueness or datedness, the most exciting challenge is getting the executive thinking outside the tunnel to help all those who subscribe to it, to realise it.

It might be that a bit of focus, elaboration, reinforcement, tweaking, strategic foresight or re-focus is required to keep all members on course, but peaks and troughs or disasters aside, it is always possible to deliver fair shareholder value and sustain the organisation into new waves of visioning.

Help at Hand!

So, if you need help realising or reviewing your 2020 goals, reach out and get the necessary help to either simplify, clarify or focus on aspects that will have you and your team celebrating together, come December 2020!

If the final destination seems totally out of sight, get some help up the few flight of stairs that you can still climb, and still register significant 2020Milestones - something everyone will remember.

Readers’ Opinion

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Why is Holding a Vision Important

WHAT READERS SAY Why is Holding a Vision Important

A vision is what gives direction to the efforts of the organisation and the contribution of every individual in the organisation It provides everyone with a common destination and a shared reason to be ‘on the journey together’, no matter the role each person plays Vision gives a basis for leadership, irrespective of who ends up at the helm It guides strategic direction and reconciles disparate opinions on what is to be prioritised It helps the organisation determine whether it has the right type of leadership and pipeline It aligns the diverse and creative thinking that everybody brings to the party A vision provides basis to evaluate leadership effectiveness and decision for additional investment A vision is an essential basis for employee engagement

A vision separates drivers from passengers Elaborating on their respective sentiments, the contributors to the last two points added: If a vision resonates with prospective recruits, the company can be sure that once on board, the people will bring their hearts, minds and hands to the job. They will be emotionally connected to the company’s journey, and actively conjure up novel ways to help it reach its destination.

It is quite telling when or if a person can’t recall the organisation’s vision. And here, it doesn’t mean regurgitating it word for word, but knowing and understanding the essence of it. If someone draws a total blank, it’s either a matter of acumen or level of interest in the organisation. As such an organisation would have to introduce necessary intervention to make sure that it isn’t weighed down by disengaged baggage.

A vision attained is value delivered

As you all said it, a vision gives everyone focus and reasons to celebrate.

It gives all the players a sense of achievement. Often, this is not confined to current staff and management, but the pride also extends to those who were part of the early journey and added their sweat to the organisation: the alumni including old partners and associates.

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

6

Labour Law

Economic Hardship and Retrenchment Are Employers Exempt from Severance Pay? The latest technical recession has dented what hopes the country had of turning the unemployment tide.

PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

Labour Law

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refuse an offer of alternative employment. What is meant by the term “unreasonably refuse” is not entirely clear because the term ‘unreasonable’ is subjective. That is, it is very likely that an employer would consider the offer of a lower post to a retrenchee to be fair but an employee who might stand to get a big retrenchment package may believe that refusing a demotion is very reasonable. The BCEA neither defines what is ‘reasonable’ nor provides guidelines for determining whether a refusal of alternative employment is unreasonable. It is therefore left to employers, employees and trade unions to fight this out based on their own viewpoints. It is also up to the CCMA, bargaining councils and courts to develop their own interpretations of this provision.

Section 41(6) of the BCEA provides that any dispute about the entitlement to the statutory severance pay may be referred to a bargaining council (BC) if there is one in the industry or otherwise to the CCMA. Should conciliation fail the dispute must be arbitrated at the BC or CCMA. The issues that might come before an arbitrator (who is like a judge) could be: • Is the applicant eligible to be considered for severance pay? That is, was he/she an employee at the time of the termination, was there a true retrenchment and had the employee been in service for at least one full year?

• Is the retrenchee entitled to severance pay despite having been offered alternative employment?

• The aspects of the employee’s pay that are to be included in the severance pay calculation.

In calculating severance pay the employer is normally entitled to exclude: • Tool of trade allowances • Discretionary profit shares • An isolated lump sum payment • Education allowance • Relocation allowance • Taxi or bus fare allowances

BY: IVAN ISRAELSTAM, LABOUR LAW MANAGEMENT CONSULTING

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s companies of all sizes are pushed into a corner and contemplate closing down or retrenching, the employers need to be aware that the CCMA can enforce severance pay.

Where employees are retrenched the Basic Conditions of Employment Act (BCEA) requires employers to pay the retrenchees severance pay of at least one week’s remuneration per year of completed service.

Retrenchees are entitled to severance pay in addition to their normal remuneration, benefits, leave pay, notice, retirement fund withdrawal benefits and any other amounts due.

The statutory requirement for the payment of severance pay covers only cases where the employment is terminated due to the operational requirements of the job (better known as retrenchment). That is, the BCEA does not require the payment of such severance pay in cases of resignation, retirement, death, expiry of an employment contract, dismissal for misconduct, poor performance, illness or other reasons.

The only exception to the statutory requirement for employers to pay severance pay to retrenchees is where the employees unreasonably

However, items that the employer should include are: • Salaries • Wages • Overtime pay • Performance bonuses • Non-discretionary 13th cheques • Shift allowances • Standby allowances • Working away from home allowances • Allowances for private travel in the employee’s own vehicle • Private use portion of a company car • The employer’s contribution to benefit schemes such as death benefit, funeral, retirement and medical aid fund contributions • Payments in kind including free accommodation • Commission The issue of retrenchments in general and of assessing severance pay in particular are practically complicated and fraught with legal complexities. Employers are therefore not advised to deal with these without the assistance of an experienced and reputable labour law advisor.

You are invited to familiarise yourself with Labour Law issues and participate in the debate that continually shapes the legal landscape in the workplace. Get in touch with IPM Research or Labour Law Consulting directly to find out how.

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

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Professional Development Feature

Education False-starts To what extent are modern professionals Verwoerd’s victims?

BY: PEOPLE DYNAMICS RESEARCH

T

he assigning of poor quality of black education to Verwoerd is as justifiable as it is stunting. As a politician, Verwoerd was all about protecting the interests of the White population, for which he made no apology.

Verwoerd, on the other hand, was a true student of psychology and sociology from whom educators who wish to advance socio-economic development have great lessons to learn – if from just reflecting on one piece of writing.

What Verwoerd did as an academic and scholar has the potential to inspire any student to boundless achievement. From insisting on embracing and asserting his cultural identity to discounting race as a determinant for human achievement by thwarting theories that suggested as such.

PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

He stood up to the theory that black minds were less capable of mastering complex concepts and theories. When the workplace was looking to psychometric testing to identify suitable candidates, psychometricians wanted to attribute blacks’ lower scores to poor intellectual capacity. But, using social science research, Verwoerd countered this with findings that the assessment design and method were accountable for skewed results by being attuned to specific cultural background(s). He asserted that there was equal potential among all humans irrespective of race, given the appropriate learning opportunity, approach or environment.

To shed some light on black students’ journey, we wish to share with you an excerpt (next article) that has appealed for the nakedness of facts it lays out on the subject – what some may call objectivity or naïveté, you will have to choose what to ascribe to it.

The excerpt overlaps with the ground that our research traversed when tracing the background to South African People Management, especially regarding aspects of employee selection, training

Professional Development Feature

and development featuring the popularised use of psychometric assessments pre-and-post-recruitment, in a quest to optimise personto-job matching and unlock the full potential of employees.

If nothing else, by reflecting on this topic we raise a poignant question of whether the pre-1994 student cadre were entirely victims – and if so, whether they were victims of an education system or victims of a political regime. Either way, it makes one question whether the black student can declare himself or herself liberated and better empowered, given the demise of the old regime.

As a development researcher, I have struggled to find much fault with ‘one version’ of Verwoerd, and actually find it an inspiration, encouragement and affirmation. This is the version of Verwoerd the social sciences professor - a psychology and sociology scholar, a passionate researcher and contributor to human resource development.

When it comes to Verwoerd the politician and a powerful official in government, I have reservations of note. While one could argue that he offered blacks freedom to chart their own educational paths and to shape their own fate in their communities, I struggle to see the genuineness of the intent or gesture if educational resources were distributed unfairly, disadvantaging persons of one race over others, even if a matter of per capita budget due to disproportionately high number of blacks. Surely, having blacks making up the highest percentage of the South African population was a reality of life since they were indigenous to the continent, while the rest built local populations through smaller clusters of immigration.

This feature ignites a people development debate and empowerment introspection with much of the background covered in the piece published in politicsweb at the cusp of the country’s fifth administration by acclaimed historian and author, Professor Hermann Giliomee.

I can’t tell the impact of South African education on all South Africans, but having both been privileged and compromised by the old system, I am certain that it is our responsibility to use all tools at our disposal to the utmost. We have to continuously build our knowledge to enhance development and quality of life, mindful of who-else benefits from our contributions in the community.

Confidence and self-efficacy aside, if you are chained to a wall and tied down hands and feet, you would not be able to reach a fivecourse dinner tray offered to you even a mere five meters from you.

Notwithstanding, you would be sure to ‘make your own versions of fivecourse dinners the moment you lose the ties and the chains’ – literally or figuratively, physically or mentally.

For instance, look at what professional bodies have done for the South African education landscape. Two, in particular, come to mind: the Institute of Marketing Management and the Institute of People Management. These are bodies that have shaped and sustained many a career - surviving from voluntary member contributions, without the statutory compulsion that secures them license fees as is the case with professions like Accounting, Law or Engineering.

I see how these professional bodies gave opportunities to all shades of members; how they offered career paths for both academic and vocational candidates who sought to build their futures on these professions. I see how they offered access to the wealthy of society as well as to the disadvantaged.

I see how they worked with elite universities and colleges just as they dedicated time working with technikons and correspondence academies on one side, and industries and large businesses on the other.

I see how they levelled the playing fields, ensuring that all their

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graduates found their rightful place in the working community, with all earning respect through practice as they eked out a living with no less pride than those who enjoyed more privileged early schooling.

Whichever route their members took on their career journeys – whether beginning with academic theory earning junior degrees to later seek specialisation through these professional institutes. Or, starting off with professional studies part-time while juggling life responsibilities, then much later pursuing post-grad qualifications with their practical work experience serving as reinforcement and insights to expound on the theories… Either approach yielded quality contribution to the profession and to the economy despite earlier hurdles into the mainstream academic (masters/doctoral) path.

Whichever way one looks at it, the post-apartheid education landscape has opened up even more options than in the Z.K. Matthews’ times. How we regard and use the options will determine when we begin to make a meaningful contribution to society and critically, to our families and immediate communities where charity begins. There will always be odds to beat no matter what era we are in. So, whether in fighting the odds we draw ourselves decades back, or we train our vision to cut through the fog to the ultimate goal, is a painful choice each of us has to make for himself or herself.

A member of my family, for instance studied BSc. at Rhodes University in the 1950’s, but would rarely set foot on that campus.

Her parents, who had made all kinds of sacrifices for her to obtain her education had to be content with her being confined to classes at ‘neighbouring’ Fort Hare. As a Science and Maths major, she went on to achieve great things, using her privileged disadvantaged circumstances to empower scores of teachers and students who genuinely yearned for science and maths mastery, despite a series of social challenges black communities in TBVC and metro townships were subjected to.

Cikizwa Ntombi-ka-Nzube, aka Igqabi, didn’t only become my favourite relative, but she became my most tenacious science teacher, a mentor and an admired professional rival. She stitched, sewed and darned torn educational aspirations. She built bridges for “lost” students to reach their wildest academic dreams, and certainly knew how to make lemonade from all sorts of lemons life dished her – from Lovedale to Diepkloof and Diepsloot; from Rhodes or Fort Hare to Wits and Oxford.

Were it not for the global plague currently restricting movement, I’d have certainly loved to read the following article (excerpt) with her, and hear her take on the core content, the players and the hats they wore, the before & after situations of our education, and what attitude and action to take from here. While it might be ‘nice’ to have her views, she’s had her run. It’s now time for yours and mine.

It would be great for us to engage, if not at one of our Round Tables, you can pen us your thoughts and experience in navigating the exciting professional education subject.

Have your say Given education then and now, 1. To what extent is the pre-1994 generation victims?

2. To what extent are current students victims?

3. Are professional bodies culpable?

4. Are/were professional bodies complicit?

5. What role should they play to lift education standards?

6. What contribution should they be making to help the country avoid having more “lost generations”?

7. What improvement strategies can come out of the Verwoerd case study?

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

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Professional Development

Education Woes

A result of System Error or Power Issues?

An Excerpt from Bantu Education: Destruction Intervention or Part Reform BY: PROF. HERMANN GILIOMEE

T

he article attempts to focus only on some of the aspects of the ‘Black Education’ system, such as funding and the relative value of mother tongue education, and not on the more ideological aspects like the attempt to use the schools to foster distinctive ethnic identities.

Verwoerd’s Bantu education signaled the introduction of mass education in South Africa. After 1994 a new regime had removed all forms of racial privilege, but black public schools remained in a state of crisis. It is important to go back to the founding years of the system to establish to what extent the roots of the crisis could be traced back to these years.

The ‘indictment’

The indictment of the education system that Hendrik Verwoerd, Minister of Native Affairs, introduced in 1954 consists of several charges. The most important are: • He closed down a functioning system of black education that included some good mission schools like Lovedale and Healdtown • His policy based on ‘the assumption of an inferior potential of African minds’ was ‘explicitly designed to prepare blacks for a subordinate place in society.’[0] • He discouraged the teaching of Mathematics and Science • The policy deliberately starved black education of funds In the reading of his speech in parliament in 1953 when he introduced the policy, Verwoerd attacked the existing policy, which, in his words, showed the black man ‘the green pastures of the European but still did not allow him to graze there’. By that he meant pupils were provided with skills that employers did not want from black workers.

He criticised the existing policy as uneconomic, because money was spent on education with no clear aim. This frustrated educated blacks, who were unable to find the jobs they wanted.

He said: ‘Education should have its roots entirely in the Native areas and in the Native environment and the Native community ... The PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

Bantu must be guided to serve his own community in all respects.

There is no place for him in the European community above the level of certain forms of labour. Within his own community, however, all doors are open.’

This comment is quoted in virtually every article on the subject.

It is often distorted by quoting only the first part - ‘There is no place for him in the European community above certain forms of labour’ and by omitting the qualifier that Verwoerd added: ‘Within his own community, however, all doors are open.’ [1] Today the first part of the quote sounds very harsh, but it was not out of line with existing policy. A study states: ‘The overwhelming demand among urban employers was for workers with basic literacy, who could be employed as unskilled labour. In most cases “tribal labour” was preferred.’[2] There was little demand for blacks who had completed the more advanced standards.

The previous United Party government had also seen little need for the training of large numbers of black artisans for employment in the common area. The policy emphasised the training of whites for skilled labour in the so-called “white areas”. Blacks could only expect to do skilled work in the reserves. In terms very similar to those Verwoerd would use later, the secretary of the Department of Native Affairs told the De Villiers Commission on Technical and Vocational Training in 1947 that ‘the unfolding of extensive government development schemes’ in the reserves would produce a large number of skilled posts.[3] White supremacy was clearly incompatible with a steadily rising, better educated, urbanised black population moving up to strategic levels of the economy. Recognizing this, J.G. Strijdom, Transvaal NP leader, warned D.F Malan in 1946 that it would be impossible to maintain racial discrimination if the quality of education of the subordinate people was steadily improved. ‘Our church ministers,’ he added, ‘were far too eager to compete with other missionary societies in trying to provide the most education to blacks.’ If the state in the future tried to withhold equal rights from educated people it would

Professional Development

lead to ‘bloody clashes and revolutions.’[4] To put it in non-racist terms, by modernising the provision of education to the subordinates, however incompletely, the apartheid state ran the risk of sowing the seeds of its own destruction. An opinion survey conducted in 1981 showed that black children’s rejection of segregation steadily increased with higher education levels. About half of the children with only four years of schooling said whites could keep their own housing areas and schools, against only a third of those in Standards 7 to 9, and only one tenth of those in Std 10 and higher. See Table 1.[5]

Table 1: Black political responses (%) according to level of education - 1981 Whites can have their own...

Std 2 or below

Std 3-6

Std 7-9

Std 10 & above

Laws against mixed marriages

70

65

45

18

Own housing areas

62

52

32

15

Own schools

53

34

26

13

Farmlands

47

38

29

11

Recreation facilities

41

27

13

9

Transport and Buses

36

26

18

2

Note: Only percentages accepting segregation are given Source: Hermann Giliomee and Lawrence Schlemmer, From Apartheid to Nation-building, p.119

Yet for the Afrikaner nationalists to deny the subordinates a proper education would undermine their conception that they were serious in their commitment to rehabilitate the subordinate population.

Verwoerd’s compromise would be to expand black education greatly, with the provision that it be closely linked to lower level jobs in the economy and, in the case of skilled work, to service to the black community.

The first half of Verwoerd’s formulation in 1953 affirmed what was already the situation on the ground. Blacks had always been excluded from skilled or other advanced jobs and the central state bureaucracy.

What was new was, as a recent study noted, ‘Verwoerd’s aim of creating new opportunities for blacks in the homelands and what was called ‘serving their own people’.

It is ironic that Verwoerd today is branded as a racist when he was the only member of NP government in the 1950s who, as far as I know, is on record explicitly rejecting racist assumptions. In his class notes, as Professor of Sociology at the University of Stellenbosch between 1927 and 1936, he dismissed the idea of biological differences among the ‘big races’, adding that because there were no differences, “this was not really a factor in the development of a higher civilisation by the Caucasian race.” He also rejected the notion of different innate abilities. He observed that what appeared to be differences in skills in the case of Europeans and Africans were simply differences in culture due to historical experience.[6] In the first few weeks of his term as Minister of Native Affairs

11

Verwoerd made an astounding proposal, which historians surprisingly have ignored. It shows that he initially did not intend to limit opportunities for blacks to do advance jobs to the homelands.

Verwoerd became Minister for Native Affairs on 19 October 1950, and six weeks later, on 5 December had a meeting at his request with the members of the Native Representative Council, which included several leading ANC members. Stating that he expected large numbers of blacks to remain in the big cities for many years, he announced that government planned to give blacks ‘the greatest possible measure of self-government’ in these urban areas. All the work in these townships would have to be done by their own people, enabling blacks to pursue ‘a full life of work and service.’

For this reason, Verwoerd continued, blacks had to be educated to be sufficiently competent in many spheres, the only qualification being that they would have to place their development and their knowledge exclusively at the service of their own people. Verwoerd invited the NRC members to meet him after the session for a ‘comprehensive interview’ about these matters and to put forward proposals, offering a prompt reply from government to their representations.[7] This was a fateful turning point in South African politics. A new field for black politics could have been opened up if this offer had been accepted, particularly if it set in motion a political process that could have entailed talks between government and the urban black leadership on the election of urban black councils, the formula for the allocation of revenue, the staffing of the local councils’ bureaucracy, property ownership and opportunities for black business. It would have opened up a whole new area for the development of black managerial and administrative capacity, something that the country would sorely lack when whites handed over power in 1994.

Discouraging the teaching of Mathematics and Science?

In his 1953 speech Verwoerd also remarked that it made little sense to teach mathematics to a black child if he or she could not use it in a career. Probably taking its cue from these words, a recent study alleges that as a result mathematics was no longer taught as ‘a core subject in black schools’.[8] In fact, the policy did not change and mathematics continued to be a school subject.[9] The small number of blacks who matriculated with a school-leaving certificate remained steady. From 1958 to 1965 a total of only 431 black matriculants passed mathematics.[10] The main problem was a lack of qualified teachers in key subjects, particularly the natural sciences and mathematics. Nevertheless, the overall impression of scholars writing in the 1960s was of a definite improvement in the provision of mass education and the general standard of literacy, contrary to the popular perception today.

A 1968 study by Muriel Horrell of the SA Institute of Race Relations was critical of Bantu Education, especially its use of mother-tongue instruction, but wrote approvingly of the syllabi. Those for primary classes were ‘educationally sound’ and an improvement of the previous syllabi, while those for the junior and the senior certificate were the same as those used for white children.[11] Ken Hartshorne also states that the syllabuses were ‘very much the same as those used in white provincial schools and were an improvement on those in use previously’.[12] Deliberately starving Bantu education of funds

Strong criticism has been directed at the insufficient and discriminatory funding of black education. The common assumption is that the blame for this dreadful discrepancy lies squarely with the OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

12

Professional Development

policy as announced by Verwoerd. He stated that the state’s allocation to black education would be pegged at R13 million; any additional money had to come from direct taxes that blacks paid (2 million). As a result, the gap in the ratio of white to black per capita spending widened in these years from 7 to 1 1953 to 18 to 1 in 1969.

But it would be wrong to concentrate only on the racial gap in per capita spending. What firstly should be taken into account was major increase in the number of black pupils, the figure rising from 800 000 in 1950 to 2,75 million in 1970. This drastically affected the per capita spending on blacks. Secondly the spending on school buildings, along with other capital spending, was in the case of black education not brought into the budget of the education department, as was the case in white education, but in that of the Department of Public Works. It is estimated that capital expenditure represented roughly 15 to 20 per cent of the spending on black education if all expenses had been brought into the budget for black education.

capita at a much faster rate.

The table gives a good indication of apartheid’s rhythm. The severity of the 1950s, particularly as far as blacks were concerned; the slow relative improvement in state spending on blacks in the 1960s and the substantial increases in expenditure between 1970 and the end of the 1990s, particularly in the periods from 1977 and 1982.

[15] Vewoerd in perspective

Any assessment of Hendrik Verwoerd can only be done within the context of his times. He was an academic who was impressed with the way in which social scientists in the USA between the World Wars sought to find ways in which the modernisation of society could occur without intensifying conflict between ethnic groups and classes. He believed that the modernisation of the South African economy after the Second World War made it imperative to establish a system of

Table 2: State spending on education 1952 to 1987 in real 1987 rands (‘000s) Year

White

% change

Coloured

% change

Indian

% change

Black

% change

1952

874 582

n/a

99 706

n/a

27 319

n/a

144 385

n/a

1957

969 553

10.9%

122 561

22.9%

38 213

39.9%

165 776

14.8%

1962

1 280 105

32.0%

146 742

19.7%

49 960

30.7%

169 532

2.3%

1967

1 747 764

36.5%

289 399

97.2%

97 031

94.2%

254 344

50.0%

1972

2 719 104

55.6%

357 346

23.5%

152 092

56.7%

476 671

87.4%

1977

3 181 656

17.0%

523 088

46.4%

220 598

45.0%

640 922

34.5%

1982

4 098 822

28.8%

807 884

54.4%

390 698

77.1%

1 959 922

205.8%

1987

3 320 700

-19.0%

1 007 569

24.7%

404 647

3.6%

3 400 250

73.5%

Note: Black figures include TBVC states.

Source: Hermann Giliomee and Lawrence Schlemmer From Apartheid to Nation-building, p.106. Researched and complied by Monica Bot.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly the policy on pegging education funding to the revenue from black taxpayers was not implemented as announced by Verwoerd. From the table above it can be inferred that the policy was adhered to only between 1957 and 1962, when there was an increase of only 2 % on spending. In the next five years, between 1962 to 1967, spending grew by nearly 50%. The government had accepted that the great increases in the enrolment of black pupils had made the policy quite unrealistic.

According to Joubert Rousseau, later a Director General of Bantu Education, Verwoerd secured approval for the amount allocated to black education to be supplemented from the loan account. The loans were never paid back.[13] A serious problem affecting the implementation of the policy was the inability to attract a sufficient number of black teachers to meet the growing demand for education. A recent study passes a measured judgement of the system: ‘The experience of black schooling during the 1950-70 period was one of partial modernisation, generating a higher enrolment of black pupils, without providing additional teaching resources at a comparable rate.’ [14] It is to be doubted that the main opposition party in parliament, also subject to white electoral pressure, would have substantially narrowed the gap in per PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

public education for blacks that would provide literacy and numeracy for blacks, who in the 1950s, could not hope to progress further than semi-skilled jobs in industry. No one foresaw the very rapid economic growth in the 1960s.

Phasing out the state subsidies to some top black schools like Lovedale and Healdtown was a bitter blow to members of the urbanised black elite, intensifying its resolve to reject the apartheid system outright. Yet for twenty years after its introduction Bantu education encountered little black opposition, with black parents failing to heed the calls for school boycotts. This opposition only surfaced in the mid-1970s after the policy had been adapted to enable large numbers of black children to advance to much higher standards than was possible in the preceding decades. Inevitably this was accompanied by the increasing politicisation of the pupils as JG Strijdom had warned.

Was Verwoerd sincere in his stated commitment to educate blacks for service to their own community? David (Lang David) de Villiers, who was one of the top advocates in the 1960s, worked closely with him in the 1960s preparing South Africa’s case in the dispute over South Africa’s mandate of South West Africa that was heard by the World Court, the judgment was that it was totally alien to Verwoerd’s

Professional Development

13

the per capita expenditure on white and black pupils was related above all to the rapid increase in black numbers. As table 2 indicates actual spending increased rapidly after 1962. If capital expenditure, which was put on the budget of another department is added, the increases were quite substantial.

A character in Julian Barnes’ novel, The Sense of an Ending, which won the 2011 Man Booker Prize remarks: If one can pin the blame on a single person no else is really guilty; but if one blames a process everyone is somehow complicit.

Blaming Verwoerd for the current failures of black education seems to be so much easier. The alternative view -- that we are all complicit -- is perhaps too ghastly to contemplate. *Hermann Giliomee’s The Last Afrikaner Leaders: A Crucial Test of Power (Tafelberg) was scheduled to appear at the end of October 2012.

The original article was published with the assistance of the Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung für die Freiheit (FNF). character to mislead.[16] He made it abundantly clear that defending and promoting white interests was unambiguously his priority.

As far as Bantu education was concerned, he never seemed to understand that blacks in the top rate mission schools resented the loss of the identity of the schools as much as the Afrikaners would have done if an alien government had changed the character of a Paul Roos Gymnasium or Paarl Gymnasium.

Unlike many supporters of the National Party, Verwoerd did not consider well-educated blacks a threat as long as they directed their aspirations to their traditional “homelands”. But the Bantustans were not necessarily the end of the road. When a follower questioned the wisdom of establishing new black university colleges, he replied: ‘We shall have to negotiate frequently with [blacks] in the future over many issues, including education and politics. It would be better to negotiate with people who are well informed and educated.’[17] He died in 1966 just when it became clear that the homelands had no or little hope of becoming viable states.

Despite the elimination of racial disparities in spending and classroom numbers black public education is in such a dismal state that, in the words of Dr Mamphela Ramphele, it compares poorly with the Bantu Education of the 1950s and 1960s. The black matric pass rate of 1975 has not yet been emulated. The fault seems to lie somewhere else.

In Summary

The article firstly posed the question whether Verwoerd abolished a functioning system. To that the answer was that there were a few well functioning church schools, but the rest of the system was in drastic need of overhaul. Was the policy based on racist assumptions? If by racism is meant the ideology of a biologically-based distinction between superior and inferior abilities the answer is negative. The policy discriminated against blacks by insisting that they would be able to do advanced forms of work only in the homelands. Studies found that the syllabi of schools in the higher standard were the same as those in white schools. The increasingly high disparity between

Footnotes

N.B. Annotation of citations in square brackets are as per original article and (in round brackets) for the excerpt above [5] (0) Rodney Davenport and Christopher Saunders, South Africa: A Modern History (London: Macmillan, 20000, p. 674.

[18] (1) AN Pelzer, ed., Verwoerd Speaks (Johannesburg: APB, 1968), p.83.

[19] (2) Deborah Posel, The Making of Apartheid (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), p. 186.

[20] (3) Hyslop, The Class Room Struggle, pp. 4-5.

[21] (4) H.B. Thom, D.F. Malan (Cape Town: Tafelberg, 1980), p. 279.

[22] (5) Hermann Giliomee and Lawrence Schlemmer, From Apartheid to Nation-building (Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1989), p. 119.

[23] (6) Millar, ‘Science and Society’, pp. 638 - 646.

[24] (7) Pelzer, ed., Verwoerd Speaks, pp.28-30.

[25] (8) Francis Wilson, Dinosaurs, Diamonds and Democracy (Cape Town: Umuzi, 2009), p. 88.

[26] (9) Rousseau, ‘Iets oor Bantoe Onderwys’, p. 177.

[27] (10) Horrell, Bantu Education to 1968, p.72; Rousseau, ‘Iets oor Bantoe-onderwys’, in Verwoerd (compiler), Verwoerd, p. 177.

[28] (11) Muriel Horrell, Bantu Education to 1968 (Johannesburg: SA Institute of Race Relations, 1968), p. 58-59, 71.

[29] (12) Ken Hartshorne, Crisis and Challenge: Black Education, 1910 -1960 (Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 41.

[30] (13) Rousseau, ‘Iets oor Bantoe-Onderwys’, p. 172, [31] (14) JW Fedderke, R de Kadt and J Lutz ‘Uneducating South Africa: The Failure to address the need for human capital’, International Review of Education , 46. 3, 2000, pp.257-81 [32] (15) Giliomee and Schlemmer, From Apartheid to Nationbuilding, p.106.

[33] (16) David de Villiers, ‘Die Wereldhofsaak in Den Haag’, Verwoerd: So onthou ons hom, .144.

[34] (17) Gilles van de Wall, ‘Verwoerd, die Hervormer,’ Verwoerd, so onthou ons hom, p.166.

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Personal Development

Moving from Determination to Self-Efficacy with Albert Bandura “H

ire for attitude and train for skill!” This advice has served many recruiters well and has proved invaluable for companies who want to get the most out of human talent. It is candidates with a positive, can-do attitude and determination that usually go the distance in the demanding and capricious environment organisations operate in. This is particularly true in an unpredictable world dominated by digi-human competition and the likely effect of 4IR technologies on mainstream skills.

Candidates with a positive attitude make situations work to their advantage, which often includes succeeding in just about anything they are engaged in. But, even with the best attitude and determination, employees can fail. If small failures keep piling up and one proves disastrous, there may be no coming back from such setback. For those employees who soldier on, the journey may be draining and costly, leaving them with burnout or depression. So, it is important that no matter how strong one’s determination is, it is supported by valid sources of self-efficacy.

According to social scientist Albert Bandura, the founder of selfefficacy theory that was reinforced by the 1961 Bobo Doll experiments: ‘perceived self-efficacy relates to people’s beliefs in their capabilities to exercise control over their own functioning and over events that affect their lives.’ (Bandura 1998) This differs from just a positive attitude: a willingness to try, willingness to learn, or willingness to succeed. It is confidence with a solid basis.

While many motivation theorists and behavioural scientists were Figure 1: Self-Efficacy Theory: Bandura’s 4 Sources of Efficacy Beliefs Courtesy: iedunote

focused on research to prove that behaviour (particularly relating to workplace performance) is driven by affective and cognitive stimuli such as reinforcement or punishment, Bandura conducted studies to prove that behaviour can be driven by much more than that.

His theory suggests that behaviour may be motivated by four main forces: • Mastery Experience • Vicarious Experience.

• Social Persuasion.

• Physiological and Emotional States.

(See Figure 1.)

Simply put, self-efficacy may be driven by a track record of tasks that one has mastered; an observation of people who manage task-demands successfully; affirmation or social persuasion that one has the capabilities to succeed in given activities, and finally, inferences from somatic and emotional states indicative of one’s strengths and vulnerabilities.

Founded on these identified sources, self-efficacy plays a major part in determining our chances for success. Self-efficacy increasingly gets credit as the recipe for success above mere skills or talent.

Case Study:

Consider the case of a lecturer whose course was considered ‘a terror which no one can pass’, let alone get a distinction in.

The statistics lecturer, introducing her course for the first time to a new class, she told the newbies how seriously she takes her work – availing herself beyond school hours to assist students experiencing problems.

She assured them, however that were all of them to pay sufficient attention and engage fully in class, there should be no difficulties when they have to tackle assignments or exams. She encouraged them to keep their knowledge fresh by doing daily exercises – looking for practical examples they can try out as they pace themselves towards the exams.

She assured them that if they take this advice, they won’t have any problems and no one would need to ever call her when she’s home enjoying time with her family. Not only that, but not one of them will fail!

She ended the pep talk by showing the class a graph of her class-results over the last three exams, and the gradient was one way: up. She showed them class pictures (with all the students’ faces) from the last three years, and pointed out students who got distinctions. There were more with each progressive year.

She told the students that she couldn’t or wouldn’t have it any other way. She expected no failures and hoped for even better results with more distinctions than the previous years. Challenging the now wide-eyed but excited students, she asked them who, among them would bring her straight A’s to make her track record better.

A brief silence was broken by one hand shooting up confidently, shortly followed by a second, then, slowly, more followed. At the end of the term, that class delivered three times the number of A’s than the previous year’s.

Everyone who had had their hand up in that introduction session was given reason to believe in their ability to deliver a distinction. This, is in spite of having no mathematical background and having heard everyone calling Stats a killer subject.

Moral of the exercise

Analysing the sources of self-efficacy from this case, we borrow from author Mariam Akhtar’s treatment of the self-efficacy theories.

While the students had no ‘mastery experiences’ in the course, the three other factors identified by Bandura as sources of self-efficacy came to play right there in class.

At play in class were predominantly elements of “vicarious experience”, which gave the students confidence by observing others change from PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

Personal Development

being intimidated by the course and seeing that students from previous classes were able to achieve distinctions. It is an example of modelling that generate positive expectations among observers that ‘they can also improve their performance’ by focusing their learning efforts.

The other aspect at play was “social persuasion”. This led the students, through suggestion, into believing that they can cope successfully with the different tasks and demands of the course. Subsequent coaching and evaluative feedback on the students’ performance helped them to ultimately ace something they initially perceived as a terror.

During the course of the term, as they applied the lecturer’s advice - doing exercises and widening their reading, the students also built proficiency that led to “mastery experiences” and of course, the excellent results.

As far as the ‘emotional and physiological states’ Akhtar’s advice is: ‘When setting ourselves goals, self-efficacy plays a significant role, so we need to make sure that our efficacy beliefs are in line with our aims and not working against them.’

Self-Efficacy through Life-stages

According to Bandura, beliefs in personal efficacy not only contribute to outcomes in education and personal development. They affect life choices, level of motivation, quality of functioning, appetite for accomplishment, response to challenges, resilience to adversity and vulnerability to stress and depression.

Considering the challenging times that the world is going through, people are further confronted with various ‘impediments, adversities, setbacks, frustrations and inequities’. Against this backdrop it is imperative that individuals develop a robust sense of efficacy to sustain the perseverant effort needed to succeed.

Varying nature and scope

Even as we clear current hurdles, life will keep throwing curveballs such that as we progress in our careers and advance in age, it presents us with ‘new types of competency-demands, requiring further development of personal efficacy for successful functioning.

The nature and scope of perceived self-efficacy undergo changes throughout the course of the lifespan’. The different sources influencing self-efficacy may grow or diminish with one’s career stages.

There may also be variants outside the four main sources, which in turn may be influenced by other cultural or demographic factors.

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People seek proficient models who possess the competencies to which they aspire. Through their behaviour and expressed ways of thinking, competent models transmit knowledge and teach observers effective skills and strategies for managing environmental demands. - Says Bandura Benefits of strong self-efficacy

With the benefits that Bandura attribute to self-efficacy, it is worth having everyone giving this subject his/her attention. According to Bandura, a strong sense of efficacy enhances human accomplishment and personal well-being in many ways: 1. It builds high assurance in one’s capabilities even when approaching unchartered territory 2. It helps one to approach difficult tasks as challenges to be mastered rather than as threats to be avoided 3. It fosters intrinsic interest and deep engrossment in activities 4. It helps people set themselves challenging goals and maintain strong commitment to them 5. It builds resilience to heighten and sustain efforts in the face of failure 6. It helps people bounce back and attribute failure to insufficient effort or deficient knowledge and skills - which are acquirable 7. It builds confidence to approach threatening situations with assurance that they can exercise control over them 8. It feeds a hunger for new challenges that will translate into more personal accomplishments 9. It helps to reduce stress 10. It helps lower vulnerability to depression

‘Imaginal Experiences’

Already, one social scientist adds to Bandura’s four, a fifth distinct source of self-efficacy: Imaginal Experiences. According to James Maddux, ‘the art of visualising yourself behaving effectively or successfully in a given situation contributes to positive self-efficacy’.

The self-efficacy theories give credence to Mahatma Ghandi’s words: ‘Your beliefs become your thoughts. Your thoughts become your words. Your words become your actions. Your actions become your habits. Your habits become your values. Your values become your destiny.’

It stands to reason that a positive attitude and determination set one on the winning path. On observing role models - seeing/ learning of peers succeeding, imaginal experiences are created and confidence increases. How one puts belief into actions throughout life builds incremental affirmation and mastery experience, which, with further social persuasion, increases success in just about any aspect of life.

Advice to Line Managers

To get the most out of your team, it is worth determining the level of perceived self-efficacy for each team member and identify the most potent contributors in order to give employees access to those. A critical contribution that leaders, line managers, coaches, teachers and lecturers make to build self-efficacy among their subordinates, is having a positive impact as role models.

Sources:

1. Bandura, Albert (1997). Self-Efficacy in Changing Societies.

Cambridge University Press.

2. Akhtar, Mariam (2012), Positive Psychology for Overcoming Depression (2012) positivepsychology.org 3. Bandura, Albert (1994). Self-efficacy. In V. S. Ramachaudran (Ed.), Encyclopaedia of Human Behaviour (Vol. 4, pp. 71-81). New York: Academic Press. (Reprinted in H. Friedman [Ed.], Encyclopaedia of Mental Health. San Diego: Academic Press, 1998).

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

16

Talent Management

How to Enhance the Career Self Efficacy

of South African Millennials

The primary job of a line manager is to unlock the talent in his or her team to optimise every member’s contribution towards organisational goals BY: BRIDGET DE VILLIERS AND CHRISTELLE ROBERTSON

W

ith retirement age extending well into the seventies and Millennials being a dominant factor in the workplace, people management is a balancing act, given diverse needs of a multi-generational team. To say that the South African workplace is challenging is an understatement.

As if that were not enough, the reality of globalisation and technological advancement makes continuous change and development the new normal. This has resulted from the integration of numerous technologies leading to artificial intelligence, online teaching, cloud data, robotics, virtualisation and smart devices.

Boundaryless markets and global competition adds to this complexity, resulting in less secure work and the need for employees to manage their own careers and personal progress. Employees and managers alike are challenged by this rate of transformation and the necessity to rapidly adjust to evolving work environments.

Millennials (born between 1980 and 1994, and currently between 26 and 40 years) will represent 75 percent of the global workforce by 2025. It is therefore important to learn more about this generation to ensure that they succeed and flourish in the workplace while contributing towards organisational objectives.

All employees need to be independent, self-directed and selfreliant to succeed at work. At the same time, employees require strong communication and interpersonal skills to deal with the pressure and uncertainty that characterises the 21st century workplace. Further, in order to survive and thrive in this environment, employees need to possess high levels of career self-efficacy. Career self-efficacy is described as an employee’s belief in his/her capability to complete

PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

specific tasks in order to achieve set goals. Having a high sense of self-efficacy increases the effort and perseverance that an employee has towards challenging tasks, thereby increasing the possibility that tasks will be successfully completed.

Considering the rising prevalence of millennials in the workplace and the importance of career self-efficacy in the 21st century, the career selfefficacy of South African millennials was explored in a study conducted

by Christelle Robertson, while being a Masters’ student within the Faculty of Business and Economic Sciences at the Nelson Mandela University.

The rationale behind the study was that an understanding of the factors that enhance their career self-efficacy allows managers and millennials alike to leverage these factors and thus enable millennials to withstand and thrive in the volatile, uncertain, challenging and ambiguous 21st century workplace.

The study took the form of semi-structured one-on-one interviews held with millennials. Gathering data in this manner allowed for the identification of themes or factors seen to promote career self-efficacy.

In the study it emerged that the factors that millennials themselves perceived to exert the greatest influence on their career self-efficacy were growing conversations, studying and/or training, and performing meaningful work that was seen to be purposeful and significant, with each of these factors being underpinned by encouraging relationships.

Millennials found growing conversations with their managers empowering in approaching tasks. Growing conversations are described as “in the moment”, continuous coaching conversations that focus on learning from mistakes and failures through developing strengths to build capacity These conversations were seen as empowering as they allowed the millennials to know exactly what was expected from them, what the measurements for success were, what time-frame they had in which to achieve a specific goal, and how to improve their performance if they made a mistake. Even if these conversations were not overtly positive, the millennials still reported that they took the learning to heart as it assisted them in exploring alternative strategies to success. These conversations were not seen as one-off activities occurring when correction was required, but rather as a continuous engagement that took place at regular intervals. This continuous engagement strengthened the millennials’ perseverance and increased their dedication towards achieving set goals.

The second factor found to promote career self-efficacy was that of studying and/or receiving training. Millennials stated that they

Talent Management

felt equipped to succeed if they had some experience or training in a task, as this provided clear guidelines of what to expect and a sense of preparedness. An overarching goal for many of the participants was to achieve a tertiary education and they therefore also spoke of the obstacles that they had overcome to achieve this goal. Reaching this goal provided the courage and motivation to set even higher goals, knowing that hard work and preparation are required to achieve success.

Lastly, being passionate about and seeing the significance and purpose of their work was identified as an important influencing factor in determining career self-efficacy. Millennials stated that they would work exceedingly hard and persevere through many obstacles if they could see the difference made by their efforts in the lives of others, either in a community or through having a positive impact on the world. Being passionate about their work was likened to enjoying their work, but also through experiencing alignment between their work and their personal values and goals.

Strong and encouraging relationships were found to be an underpinning factor in all the above. In the absence of encouraging relationships, participants in the study indicated that the effectivity of the above factors on career self-efficacy was limited. This seems to suggest that connectivity is important for millennials. For example, growing conversations were perceived to be most effective if the millennial felt supported by the manager as this support made them more receptive to feedback. The millennials indicated that support went beyond that of received from the manager. It was seen to include support from significant others, such as parents and academics, which was seen to have a positive influence on their studies and careers, and in their lives in general.

Based on the findings of her study, Christelle proposed recommendations that can be used by organisations and individuals alike to explore, develop and promote strategies to drive millennial career self-efficacy. These recommendations include: • Leaders of organisations need to instil a culture of continuous improvement and high performance in organisations by holding regular coaching conversations with their managers which will equip them to better manage millennials and promote their career self-efficacy.

• These managers need to hold regular growing conversations with their millennial employees. Managers need to be equipped to hold difficult conversations in which honest feedback and encouragement are provided when confronting poor performance.

To build career self-efficacy, these conversations should address specific performance issues, be developmental in nature and build trust and open communication.

• Failure is an inevitable part of everyone’s life. Leaders and managers can assist millennials to view incidents of failure as normal and as stepping stones in the journey to success.

Leaders and managers should openly talk about their own personal failures and the lessons learnt in this regard. This will encourage millennials to manage their own reactions and attitudes towards failure, while bolstering their self-belief to take on more challenging tasks previously avoided. This will result in increased motivation and enhanced job performance.

• Millennial employees need to receive relevant training to provide them with the confidence to attempt new tasks. The training could take the form of on-the-job training, formal and informal training sessions, and advice from a peer or mentor who has a vested interest in the success of the millennial employee.

• Partnering the correct mentor and mentee is vital in positively

17

Three factors influencing career self-efficacy are growing conversations, studying and/or training, and performing meaningful work, underpinned by encouraging relationships. influencing the millennial’s career self-efficacy. Mentorship requires intentional sacrifices of time and energy from both parties to the relationship. Millennials will disengage from the relationship and experience a decrease in career self-efficacy if they perceive themselves as a burden or inconvenience to their mentors.

• Studying towards a specific career also bolsters the career selfefficacy of millennials. In this regard, millennials need to take responsibility for their careers and ensure that they are adequately equipped to achieve success by completing relevant studies. These studies could include formal tertiary education, internships, online training, watching YouTube videos and being exposed to specific tasks or jobs in the workplace. Self-development needs to be a priority, while development from the organisation seen as additional support.

• The study indicated that millennial employees do not shy away from hard work and are driven to achieve success. However, they require adequate information and guidelines in the form of clear job descriptions, instructions, timelines and measurable goals. Clear communication in this regard will provide millennials with a sense of purpose through understanding the significance of their work in relation to organisational objectives.

• When providing specific job descriptions is complicated due to continuously evolving roles in a fast-changing environment, clear goals and the desired outcomes of tasks are nonetheless required.

Through providing this information millennials can develop and implement strategies to achieve goals. This is strengthened by providing appropriate feedback at regular intervals to direct their focus and enthuse them towards achieving set goals.

• Connectivity is essential to millennial employees. The abovementioned interventions stand to be more effective if a trust relationship exists between the employee and the manager. Having an open-door policy and investing in the relationship with the millennial employee will improve organisational morale, enrich motivation and enhance productivity.

The 21st century workplace in South Africa is becoming increasingly challenging, requiring that employees are robust and resilient and possess high levels of career self-efficacy. With this study providing a greater understanding of the factors driving career self-efficacy among millennials, managers can implement interventions and strategies to influence the career self-efficacy of millennials in a positive manner.

It furthermore provides millennials with a greater understanding of what drives their career self-efficacy which will allow them to proactively take responsibility for their own actions and success.

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Human Rights Issue

“It is not the virus that will kill us,

IT’S HUNGER!”

China, Italy, Korea and the U.S. made for useful case studies for a Covid-19 crash course. So we learn from those who walked this way ahead of us…

PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

BY: PEOPLE DYNAMICS CORRESPONDENT

T

he current context of the COVID-19 lockdown means that the state has suspended certain freedoms, in terms of the Disaster Act, which materially impacts on many people’s ability to make the money with which to buy food. So far, South Africa has received praise from the World Health Organisation (WHO) for the way the country has responded to the threatening and decimating virus. The effects of a relatively early lockdown seem to paying off, judging from the ratio of infections to deaths.

Asked how come Gauteng province with the highest number of infections recorded a remarkably low number of fatalities, the Health MEC attributed it to the fact that most of those afflicted happen to be from the affluent sectors of the economy, and have been able to recover.

Successful recovery has been linked to a multiple of factors – which also help deter new infections and symptoms. The more obvious factor is a sound constituency or immune system of the infected person. This is followed by adherence to recommended health-safety measures, including maintaining good hygiene and avoiding compounding infections. The matter of isolation has also been regarded as a positive factor in “slowing the upward curve” for

Human Rights Issue

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There’s no greater lawlessness than the injustice of allowing people to live precariously, deprived of food and food sources to sustain them. The Corona virus is not just highlighting the imparity between the haves and the have-nots, it brings to the fore what a greed-laden capitalistic system and its economics subject humanity to. both infections and deaths. So far, families of surviving Covid-19 patients have kept themselves safe by either restricting contact with infected members, or ensuring maximum protective measures (PPE) when in their company.

It is also a fact that the availability of hospital isolation facilities and the quality of care have played a role in the recovery of the early patients. The measures mentioned, coupled with effective early contact-tracing, served the province well to constrain the deadly force of the virus.

Streets away - Worlds apart

It does not take a scientist to imagine how different the Gauteng picture would have been had those early infections been in densely populated communities with high, untraceable contacts.

There’s no doubt that the country is saying a collective prayer that the spread should be contained and, as far as possible, kept away from the less affluent communities who will not have the resources, the space and other social conveniences that have so far arrested the loss of lives in Gauteng.

The quote (title) above echoes the words of many members of township communities and informal settlements. These areas recorded success and compliance during the first couple of days of lockdown. But increasingly, hunger has driven many to the streets, in some cases, literally. In one case, a long queue of people waiting for food parcels stood in vain before breaking into a riot. There are reports of shop looting and trucks transporting food being allegedly threatened by protesters who wanted to relieve them of their load. All this, while small-farmworker vehicles carrying fresh produce to urban areas (without required legal permits) are turned back.

It is reasonable to argue that there is no room for lawlessness irrespective of one’s circumstances. People have no business breaking lockdown restrictions that have been gazetted for their own protection.

Let alone leaving home to loot or steal others’ property. Things people do in desperation!

The hunger suffered by many is not a case of lack of resources.

LERATO SENOKO HARVESTING SPINACH

It’s a case of unfair distribution and in the worst cases, deliberate destruction of resources. A recent report alleging that a dairy producer in the U.K. was throwing milk in drains due to lack of demand (and perhaps due to closure of processing facilities due to lockdown) may be news because of the topical Corona issue. Yet, it is a “norm” to many industries, to control prices by driving higher demands (versus supply). They would rather destroy food than find and feed those in dire need, who can’t afford to buy it.

There is a lot wrong with humans who would rather protect personal wealth than protect human lives. The concept of human rights is constantly being hollowed out while authorities who do not engage on global sustainable solutions allow gross inhumanities to take place on their watch.

Given that this season commemorates the world’s declaration of human rights, and that the country is reminded of its journey to liberation whether by Mandela, Sobukwe or Jesus, the following piece

by Human Rights advocate and a recipient of the Mail & Guardian Top 200 Young South Africans Award piqued the interest of our researchers. It may not get you resolving global issues, but it may incite you to creative thinking toward a lucrative project that will help create humane ways to distribute resources – as much to those who need them as to those who can afford to pay for them.

“You came to earth with nothing, and you will leave with nothing.”

I think of this quote and why as humans we won’t use our acquired resources to benefit those we’ll leave behind.

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Human Rights

HUNGER

in the face of plenty:

Can humans right this wrong? Can the Industry 4.0 technologies? Will it be a digi-human collaboration?

A HUMAN RIGHTS ISSUE

BY: BUSISO MOYO

T

he essential story of development over the past century has been one in which a succession of celebrated technological breakthroughs has failed to bring about the emancipation of human societies.

Global hunger is perhaps the prime example of this fact. Despite numerous commitments and acknowledgements that the resources to feed the world now exist, starvation and hunger persist at unprecedented levels. “Food security” in this sense has always been an aspirational term, describing a state, which has never existed in any part of the world.

The Market Economy is based on the economics of scarcity, or more precisely, the dogma of scarce resources. Nature is held responsible for inequities because she is stingy and does not provide enough to go around. The other way of stating this same approach is that there are too many people. If a society does not want to address the issue of distributive or social justice – making sure that every member of the household is fed – then a theory of scarce resources and overpopulation can serve a useful function in maintaining class inequities: there simply isn’t enough to go around they say.

The result is that there are many people who believe that unless we continue to become more productive, we will face disaster within a few decades as the growth of the global population outstrips the growth in the world’s food supply. Generally speaking, the class of people that put this argument forward are followers of Thomas Malthus, the 19th-century prophet of overpopulation and famine.

Their argument has been consistent: poor people tend to multiply at a higher rate than rich people, and left unchecked they will multiply beyond the ability of the earth to provide for them. Thus the poor are themselves believed to be the cause of their own poverty. Now, for black African people in particular, human reproduction rates are, in fact, closely correlated with economic well-being: the harder the circumstances, the more children a family will have in order to have more breadwinners and to ensure that there will be enough that survive to care for the elderly. The easier the circumstances, the smaller the families, and until a woman can be sure that all her children will survive, it does not make economic sense to her to limit her family. As a study done for the Brundtland Commission expressed it, “the problem is not one of global food production being outstripped by the global population … The problem has three aspects: where our food is being produced, by whom, and who commands authority over the global food value chain .” 1

PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

Efficient, productive, and competitive; these are the three magic words of the modern Market Economy. They are being used to facilitate the reduction of agriculture to a lifeless industrial process under the control of a limited number of transnational corporations.

Within the political economy of food, this logic, “competitive” describes the character of social relations between individuals seeking what is best for themselves. Those that are successful, the winners, are by definition “efficient” and “productive”. If, as a result, some people get rich and others starve, that is regarded as an unfortunate consequence of an efficient market economy and not a moral issue.

How does a fifth of the South African population have severely inadequate access to food, one third of children experience hunger and two-thirds experience income poverty? For a country deemed “food secure” we are clearly witnessing starvation in the face of plenty! For South Africa, these risks remain powerfully linked to race, gender and where we live in the country. Constitutionally speaking, we have the “right to access sufficient food”, however, the debate needs to extend beyond a production and land focus, and consider the food system as a whole and barriers to urban residents in particular in their efforts to secure sufficient food for a healthy life.

South Africa’s biggest failure in establishing a nourishing food system for all has revolved around its lacklustre approach in confronting capital interests and reforming agricultural markets. The fact that our agricultural policies have prioritized industrial farming practices highlights the system’s failure. Food security, quality, health and the land tenure question have all stagnated. If we are to progress we must implement alternative models that have been proven to work.

It is strange how we have come to regard as normal and reasonable the notion that the only way to eat is to first buy food at a store. We don’t start life this way, and it is often a matter of years before we learn how to function properly as customers in the food system.

We have to be taught (some might say brain-washed) to be accomplices in the crime of capital accumulation through the necessity of eating. If we were to be consistent and the Market Economy universal, we might carry with us little air meters, so we could pay for the air we require. It would be a bit complicated, because we would have to have accounts with “owners” of the air in every jurisdiction through which we might pass. Truly a challenge to the electronics and information

Human Rights

processing engineers! But buying our basic nutrition, in the form of commodities, is no less absurd, though it does accurately reflect the ethics of an economy that measures success in terms of accumulated capital and value in terms of price.

Being alive is more than simply making and spending money, and so we must consider how we can make it possible to think of our lives differently. The provision of, or allowance for, the minimal requirements of air, water, and food for everybody is a common-sense beginning. The issue is universal access rather than market access.

There are many ways one can imagine organizing the production and distribution of food to ensure that every person receives what he or she requires as members of society. Children do not make a decision to be born. We bring them into the world, and they remain our responsibility.

In a sense we have recognized this in South Africa through the intent of our National Health Insurance (NHI) scheme with its principle of universal access. Yet basic health care, in the form of good nutrition, remains in the competitive Market Economy. Global capital will not and cannot, feed the world. The contradiction between food and profits is far too fundamental. Food is about sustenance. Profit derives from excess – draining the ‘natural resources’ and squeezing the economic system, from the bottom like a tube of toothpaste, to provide unearned wealth for investors. The reason for addressing the issue of current and future food supply and price is often cited as possible “social and political unrest”.

The words hunger; malnutrition and starvation do not appear in these reports. Neither do justice or responsibility.

The Sowetan newspaper graphically illustrated the human tragedy of this situation for the South African experience in November 2011, when it reported on the death of four siblings in the North West province, caused by hunger. They died in their quest to find their mother and sister who had left in search of food. The post mortem results revealed that the cause of death was hunger and dehydration after they had walked a distance of more than 10km . A child that dies of starvation these days has been murdered. The murderer is the cannibalistic world order and multinational corporations dominate that world order! Some 10 multinational companies that function according the principle of profit maximization dominate the global agricultural market and that’s completely normal. It’s not a matter of attacking them. What matters here is the structural violence of a cannibalistic order. The tyranny of the oligarchy of globalised financial capital has existed for over 20 years now. Things have been liberalised and privatised as never before in the history of humankind.

Yet hunger is growing. Minimum wages for farmers and farm-workers, land rights, rights to seeds, rights to fertilizers, the legally protected access of people to sufficient food: these are things we can achieve – it is not a utopian dream.

We just have to wonder how many hungry people have the time, energy and money to seek out a lawyer to take their case to court.

And if they get that far, who will provide them with food while they are waiting? In fact, it is fair to say that while the right to food may be a globally popular term, it is little more than a morally upright principle without a cost to those in command of food production and distribution.

More importantly, food security cannot be realized until women are centrally included in policy discussions about food.

Women’s special relationship with food is culturally constructed and not a natural division of labour. Women’s identity and sense of self is often based on their ability to feed their families and others; it goes without saying that food insecurity denies them this right. As such, the crumbling of the world, as we have known it now requires that we reconsider the assumptions and framing of the concepts and practices of ‘western civilization’, including individualism, progress, property, capitalism and human rights.

Calls to “fix a broken world food system” assume that the capitalist

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food system used to work well. This assumption ignores the food system’s long, racialized history of mistreatment of people of colour in particular.

The food system is unjust and unsustainable, but it is not broken. It functions precisely as the capitalist food system has always worked, concentrating power in the hands of a privileged minority and passing off the social and environmental “externalities” disproportionately to racially stigmatized groups. We need fundamental change in the food system that has developed in the rich world, particularly in the last 75 years or so. It is dysfunctional and unjust - and it fails to deliver a safe, secure, sufficient, nutritious diet sustainably for everyone with equity.

As Amartya Sen noted more than three decades ago, if people go hungry, that is about them not having enough food to eat, not a characteristic of there not being enough food to eat. We know that we can feed the world by shifting human food production toward localized, sustainable, diverse, smart farming systems. While this may entail some changes in how we eat and shop, it is critically important to initiate a planned transition in order to initiate these changes without creating systemic shocks and instability within the food chain. On the other hand, the damage wrought on the planet is mirrored in the damage on our health. We really need to turn onto the smart path. If no urgent response is formulated in response to the obvious challenges facing the realization of the right to food – all of us will feel the impact of this perfect storm, but yet again it will be the poorest amongst us who are most seriously affected. This has serious implications for social stability – as was seen in Egypt with the 2008 food riots, for a country like ours beset by the twin challenges of poverty and inequality the ball needs to get rolling.

Lastly, land is at the centre of all these challenges and trade-offs in the food system! While the nature of the relationship between people and the planet has changed in once unthinkable ways, land remains a fundamental component of the world’s ability to feed itself. The “only way” we’re going to achieve food security for large numbers of people is to produce a lot more food in the countries that are food-insecure.

And this is why land reform and redress is non-negotiable! We need to fortify the link between land rights and food security. Food scarcity is not the problem, but the scarcity of real democracy protecting people’s access to nutritious food is the problem. So, fighting hunger means tackling concentrated political and economic power in order to create new equitable rules. Otherwise hunger will continue no matter how much food we grow. And so, to conclude, as has been experienced over and over again in the ongoing struggle for fairness and justice, human beings have an inbred inclination towards greed, self-interests and shameless disregard for the vulnerable, the Wretched of the Earth.

This, compounded by abhorrent political systems, which enable global corporate greed to inflict reckless social practices on humanity, means that extreme measures are required to protect humanity from themselves!

It is only those directly affected by the abominable food system that leaves the most vulnerable of our global society hungry, and those who have embodied human rights within their personal human integrity and sense of fairness and justice that have the political will to transform the system. Only collective efforts that are closely connected to communities, groups, and individuals facing oppression, and that “nurture sensibilities and skills compatible with a collective fight for social change”, can be ultimately successful in addressing human rights problems that we face at present in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) era, and may face in the future.

Busiso Moyo (M.A) is a doctoral research candidate with the School of Public Health at the University of the Western Cape and an affiliate of the DST-NRF Centre of Excellence in Food Security.

1. See: https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/ documents/5987our-common-future.pdf 2. The Sowetan. Hunger killed them. 11 November 2011.

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Leadership Discussion

ON THE WAY

TO CREATING A NEW NORMAL W

ith economy said to be in recession, rating agencies branding it ‘junk’ and GDP figures inducing migraine when compared to 25 years ago, we need to convince ourselves that the country isn’t going to the dogs and as a people we are not reduced to junk. Are our identified economic growth-acceleration sectors performing?

Scientists, accountants, economists and politicians are known to enjoy speaking in formulae, codes and tongues that ordinary people can’t readily decipher. Can we set jargon aside and find each other on where to go post Covid-19?

PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

Custom vs Imported Strategies

The jumping onto the different global bandwagons, including edging out primary production industries in favour of the “progressive” economies have seen us artificially borrowing foreign problems and making them ours. No one would dispute that global waves such as the information age, the service, knowledge and now digital economy are innovations to serve countries that are under-populated, labourconstrained and/or land-strapped. These are things South Africa doesn’t suffer from.

Structural Unemployment

The problem with us as South Africans is that we can have the sophistication of a fourth world (science/tech-wise), aspirations of a third world and complexes of a first world. We have a high population of uneducated people. Yes, uneducated in the sense that the education is nil-for-purpose considering our resources and what the economy really needs. We send all our students into management-this and management-the-other, killing our technical skill capacity that would enable us to exploit our natural resources and maintain decent lifestyles for all through meaningful work and self-sustainability.

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we need bread but cry for chocolate, crisps and cigarettes. And yes, the tobacco industry is responsible for a great number of people, certainly from an employment point of view. So, a case may well be made to the powers that be – especially if there’s also the ‘spin’ that tobacco components are used for medicinal purposes.

Whereas it’s possible that whoever has enough eloquence or financial clout to twist the Covid-19 advisory committee’s arm will probably get their industry back at work. If it were to be safety-assured with people as beneficiaries instead of sacrifices, that would be one thing… but then, that particular horse may have bolted. But who says the proverbial war has been lost? We may yet win this!

With Gold heydays over to boost GDP, and most of it having found homes in foreign vaults, we need to re-imagine what value South Africans can eke out of their current resources. We recall three sectors that the President suggested to accelerate economic growth, for which budgets were re-directed. For now, we can put a spotlight on Tourism – particularly seeing that a major strategic part of may be at the brink of operational ruin.

Tourism – The new Gold?

Some minister dubbed Tourism “the new Gold” and affirming this, the President headlined it among priority sectors for accelerated growth, along with Agriculture, Manufacturing/textiles, rural/township industries and SME businesses. While, admittedly, Tourism and Hospitality eases entry into employment and can absorb significant numbers in a short space of time, most of it is sustained by unhealthy and unsightly conditions for those at the bottom-end. Up to eight people can be crammed into inner-city bachelor or 1-bed apartments, or tiny backrooms in townships – risking their lives as they commute or walk home at all ungodly hours. This isn’t so much due to greed of employers, but save for a few conglomerates, tourism companies tend to be medium to small family ventures who are dependent on fluctuating market demand and therefore cannot commit to major business loans or investments.

Dearth of Technical Skill

Tourism “Poverty”

We phased out technikons and turned everyone into theoretic masters or esoteric gurus that can’t put real food on the table. This is characterised by the flocking of youth from ground-abundant “homes” into sardine accommodation and precarious makeshift structures waiting day-in-day-out for “management” jobs that they are illequipped for.

Even the jobs they afford workers are hardly secure - nor can the majority pay enough for employees to thrive. As a result, the sector is a haunt for desperate immigrants who, with no local family ties restricting them, can work the unpredictable hours with relative ease.

I stopped counting the number of local tourism “graduates” who have traded tourism for call centres doing nothing even remotely tourismorientated.

The rest are in permanent/rotational internships with different tourism outfits. Those enjoying security are employed by government or state-owned agencies who are compelled to maintain them for as long as possible.

So, to what’s good to salvage the South African economy and how to contain or mitigate future risks...

Covid-19 and Economic Re-Start

Criticising or analysing the situation ad-infinitum won’t help. The challenge brought by the Coronavirus to the world is one opportunity for everyone - every country, to redial and restart their economies from zero, in a fit-for-purpose way. Alas, the thought may be a couple of weeks too late. Already, the progressive easing of lockdown is as rational as it is a reflex, as logical as it is desperate, with industries competing about whose voice can shout the loudest, whose lawyers have the mightiest bark and whose threats are most menacing.

Haphazard Emergence from Lockdown?

To think that Covid-19 is said to be devastating to those with compromised immune systems, underlying ailments including pulmonary weaknesses, yet, there’s a fight to lift a ban on cigarette sales – with an argument that people can still buy “other junk” such as sweets and chocolates when shopping for essentials would be laughable if it were not so perilous.

Yes, just like a baby needs milk but cries for a pacifying dummy;

Strategy and Ground Implementation Mismatch

While no one could have predicted the Covid-19 havoc, it looks like the budget committed in 2018 to accelerate growth has been slow gaining traction on the ground. Strategy hasn’t quite connected with the execution. This is because a looming demise of SAA has raised an outcry in the tourism industry, since it is seen to potentially compromise tourism access to the country.

Star Performer Stunted?

This would hit the business tourism arm of the sector even more, since bidding for large events and conferences relies on partnerships in the OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

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Leadership Discussion

value-chain, including hosting venues, accommodation, land and air transportation. The formation of Convention Bureaux throughout the country was due to the size and measurability of the economic impact brought about by planned major international events, exhibitions, conventions and summits. This also which lend themselves to better business forecasting than leisure tourism as they can be targeted, planned and scheduled several years ahead with well-calculated value to the economy. Business Tourism events are also important as they can be used to fill up low-occupancy periods to ensure a continuous flow of tourism outside of peak holiday season. Having SAA as a partner helped complete the chain, even though it may have meant the airline discounting the block purchases – impacting the profitability levels.

China Model / Market Study

The China intra-country tourism case-study is a great inspiration for any country seeking to flatten tourism fluctuations and create stability for the sector traders. The obvious advantage China has that South Africa lacks is the size of ‘the market’. China has the population numbers and far more ready tourism consumers according to the number of young, healthy, ‘educated’ and working citizens.

The Chinese universities population alone could feed the South African tourism market many seasons over. South Africa, on the other hand, has less of mobile, ‘affluent’ youth, and the older folk are tied down with grandchildren as opposed to the Chinese empty-nester wanderlust community.

Domestic Tourism Unrealised Potential

What little domestic travel South Africa enjoys relatively speaking, brings much less income than what international tourism delivers on a per person per day spend calculation. A re-imagining of domestic tourism is needed to make it accessible to more people, but if income levels are constrained, hard-working South Africans are still likely to prioritise clothing, car-repayments, and suburban rentals than build a travel fund. Also those who travel would rather book at wellestablished hotel or guest house than at an “unpredictable”, township or village homestay.

Growth Opportunity

The exception here is if an establishment is located close to a friend or colleague’s home and as such comes “guaranteed”. Tourism that lends itself to this is social events tourism, where a group travels for a ceremony or celebration – a party, wedding, funeral or religious gathering.

Suburban/Village Imbalances

The economic situation and low-demand from international visitors sees township/rural establishments squeezed out by more luxurious suburban B&B’s. B&B’s in suburbs are generally more readily welcoming and hospitable given smaller-size households and larger accommodation with sprawling grounds around safe, walkable neighbourhoods. Suburban owners also have relative ease to maintain international word-of-mouth promotion, high-profile ad presence and endorsements across websites.

Community Apathy & Neglect

Besides challenges that new or smaller operators may experience in accommodation, South Africa is yet to have locals’ commitment in building, maintaining and showcasing local natural attractions.

Projects built around iconic nature spots tend to experience stopsPEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

and-starts either due to non-sustained funding, or unsustainability due to disputes about who of the locals should operate, participate in or benefit from the attraction. As a result, one finds a number of sites that had tremendous potential and viability on paper, left to dilapidate.

Also, with many South Africans born in poverty-stricken rural areas or brought up in relative township poverty, there is little excitement around making a weekend home in the middle of nowhere, roughing it up on the way there or living an adventure with limited conveniences.

Tourism Exchange Strategy

If anything, the most loyal tourism consumers in South Africa are tourism officials themselves. Right there, probably, lies the opportunity. If every home owner were to turn into a host, it might start increasing appreciation for the natural attractions in the local neighbourhoods, and stimulate creativity and innovation in making the homes special for overall unique experiences for guests.

Agriculture

When it comes to other “priority” sectors and programmes, including Agriculture and township small industries, there is hopefully better progress and prospects. I am hoping that many of the producers that are supplying supermarkets during lockdown are operations representative of the diversity of South Africans, particularly to include those at the bottom-most end of the economic scale.

Township Trade and SME Businesses

On the township businesses and SME front, it is uplifting that tradesmen are allowed to work and serve communities in case of household emergencies. Agriculture, health, emergency household maintenance are essential cogs of the South African economy wheel, less so than household insurance, retail clothing and e-commerce ventures, if you ask me.

Education

What I would like revved up is an education strategy that will enable all pupils and students to not just catch up with their scheduled work for the year, but to have a review of the curriculum to ensure that 80% of what is taught and studied feeds into or supports the “real” priority areas and essential sectors of the economy. Urgent priority should be given in establishing a curriculum that enables South Africa to make profitable use of what she has to create meaningful living for all her people.

But then, back to whether we need jargon to measure of our economic heart beat? Where do we find a measure that is simple to understand and actively contribute toward with strategies, policies and everyday actions?

Or, should we simply get the results on the priority sectors into which we poured and redirected funds to accelerate growth? How much did we invest? How much impact has it had – on jobs, on quality of lives and the multiplier effect in the economy?

What proposals are out there, aside from ramping up production or manufacturing of the essentials underscored by the lockdown? There’s a thought that might sow a positive seed, from one game-changing social economist…

He proposes that instead of arbitrary computational measures that have little significance or tangible impact on the ground, countries move toward measuring things that have a meaningful day-to-day impact on every citizen across the social and economic strata. While GDP measure can continue to help with the tracking and comparisons of different eras of our economy, there’s value in exploring other more qualitative measures of an economic’s ‘health’.

Corporate Social Responsibility

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Where to focus energies to

sustain jobs and healthy triple bottom-lines

Human resources executives and managers have a crucial contribution to the socioeconomic status that prevails in a country. Think no further than the Ginicoefficient.

I

f we think of CSR and Corporate Citizenship in terms of painting a creche wall or delivering a soccer kit, we ought to think again.

While these are great cheer-givers, corporates can do more to ensure that the cheer lingers beyond a Mandela Day campaign. We need to create a lasting social cheer at policy level, and hold hands with like-minded organisations to deliver it at strategic level.

No one said these times would be easy, so we can gear ourselves for tough from here on.

Today, it can’t be hard to imagine a day when we have all the money but we have to throw it to the streets because there’s nothing to buy with it. It is not too difficult to imagine a day when we will be on permanent self-imposed lockdown because the streets are swarming with desperate, hungry people that will do anything to feed their destitute families.

For those who are not real South African it may be easy enough – a flight will do, literally and figuratively. But for those who are real to South Africa and to the world for that matter – born here or not, corporate or private citizens, the window to entertain vulgar wealth for two, when two thousand other humans outside the perimeter wall or estate go without, is closing.

For business leadership and HR, it is time to carefully look at the gap between executive pay and the brown/blue-collar wage

and decide what to do about it, while it can still be ‘an executive decision’.

At corporate citizenship level, we need to look at how we can make a contribution to a national strategy that will see the country empowering citizens – not by giving hand-outs, but creating jobs that sustain their existence, wellbeing and even happiness.

Of course, we want technology. No, we need it. It helps us to be efficient, safe, and creative. But if that is achieved with no concern for humans who are displaced by technology, we might as well pack our bags right now and hitch the flight. Of course, government has to do its part, that’s the job. Yes, it should clean up its act, that’s the commitment. But, as corporates, our job is not to hemorrhage human resources for profit that sustains only a few. If we are in charge of resources, our job is to upgrade or re-skill them using the very technology infrastructure, to re-purpose them for continued economic contribution within our organisations or outside, as productive entreor sociopreneurs.

So here comes inspiration… Just think on these words:

“A good economy meets everyone’s basic needs. It means people are healthy and happy with life. It avoids storing up potential sources of long-term trouble, such as extreme inequality.

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Corporate Citizenship

FIVE MEASURES OF GROWTH YOU can contribute to, that are better than GDP BY: STEWART WALLIS

G

DP is like a speedometer: it tells you whether your economy is going faster or slower. As in cars, a speedometer is useful but doesn’t tell you everything you want to know. For example, it won’t tell you whether you are overheating, or about to run out of fuel.

Above all, the speedometer doesn’t tell you whether or not you’re going in the right direction. If you suggest to a car driver that you might be on the wrong road, and the response is “then we must go faster”, you might think that’s pretty stupid. Yet this is what happens whenever complaints about the state of the economy elicit a commitment to boost growth.

So what is the right direction for a modern economy (and companies operating within it)? That’s a relatively easy question to answer: when you ask people, they say much the same things. A good economy meets everyone’s basic needs. It means people are healthy and happy with life. It avoids storing up potential sources of long-term trouble, such as extreme inequality and environmental collapse.

It is, of course, entirely possible for an economy to go faster and faster without getting closer to meeting these goals – indeed, while heading the wrong direction.

Now the trickier part. What would be the economic equivalent of a compass? We need to measure the direction of economic travel in a way that’s comparable to how GDP measures its speed – easy to communicate, and amenable to being influenced by policy decisions.

PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

The New Economics Foundation (NEF), where I was the Executive Director until December 2015, proposed five indicators in an October 2015 report. Imagine them arrayed like dials on a dashboard that you can glance at for an overall picture, as well as study in more detail if you want. Why five? It’s hard to capture everything that matters in one metric, and psychological research demonstrates that people struggle to hold more than five things in their heads at once. So here goes: 1. Good jobs. Employment statistics tell us what proportion of

people have jobs. They don’t tell us what proportion of those with jobs are paid too little to afford a decent standard of living, or worry about whether they’ll still have work next month.

According to UK government figures, 94% of people were in work in 2014 – up nearly two percentage points in four years. However, the NEF calculated that only 61% were in secure jobs paying a living wage – down a similar amount in the same period.

2. Wellbeing. A growing economy is not an end in itself – it’s a means to improving people’s lives. Few would disagree that the ultimate aim of public policy is wellbeing; we care about GDP because we assume it means more wellbeing. So why not also measure wellbeing directly?

The validity of research into measuring wellbeing, by asking people about their life satisfaction, is now widely accepted.

Such measures capture a range of things that people care about and that policies can influence – from income and health to housing and social connections.

Some governments do measure life satisfaction, including the UK

Corporate Citizenship

(it increased from 7.4 to 7.6, on a scale of 0-10, in the four years to 2014). However, it remains at the margins of policymaking.

3. Environment. The NEF propose a national indicator of lifestylerelated carbon emissions, relative to an allocation calculated from global targets for avoiding dangerous levels of climate change.

In four years, the UK’s position deteriorated from using 91% of its allocation to 98%. As climate is a global problem, this indicator is effectively a measure of responsible global citizenship.

4. Fairness. Research increasingly shows that high income inequality has negative social consequences, while casting doubt on the idea that it incentivises hard work.

Comparing the average incomes of the top and bottom 10%, inequality in the UK has been worsening by an average of 0.8% a year for the last four years.

5. Health. The NEF proposes “avoidable deaths” as a simple, easily-understandable measure that captures the quality of health interventions – not only treatment, but also prevention.

Here, the UK shows a positive trend, but with plenty of room for further improvement – the latest figures suggest 23% of deaths need not have happened..

Image: Courtesy New Economics Foundation (NEF)

would devise means to conduct a national study representative of the population, companies can proactively get intra-organisational snap shots in a similar way as they conduct climate surveys.

This approach to measuring countries’ social and economic health has been well canvassed since the initial proposal by NEF in 2015, and in South Africa, it aligns with the National Development Plan (NDP-2030) aspirations. While there’s some ‘reluctance to move away from viewing economics as a hard, mathematical science, and accept the need to incorporate more of a social science mindset’, the new measurements have been well received across the world by policy makers and technocrats who increasingly appreciate the problems with the current economic system.

On the other hand, it is yet to take hold among political leaders and ultimate decision-makers. Wallis suggests that venturing into a new measurement system would require commitment and initiation costs. In addition, it might bring latent weakness to government policy-or programmes to the fore, imposing further short-term costs toward addressing them.

But if we look at the measurement as a more meaningful tool to reflect the state of sustainable wellbeing of the country, a willingness to invest in its operationalisation should cut across - with a view to long-term dividends for the economy. On different levels and scales, organisational programmes and interventions that kick-start

GOOD JOBS

WELLBEING

ENVIRONMEMNT

FAIRNESS

HEALTH

Average annual deterioration of 1.0% over 4 years

Average annual improvement of 0.9% over 4 years

Average annual deterioration of 1.8% over 4 years

Average annual deterioration of 0.8% over 4 years

Avearge annual improvement of 1.8% over 4 years

61% of the labour force has a secure job that pays at least the Living Wage

Average life satisfaction is 7.6 on a scale of 0-10

Carbon emissions are 2% below a limit set to avoid dangerous climate change

After tax, average incomes of the top 10% of households are 8.7 times higher than the bottom 10%

23% of deaths in England and Wales could have been avoided through good quality healthcare or public health interventions

Reflection:

While these measures were designed with the United Kingdom in mind, working with the UK national statistics office, they are easy to adopt for any country. What makes them attractive is that they are quite meaningful across all sectors of economy.

Individual organisations can also formulate policies and set themselves targets to positively contribute to the wellbeing of their employees and by default, the country’s. They could establish programmes and promote behaviours that will drive positive results and feed into the national effort and statistics. While the country

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improvements to the quality of life ultimately contributing toward a positive national picture. So, each organisation can move ahead and do its part.

A slow political uptake should not deter us, nor should we be bent on the abolishment of the GDP measure before the alternative measurements have successfully bedded.

Stewart Wallis is an Independent Thinker, Speaker and advocate for the new economic system. This article is by courtesy of the author and the WEF, where it first appeared.

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Leadership

Leadership Resilience and Business Continuity through a Global Pandemic BY: RRE ELIJAH LITHEKO

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he global economy has been disrupted severely by the outbreak of the coronavirus, also referred to as Covid-19. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), the virus originated in the city of Wuhan in the province of Hubei, in China around December 2019.

The virus has since spread across the globe causing panic in its wake because of its contagious nature, with fatal consequences. On the 11th March 2020 the World Health Organisation declared the coronavirus a global pandemic and raised a concern in relation to its spread and severity. It pointed out that lack of action from governments in response to this pandemic will pose a health risk to people globally.

Its Director-General, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, however, indicated that “all countries still can change the course of the pandemic” if they could put systems and processes in place to detect, test, treat, isolate, trace and mobilise their people in response.

Details, updates and advice on the coronavirus are accessible on: www. gov.za; www.who.int; www.unfoundation.org; www.sacoronavirus.co.za Indications are that the South African government heard and understood the call to action from the World Health Organisation loud and clear, as evidenced by the following actions: • On Monday 21 March 2020 President Ramaphosa announced to the nation that with effect from midnight on Thursday 26 March 2020, the country will be on a 21-days lockdown until midnight on 16 April 2020 as provided for in the Disaster Management Act • Government interaction with social partners, including civil society and faith based organisations • Deployment of the police and army to monitor general compliance of the lockdown • Setting up of the Solidarity Fund • Testing and isolation of affected people • Putting health facilities and health-workers under alert and other related measures • On Thursday 9 April 2020, President Ramaphosa in a public address to the nation extended the lockdown period by a further two weeks to 30 April 2020 and gave a detailed motivation for such a course of action

On 1 April 2020, the Director-General of the Health World Organisation reported as follows: “Over the past five weeks, we have witnessed a near exponential growth in the number of new cases, reaching almost every country, territory and area.” This is a clear indication that this pandemic knows no boundaries nor is it concerned about social status. It impacts people at all levels – employees, managers, business executives, public servants, professionals across all sectors of the economy – hence the government’s timely response.

People across the world are hoping that a sustainable cure to this virus will be found, thereby curbing its spread and destabilising effect.

Commendable initiatives and interventions that demonstrate high levels of empathy, compassion, generosity and caring attitude are beginning to emerge all over the world in a spirit of solidarity. This spirit of solidarity PEOPLE DYNAMICS | March - April 2020

might be ushering a new world culture of collaboration and sharing where everybody knows that he/she is a welcome member of the society with a role to play.

With this context in mind let us now consider the impact of the pandemic and the lockout on business operations.

It is clear that since the proclamation of the lockdown, economic activity in South Africa and across the world has been severely affected – all business transactions except for essential services and retail outlets selling groceries and medicine have all come to a halt with some conducted remotely. Very few business leaders were prepared for this dramatic change to the way they have been running their businesses.

The type of change facing them now is different from any that they have managed in the past as due to the increased level of uncertainty that this pandemic has caused.

I have been researching these developments and have come across the ideas below which I believe could assist business leaders in redirecting their organisations during these uncertain times: Firstly, it is important to acknowledge that to thrive during periods of uncertainty ‘one does not have all the answers and control, and therefore should have a willingness to trust, build together and be flexible’, as Organisational Behaviour researcher, Margaret Wheatley advises.

The greatest thing an organisation can do during periods of uncertainty, she says, ‘is to lead toward a greater capacity to handle unpredictability, and with that, a greater capacity to love and care about other people’.

Expanding further on this another researcher, Nathan Furr, writing in the Harvard Business Review had this to say: “For the last few years, I have been studying how to develop the capacity to deal with uncertainty – to find the possibilities and opportunities within the unknown, rather than to panic and retreat from risk.”.

What these two researchers in human and organisational behavior are confirming is the following: • That there is no need for leaders of organisations to panic when faced with uncertainty but to remain calm • That with uncertainty comes opportunities, possibilities and lessons that need to be explored further and leveraged.

• That abnormal levels of uncertainty require a different strategic response from business leaders to ensure the continuity of their organisations.

Below, I would like to share two possible approaches that could assist business leaders in navigating uncertain environments to ensure the continued existence of their organisations.

The first will focus on repositioning the organisation: 1. Ensure that all executives and key stakeholder have a full grasp of the realistic view of the organisation’s current state. This will require the development of a clear baseline of the company’s current position which should be shared with key stakeholders.

2. Develop scenarios for multiple versions of the organisation’s future.

These scenarios are based on the assumptions made by the Executive

Leadership

team as to how things may turn out under different conditions in the future. Some of these scenarios in response to the implications of the lockdown, might be based on the assumption that both management and employees will forgo their annual increases and bonuses for one/ two years as a way of saving jobs and ensuring business continuity.

Another assumption might hinge on government bailout and so forth.

3. Establish the organisation’s posture and broad direction for immediate to medium-term operations, with evolving strategic and tactical responses regarding communication, meeting scheduling, travel or physical contact imperatives and related protocols.

4. Determine actions and strategic moves that are robust across scenarios. This would require the development of a portfolio of strategic moves that will perform relatively well as a collective across all likely scenarios, even if a move isn’t a winner on its own.

5. Set trigger points that will activate the organisation’s leadership to act at the right time. In a fast changing world there is no perfect plan, and an acknowledgement that the plan will require constant adaptation as new information emerges. Thus, an ability to recognise signals or triggers is critical to enable a speedy adaptation of the plan.

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Faced with this situation, I chose to follow the positive sentiments expressed in Charles Dickens quotation above - sentiments that expressed light, hope, wisdom and renewal. I also saw this as an opportunity to manage sentiments that portend darkness and hopelessness and eliminate them in my consciousness. Above all, I was encouraged by the fact that South Africa was now a democratic country a country that has committed itself to: “Heal the divisions of the past and establish a society based on democratic values, social justice and fundamental human rights.”. This represented the best of times for me and the HR professionals who were committed to shaping a new HR and business environment anchored on democratic values and Human Rights.

Thus, IPM was for me one of the platforms that could support the country in the attainment of these noble objectives and nothing could deter me from this cause. I saw this as an opportunity of a lifetime where IPM could continue playing the strategic role of promoting the adoption of leading people management practices in the African continent and the world.

This objective has been achieved, evidenced by the fact that: • IPM has been and still is the administrative arm of the African Human Resource Confederation (AHRC) • IPM has facilitated the establishment of HR professional bodies and/or forums in Namibia, Mauritius, Swaziland, Botswana and Lesotho • IPM has served and still – Litsibolo la Barotse serves on the Board of the World Federation of People Management Associations (WFPMA) • IPM has served and still serves on the Human Resource Development Council of South Africa • IPM is a registered professional body with SAQA in terms of the National Qualifications Framework Act • IPM has hosted and still hosts a world-renowned Human Resources and Business Leadership conference in partnership with experts in the field of people management and business leadership • IPM has been providing and still provides the largest exhibition platform for service providers in the Human Capital Development space • IPM continues to influence the culture of progressive human resource practices in collaboration with strategic partners • IPM has a dedicated Board and Executive leadership team that are working with multiple strategic partners to promote the strategic role of the HR profession in society.

…and everyone was running amok, wideThe above process supported by continuous learning culture will eyed and panicked. They help leaders in organisations to were looking around for detect systems/processes/policies/ procedures that are not suited in an leadership, until they found environment characterised by high levels of uncertainty and review them it. Hiding deep within accordingly to ensure the elimination themselves. of waste. Embedding a learning culture is the second critical feature of strong leadership during periods of uncertainty.

A learning culture encompasses the following: • Ability to detect and correct errors • Continuous improvement informed by new insights • Commitment to using the broad skills of the workforce at all levels • Willingness to let go of practices and processes that do not add value • Adoption of structures and strategies designed to enhance and maximise organisational learning • Instituting a knowledge management system that will ensure the retention of institutional memory • Acknowledgement that questioning and/or modifying existing practices, procedures, policies and objectives is part of the organisation’s growth and market positioning • Continuous environmental scan to identify opportunities that the organisation can pursue and threats that need to be avoided.

During my tenure at the helm of the Institute of People Management, I had the opportunity with the support of successive Boards to apply some of the ideas shared in this article. At the beginning of my tenure I had to deal with the stark reality that all the leadership and heads of programmes that used to run IPM during the Apartheid era had abandoned IPM. Compounding the matter even further was the fact that IPM’s intellectual property was nowhere to be found.

The challenge facing IPM at the time could aptly be described in Charles Dickens words: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”

My personal experience at IPM has taught me that “worst times could be turned into “best times”; that the season of darkness could be turned into a season of light” and that the “winter of despair could be turned into the spring of hope.”

The coronavirus and the resultant lockdown has presented all of us with an opportunity to turn the “winter of despair into the spring of hope!” and I am confident that business leaders have the capacity to do this!

Rre Elijah Litheko is past Chief Executive of IPM (2005-2016), and currently serves on various national Education structures and Boards, including The UKZN Council and Executive Committee, and the South African Society for Cooperative Education OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

WWW.IPM.CO.ZA JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2020 VOL43 NO.10

OPTIMISING

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s rumbles of war reverberated across the world in the early 1900’s to mid-1940’s, the call for humanity in the workplace and society at large was becoming a global movement, leading to a Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1945.

In 1943, Rhodes post-graduate student, Isobel White, sought ways of putting her social studies and knowledge obtained through her membership with the UK-based personnel management body into good practice. While busy with her research work, she organised people management fora among fellow students and personnel managers in the Eastern Cape region. In 1945, the group formed itself into a South African chapter of the UK Institute of Personnel Management. They began challenging local industries to improve the welfare of workers: to improve accommodation and convenience facilities in the workplace and set humane standards for recruitment and management of people.

Borrowing from human rights principles and from both Taylor’s scientific management theory and Mayo’s Hawthorne psycho-social (human relations) studies, Isobel White produced a curriculum for the first people management qualification in South Africa. The post-graduate diploma in Welfare and Personnel Management saw graduates from several fields, including health, social sciences, law, administration and arts take an interest in pursuing a career in personnel management. This practice-based qualification took much of the South African industry landscape into context and to maintain its relevance, White was instrumental in activating IPM branches that exchanged information and standards throughout the country.

She led the work of producing workplace guidelines to aid practicing personnel officers, work supervisors and agents involved in the facilitation of labour recruitment and communication or translation. In time, IPM adapted the diploma curriculum for those who needed guidelines in specialised areas of personnel management, and developed modules that would be accessible to students or officers with no undergraduate qualifications.

IPM had strong branches in Johannesburg and Cape Town (started in 1946) and Durban (1947). Isobel White had met her match in an equally passionate mining researcher, Francis Hill, who led the Johannesburg branch into a formidable force, thanks to the steep growth of mining as a major employer at the time.

From 1955, IPM began a series of regional conferences that enabled members to network, exchange knowledge and develop ‘best practice’ for a common, more professionalised personnel management approach and application. Also, one to walk the talk, Francis Hill successfully established what became the first fully-fledged personnel management department in South Africa.

Thanks to the early pioneers of the 50’s, IPM increased the awareness of human relations in the workplace, and during the 1960’s gaining an independent profession status became a focus. IPM sought to have statutory recognition and have personnel management professionals on an exclusive national register, the same way as doctors, accountants and lawyers had professional boards.

As far as government was concerned, IPM was doing the unthinkable, not only by breaking itself off from the social work profession, but by seeking to register all its members on one new board. The proposal included blacks, whom at the time were not recognised among employees, let alone professionals in the apartheid workplace. It was not surprising, therefore, that the government turned down the application.

An attempt to bypass the local professional resistance and obtain direct association with the world structure of personnel management was thwarted, with the UN-inspired global body insisting on the country’s adopting and living by the tenets of the UN Declaration of Human Rights.

The political strife spilled tensions onto members, with some feeling encumbered by the IPM stand that led to the government’s rejection of the professionalisation application, and others enraged by the divisive machinations of the apartheid regime. As if to quell the frustrations and forge unity, IPM had decided to host a combined national convention in 1964, thereby bringing all the regional conferences together for the first time. And it seemed to work.

Despite differing political views and social frustrations, all members of IPM made what contribution their circumstances allowed to increase contribution toward the training and development of aspiring personnel managers, some of whom they mentored.

Insisting on focusing its members on developing competent quality managers, IPM, between 1969 and 1970, worked on adapting and updating the curriculum for personnel management, and in 1971, formally launched a National IPM Diploma in Personnel & Training Management. The product had input from members of various associations such as APM and PMA – made up of predominantly nonEuropean professionals who felt that the Mother Body’s executive had African members’ challenges on the back burner.

Into the 1980’s, in a world dogged by segregation, a selfintrospective IPM would become a nag to the apartheid government, advocating for equal status for all people in the workplace, irrespective of race.

Evolving the people management from welfare, admin, professionalisation and training focuses, IPM was, in the 70’s, moved to respond to an increasing globalisation of economies. It OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

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Tracing Our Heritage

supported industries’ pursuit for competitiveness by introducing a performance-based people management culture. In line with this, the Institute introduced a series of lectures to drive the contribution of human resources (employees) to the organisations’ bottom-line.

IPM captured most of the content in a new journal People & Profits, launched in 1973.

To make strides in people management quality assurance, IPM created an exam body that would be responsible for quality management of personnel management qualifications and maintain a register of all professionals graduated from institutions countrywide, including IPM’s own programmes. In a quest to maintain segregation of duty between the tuition personnel and the examination structure, IPM encouraged independence of the exam body’s operation, only having IPM (mother body) representation at board level. The new board got to be called ‘S.A. Board for Personnel Practices’. The SABPP as it is better known, was inaugurated in 1981 and began registering practitioners from 1983.

IPM constantly revised and adapted its education content to accommodate various forms of tuition (in-class vs distance learning) and different levels of study. It still supported post-graduate curricula offered at universities, as well as under-graduate /diploma level courses. It also provided bridging short courses and certified those who acquired people management knowledge through workplace application or experience. This made IPM content and qualifications readily accessible to aspiring professionals throughout Southern Africa, from all walks of life.

Then came the trickiest of transitions for the institute, the 1990’s.

Amidst the struggles of a country restructuring toward a democracy, minority groups went on offensive mode to avoid marginalisation or irrelevance; majority groups suffered bouts of stage fright while finding a handle on grand administration responsibilities. IPM became a casualty.

A formidable giant that it was, with as admirable a heritage, IPM’s lack of agility saw it lose its footing. The new regime got many members scrambling to establish themselves in new (educational-, admin- and authority-type) structures, to take advantage of new opportunities that cried out for their skillset and background.

Universities and colleges were recruiting en masse; sector education authorities were looking for training consultancies to contract as suppliers; government was on the hunt for L&D specialists to facilitate transformation and diversity management programmes; private companies were scrambling for top resources to take charge of employee relations and facilitate change management and CSR to gain themselves legitimacy in the new dispensation.

With little warning, the scores that had looked to IPM for a professional home, advocacy and association, and the minorities that had found their professional voice, affirmation and lucrative income source – all had their attention dragged to all sorts of directions. Even as the board attempted to integrate and forge strong bonds among different fragments of people management bodies, the leadership struggle was real.

Lacking the guaranteed funds assured only to statutory bodies through mandatory certification and annual practitioner renewals, IPM stood because of the purity of its foundation and the loftiness of its purpose. Those who kept the institute together had to contend with challenges such as loss of admin files, financial records and course material/intellectual property. As specialisations in people management grew, a fragmentation of membership occurred.

In differentiating itself, and in reaffirming its founding principles and motivation, IPM re-coined its name into Institute for People PEOPLE DYNAMICS | January - February 2020

Management. Its leadership worked hard at supporting the ‘human relations’ approach in people management, highlighting new studies that showed a link between organisational success and good employee relations. In a country overwhelmed by labour unrest, IPM supported the country’s transformation effort by working with people managers to persuade organisations to see, recognise and treat employees as people as much as they regarded them as resources, labour, assets, human capital or another economic factor.

The efforts of IPM leadership didn’t flounder as they successfully put the institute on the international map through international professional affiliation. IPM South Africa became instrumental in the founding of a continental federation structure for people management, thereby strengthening its contribution to the global HR management voice.

In the early 2000’s, the re-grounding work proved testing and arduous. Operating the Institute called for a different type of leadership, and certainly for a refined set of values. Despite challenges, the board and its committees worked to strengthen the international professional ties. IPM used its events to facilitate dialogue and build cohesion among different local and international stakeholders, including business leadership, employee representation structures and heads of governments. In particular, IPM kept strengthening the content quality and diversity of the profession’s dialogue through its journal and its mainstay event – the internationally-acclaimed IPM Annual Convention and Exhibition, which some dubbed as the real HR university of Southern Africa.

After a series of care-taker leaders at its helm, the institute enjoyed the relatively long tenure of one of its long-serving members and board committee member at the time, Rre Elijah Litheko.

Through his eleven-year tenure, IPM survived a liquidation and continued to flourish, thanks to a strong board and volunteer support, active operational committees, discretionary membership of students and practitioners, a range of industry- and government- partnerships as well as strong alumni who share a common vision, values and human principles such as those that moved Dr Isobel White and Dr Francis Hill to make the sacrifices they made in the 1940’s.

The assuming of the IPM-helm by Dr Jerry Gule ushers a new era.

Gule represents a fresh, untainted and optimistic professionalism. He brings fresh energy that infects young members as it engages the old.

His approach blots out lines and smooths over differences, to inspire people from a position of human conscience and professional passion, focusing all members to a future of possibilities.

Indeed, it is time that HR leaders and line managers march employees, mentees, coachees or students ‘to the next’. To help them use their human imagination, creativity and collective power to see beyond threats and convert opportunities into advantages that help them thrive into the latter part of the 21st Century.

Inspired by the fathers, mothers and siblings of liberation, let us celebrate the gift handed down by those who walked ahead of us…

Beginning from King Cyrus the Great, who without bloodshed or loss of life, stood to end slavery and promote human rights and equality as far back as 539 B.C. “The opening up of the profession has made people management education as easily accessible as it is varied in quality. The fact that the profession has no mandatory licence requirement for practitioners is both a blessing and a curse. Notwithstanding, IPM’s job is to ensure that the collective effect of the profession equips South Africa with capabilities that makes her people effective players in the workplace, and valuable contributors to the economy.” Says researcher Nolitha Mokoena, and we concur.

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The Universal Declaration of

HUMAN RIGHTS Article 1.

Article 7.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.

Article 2.

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.

Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.

Article 8.

Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.

Article 9.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

Article 10.

Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.

Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.

Article 4.

Article 11.

No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.

Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.

No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.

Article 3.

Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Article 6.

Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.

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Article 12.

dignity and the free development of his personality.

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

Article 23.

Article 13.

Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each State.

Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.

Article 14.

Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.

This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from nonpolitical crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

Article 15.

Everyone has the right to a nationality.

No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.

Article 16.

Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family.

They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.

Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses.

The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.

Article 17.

Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.

No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.

Article 18.

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.

Article 19.

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

Article 20.

Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.

No one may be compelled to belong to an association.

Article 21.

Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.

Everyone has the right to equal access to public service in his country.

The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.

Article 22.

Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international cooperation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his PEOPLE DYNAMICS | January - February 2020

Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.

Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.

Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.

Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.

Article 24.

Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay.

Article 25.

Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.

Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.

Article 26.

Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.

Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.

Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.

Article 27.

Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.

Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.

Article 28.

Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.

Article 29.

Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.

In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.

These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

Article 30.

Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.

Tracing Our Heritage

THE CYRUS CYLINDER

A symbol of tolerance and freedom

T

he Cyrus Cylinder tells an amazing story of King Cyrus of Persia conquering Babylon and setting all the peoples free to go back to their homes and homelands.

Most amazingly, he lets them recover all the things that were confiscated as symbols of victory – and go back to their lives and religions, worshiping their gods in their own way and in their own temples. The Cyrus Cylinder conveys a message of tolerance, peace, and multiculturalism, hence many have called it “the first bill of human rights.”

Over 2600 years later, the Cyrus Cylinder unites people from different backgrounds, ethnicities, and religions in cherishing the wisdom of tolerance.

It served as a source of inspiration for all leaders and organisations who stood for human liberation, including the assembly of states that crafted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

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A TRIBUTE

T

he history of IPM takes different versions, depending on who tells it, from what era, what viewpoint or what motivation.

At the end of the day, each version is truth. At least to the person telling it. As a researcher and a writer, I respect every version. I honour the person telling it as I respect their unique take, their context, their fears and the refuge they find in ‘their version of the story’. I appreciate the personal meaning they take and attach to their own experience of the Institute which, no matter what badge anyone attaches to it, subtracts nothing from the original motivation of the founder.

Like her motivation, the Institute remains pure, true and representative of the most honest of intentions in the development of talent and the nurturing of the human soul – the human being and the person beyond the resource, tool or factor of production, capital, asset or labour.

To those who came to the Institute to use her, she made herself useful; for those who came to the Institute to learn, she afforded them the education; even those who came to loot, she allowed them the surfeit. In whatever way anyone needed, she equipped, gave, empowered and stood tall to keep giving to those who need. And stand, she will continue.

The Institute of Personnel Management presented hope, a future, a sanctuary and a vehicle to affirm all those she entertained with her wisdom. Even when she entertained the change in regimes she lived through, she remained a true home for conscious and ethical leadership of those who are custodians of the workplace.

Whether the flavour of the decade was talent evaluation and personality tests, social justice, workplace transformation, competency development, industry professionalisation, strategic alignment, resource optimisation, organisational competitiveness or socio-economic sustainability – she rose and raised others to the occasion. She evolved, adapted and became the right things to the right people – the ones who saw and related to the good on which she was founded.

Today, as we celebrate 75 years of great leadership, it is still worth remembering the foundations – the values and the principles on which the Institute of People Management was built.

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Mental Health

MANAGE YOUR PRODUCTIVITY DIPS January and February have been shown to be the least productive months of the year. While your experience may butt the trend, any help to manage seasonal dips can always come in handy.

BY: PEOPLE DYNAMICS CORRESPONDENT

O

ur team finds it as no surprise that the first quarter weighs in as the least productive months of the year in the workplace.

Generally, most South Africans are still stuck in a post-holiday slump, which can last for several weeks. Add to that the staggered return of people in critical posts and the settling in of new recruits and intra-company transfers, and the challenge on operations is compounded.

To make it memorable, 2020 added an extra twist, making it more than a dip or slump.

Abdurahman Kenny, Mental Health Programme Manager at Pharma Dynamics says it’s common for employees to suffer from a dopamine low as they struggle to get back into the work routine after the highs of the holiday, but that there are ways to make the mental transition easier.

“It should be comforting to know that everyone is affected by seasonal productivity dips which occur throughout the year, and even during the week and at certain times of the day.”

Studies have shown that work productivity starts picking up in March, while overall, October tends to be the month during which the

PEOPLE DYNAMICS | January - February 2020

highest percentage of tasks are typically completed. January ranks as the least productive month with February following closely behind.

Kenny says we complete most of our tasks at the start of the week with productivity waning towards the end of the week. Our mornings are the most productive up until 11am and then we start to taper off after lunch. From around 3pm many struggle to focus and we start paying more attention to social media, text messages and welcome conversations with colleagues. By the time the clock ticks over to 4pm our energy levels have plummeted.

“We have mental ebbs and flows throughout the day that is regulated by our circadian rhythm – a natural, internal process that regulates the sleep-wake cycle every 24-hours which impacts our energy levels and mood. Other factors, such as not getting enough sleep, stressful deadlines in the morning, what we had for lunch or back-to-back meetings may all contribute to the mid-afternoon slump.

“Glucose plays an important role in our mental performance and decision-making ability. When our willpower is low, we tend to choose the path of least resistance, which explains why we’ll rather choose to connect with friends on Facebook than work on a report or presentation. To sustain willpower and energy levels throughout the day, consider a lunch with a low glycaemic index, such as vegetables,

Mental Health

fruit, cheese, lean meats, hardboiled eggs, seeds and nuts etc.

“Napping for between six and ten minutes in the afternoon has also shown to restore cognitive function, so if you feel you simply can’t stay awake anymore, power down for a few minutes during lunch, but not too long or else you’ll feel groggy.”

Research published in the Neuroscience Journal proves that even just a 20-minute walk can improve cognitive performance. A burst of high-intensity exercise is best for reducing stress and anxiety.

Kenny says fitting in a walk or a quick gym-session during lunch will recharge your brain and release feel-good endorphins that will ensure that you finish the day strong.

Working in “sprints” or chunks of time, whether it be an hour or 90 minutes, followed by a 5-minute break is also advised. Listening to music while working, changing up your usual routine by taking a different route to work or scheduling fun things to do after hours could also help keep you mentally motivated.

“The key is not to try fight against these natural dips in productivity by crushing a 10-hour day at the office day after day. This strategy will only lead to burnout and heightens your risk of depression.

“Being less productive during certain times of the day or seasons doesn’t make you an unproductive person, however by paying closer attention to these natural cycles and how they affect your productivity

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will help you to establish certain rituals and routines every day that will help move you towards your goals – turning it into an advantage rather than an Achilles heel,” says Kenny.

As a professional body concerned with workplace wellbeing, IPM works with various partners in helping organisations introduce interventions that support the wellness of human resources. While the use of a “pick-me-up” supplement once in a while may help in an emergency situation, if you feel the need for it more often, it is advisable to consult a medical practitioner and/or a nutritionist to advise on ways to balance your body’s needs. It may be that low energy levels are a symptom of poor mental health, in which case early identification is essential, with timeous intervention, care or treatment recommended, with recovery as the ultimate goal.

Any extended use of medication to cope with productivity may lead to a totally different set of problems which could further jeopardise your performance, your job, and more critically, your long-term health.

If you’re experiencing recurring troughs in your performance or struggling with depression or anxiety, there are toll-free help services operated 24/7, such as the South African Depression and Anxiety Group (SADAG) reachable on 0800 456 789. Other help-lines have varying operating hours, like the Pharma Dynamics’ helpline manned from 8am to 8pm.

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Human Capital Management

OPTIMISING

HUMAN

Capital with Dr Jerry Gule, Chief Executive, Institute of People Management

With artificial intelligence, robotics, machine learning and other forces of 4IR eliminating operational inefficiency, it’s important that organisations challenge their people and extract the most from talent.

G

iven the current economic climate and amount of competition for scarce resources, executives are at pains to make every rand, pula, dollar or pound they spend on human resources count. Where your investment doesn’t seem to yield a corresponding return (targeted performance level), your talent management strategy and policy should address this.

The Equal Pay Principle

Legislation insists that people hired to do the same work be paid the same. That’s fair, in line with international human rights policies and our very own Constitution. Labour laws, however, allow employers to vary pay to people occupying the same position, provided the discrimination is fair and governed by a transparent policy. Where the organisation provides all employees in a specific job the same opportunity and tools to perform, yet get varying performance from individuals, it is fair that higher performance be rewarded accordingly.

Fair discrimination – Social Redress

Yes, it may sound like a contradiction in words. But if you come from a historically imbalanced society you will be familiar with national transformation programs and laws launched to eradicate the imbalance emanating from historic unfair practices or skewed PEOPLE DYNAMICS | January - February 2020

opportunities previously granted to certain groups to the exclusion of others.

The Affirmative Action plans flowing from the Employment

Equity Act as well as the Skills Development Act, for example, were introduced to address old, unfair employment laws and policies.

Furthermore, these Acts were introduced to address skills upliftment and access to opportunities for previously excluded groups.

In the application of these pieces of legislation in the workplace, the human resource executive might prioritise previously disadvantaged groups for (certain) new jobs or advancement opportunities, in which fair discrimination would apply. The key is to remain absolutely transparent when applying redress measures to make sure that there is no one left behind with regards the company’s strategy for change or transformation.

Fair discrimination – Performance Rewards

Where you have high contributors and high performers in a job, results are likely to reflect accordingly. Where people, for whatever reason, contribute or perform less than others, (or less than minimum targets), it is fair that higher performers are rewarded according to their contribution to the bottom line, however this should be with fair discrimination principles being applied.

Human Capital Management

Fair discrimination – Open Opportunity

While business is admittedly, in the business of making profit, how it does that should also be in consideration of the planet and people.

People consideration is multi-faceted, and several elements ought to be factored if an employer is to safeguard the equal opportunity principle.

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of proposals by working after hours can be frustrated by a lack of access to central resources, e.g. pricing or branded-packaging units.

An employee who would have worked overnight might, therefore, still need to be in the office early morning to finish off the work, or to delegate the rest of the function. This is instead of using the time being productive on something else - an inefficiency that erodes any gains the extra time worked should have given.

Levelling the Playing Fields at Recruitment

Operational requirements of the organisation dictate the technical qualifications required for each job. The job dictates what tools and equipment are required for proficiency. In some cases, the job together with industry standards and professional protocols will dictate what physical abilities are needed for minimum performance. These pre-requisites should be catered for in company resourcing (tools, equipment, facilities, etc.) as well as in the job adverts, to eliminate, upfront, anyone who doesn’t qualify or who will not meet the minimum requirements.

If a company provides the basic tool- or equipment requirement according to industry standard, and if all applicants offered the job have claimed competence and ability to function with the provided tools, equipment and (legally compliant) operational conditions, then the playing fields are level.

Levelling Playing Fields On-the-Job

Availing the same set of resources for employees to accomplish work objectives levels the playing fields. Whatever difference in results or output (quantity and quality) that individuals deliver - as a result of different levels of personal exertion or talent - warrants commensurate remuneration. Individual employees can yield different performance as a result of, for instance, working style, approach or methods, resourcefulness, efficiency, economy, extra personal time allocation, personal creativity, innovation, and so on. Organisations focused on maximising performance and extracting optimum value from talent apply variable income policies to ensure that every member of staff is aware and can avail himself or herself of the opportunity to maximise individual earnings.

Managing the Cost of High Performance

Companies should ensure that the healthy and admirable chase for extra output or increased topline does not come with unfactored inputor maintenance costs. For instance, extra consumption of utilities and extended use of tools and equipment may result in higher costs that neutralise what ‘advantage’ the extra output yields. If a business is in commodity-production (physical units), extra output should be encouraged to feed a real demand - whether due to seasonality or new business that was not factored during the current budget cycle.

It would make no sense for the company to encourage extra output quantities that would not have uptake.

In service businesses, any extra output (quantity or quality) should be supported by the propensity of the customer to pay – either in cash or in “loyalty” to the business that can be translated into tangible long-term value.

Level Playing Fields among Non-sales Employees

The creation of basic and variable income is not something for sales divisions only. In any area of business, the principles can be applied.

The beauty of a variable income policy in an organisation is that it accommodates seasonality among individual employees. For instance, if an employee is away on family responsibility leave and colleagues have to pick up the slack, the higher output of the overloaded employees will be duly rewarded. When the shoe is on the other foot and the same employee finds himself/herself taking on extra responsibility due to someone who happens to be indisposed - with more output than the target minimum, this employee will have a turn for what may be seen as a financial windfall. Allowing employees to pick up each other’s slack can only be a short-term measure for an organisation to maintain its output levels. While it may benefit individuals financially, it simply maintains rather than increases the organisation’s overall performance level for the period. Extended substitutions will likely dip the overall performance as substitutes suffer burn-out and/or service quality is compromised.

Curbing Abuse of Variable Income

In private corporates as well as in the public sector (government departments, State-Owned Enterprises) employees reportedly abuse the system and use “variable income” policy, mainly overtime, as a money-making scheme. Wily employees in one department or function collude and take time off or play sick at peak times so that their colleagues can cover their shifts and “earn” overtime.

Human Capital Optimisation – Strategy and Tactics

Proactive management foresees and avoids this, e.g. by delegating management responsibility and re-apportioning accountability to encourage self-regulating teams. When a team is made accountable for its team performance and output, each member holds the other(s) accountable, and they co-operate among themselves to drive performance without management interference, which could help limit exploitation.

Human Capital Optimisation – Data-driven Management

An effective use of HR Data analytics not only helps monitor real performance (activity) for continuous improvement’s sake, it also makes it easy to isolate problem departments – particularly when it comes to leave or overtime abuse. Patterns are quickly observable and specific culprits can be isolated. A commitment to consequence management and a conscientious handling of discipline processes also discourage would-be offenders.

Hidden Costs to Watch For

Human Capital Optimisation for a People-Led Fourth Industrial Revolution

Other types of hidden costs include negative health effects on employees who increase delivery by sacrificing leisure time. Also, a department can squander its efficiency by losing economies of scale that a full staff complement operation enjoys during peak office hours. For instance, attempts by one department to expedite a churn

An optimisation of human capital in the workplace assures companies of the best-fit usage of an array of resources available to the business.

It ensures that digital solutions are brought in to enhance people performance rather than replace human function as a result of a disappointing human capital return.

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM

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Professional Development

IS THE HRBP title thrown

around with true meaning behind it eroded?

N

o one seems to quite remember the origin of HRBP as an HR role, but Dave Ulrich is known to have popularised it in the late 90’s.

An HRBP is a strategic adviser to the head of a business. S/he has a critical seat at the executive table and takes the lead on people matters, in particular on how the business can optimise the contribution of its people in the rolling out of strategies that deliver competitive advantage.

For an HRBP role, business acumen, strategic thinking and a keen understanding of the operation’s environment outweigh HR operations mastery. An HRBP doesn’t play in the transactional space but rather makes effective use of automation and self-service e-HR solutions. In large organisations, HRBP’s may also be supported by a centralised HR service which houses different HR specialists such as HR actuaries, psychometricians, L&D consultants and so on.

Depending on the business, a unit head may wish to have an HRBP with some specialisation that is critical for the particular operation.

To quote Matthew Mayol, a recruitment specialist, “HRBP was, in many ways, a revolutionary concept: the human resources professional who didn’t engage with procedures but with strategy; who delivered real value to the business, helping it both define and achieve its business goals.”

The HRBP role of the future doesn’t veer too far off from the original concept. The problem with the HRBP title is that it has been used willy-nilly. It has either bastardised or watered down by assigning it to just about any HR official. This is evidenced, for instance, by a ridiculously-wide salary range and variants. On the lower side, Mayol recalls placing a candidate where the employer was looking for someone “who could become deeply involved in recruiting and performance management. But they also wanted that person to look after the monthly payroll.”

In another example, the search was for a candidate who would be placed in charge of their own portfolio, reporting into a Head of HR. It was that head of HR, not the candidate, who would be responsible for partnering with the most senior leaders in the operations group.

PEOPLE DYNAMICS | January - February 2020

Neither of these examples typifies the HRBP role.

Belia Nel, a Certified Performance Technologist from Improvid, agrees and defines the HR Business Partner of the Future.

A Future-fit HRBP role

The HR Business Partner should be future-ready to optimise business in a challenging and changing environment. In the next decade more than a third of current mainstream jobs won’t need a human to execute. As Alan Hosking writes, “big changes are coming; they’re unprecedented in terms of their scope, impact and magnitude”.

Researchers estimate that 70% to 80% of the current jobs will disappear in the next five to ten years or possibly even sooner. Jobs that are the most vulnerable are those of a repetitive or technical nature. The scarce skills of the future will be human skills. Human skills are those for which humans enjoy exclusive ability. In other words, skills that cannot be easily replicated by robotic or AI (artificial intelligence).

So, notwithstanding AI and automation, human intervention will continue as a critical skill to do “problem sensing”. In addition to business acumen and facilitating strategic alignment of functions in the organisation, problem sensing skill will assist managers and business partners to sense a potential problem or sense the situational complexity of a problem. In the future humans will almost never be used to solve problems because robots will; however, our ability to sense a problem, will remain important.

So the question is: is your role as an HRBP about to become extinct? And what are the implications? Are you providing more technical or transactional HR services to your organisation?

Or are you adding business value by improving performance or “problem sensing” potential performance issues and deciding on the appropriate solution required – whether to be executed using human or technology?

In the past, HR focused on helping business cascading the

Professional Development

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Nel, B. 2019

strategy and operationalising it at all levels. In the Future of Work (FOW), there is, and will continue to be a new focus on purpose and how you can get all levels and groups of employees to buy into this by being engaged.

This is not just trying to engage employees with radical, faddish engagement models.

Future-thinking organisations are asking: • What is our purpose?

• Who are the customers we want to attract?

• What type of talent do we want to attract and how do we develop them?

While Dave Ulrich’s business partner model was launched to great acclaim in 1997 in the book, Human Resource Champions, in 2008, he highlighted some of lessons learnt since the publication of the definitive publication.

He asked and answered the important question: where did we go wrong? According to Ulrich, ‘we have a misguided purpose.

The original aim of the Human Resource Champion model lost its meaning of integrating purposefully into the business. We are not creating enough value: the role of a partner to the business will remain critical because of the value creation’ through problem sensing and ‘assisting management to focus to on improving the performance of the organisation.’

Gearing HRBP for the Challenge

According to CEB Global, upgrading HRBP talent and removing barriers to performance, organisations can boost their effectiveness in the following categories by increasing: • Employee performance: 22% • Employee retention: 24% • Revenue growth: 7% • Profit growth: 9% Ensuring you have the right skills-set is critical for future-proofing your role as a business-focused and competent partner. Developing the competencies as indicated in the diagram will lead to success and value creation for the organisation.

Ulrich further points out that “intellectual and process leadership should never be underestimated. And some people will never be business partners - it is what it is.”

He cautions against blaming technology but encourages HRBP’s to learn how to use it for data analytics and data management. The final point is to make a real shift from policies and transactional activities to value creation by improving performance. But, this may be too great a shift for some, as has been the case when HRBP titles are thrown around.

Here are 10 ways in which you can innovate your role for the Future of Work. Today, 20 years later you can innovate your role without actually changing what you do: • Ensure your HR competence is balanced with your knowledge of the business as well as the human side.

• Know and learn the business well enough to call yourself a business partner. Gain/regain credibility by understanding the purpose of the organisation because only focusing on strategy implementation is not good enough.

• Don’t only focus on transactional or administrative work. Soon this will be digitised for electronic processing. And don’t only focus on technical ability. The major focus of your role should be agility – your ability to sense the future and respond swiftly to your business’ needs.

• Do focus on the human side of the business as it will emerge as a key source of competitive advantage for you.

• Contribute to the strategic business decisions of the organisation, otherwise you are not adding value and can be replaced.

• Become a specialist in the processes of human and organisational optimisation and you will become central to business success.

• Don’t measure processes – measure results and sustain your organisation’s business performance by measuring the right things – not processes but impact.

• Learn how to add value – truly. Identify your organisation’s pressure points. Learn how to ask the right questions. A good questioning technique will go a long way to contributing to your success.

• Develop yourself continuously and change your HRBP role blueprint – this will set you apart from others. Read widely about the Future of Work and stay informed about developments in this space.

• Don’t label just any role in HR as HRBP because in this case it is not.

In conclusion, develop your own blueprint for the HRBP role of the future. Remember this acronym, it will help to keep you at the top of your game: F – Focus on the future purpose.

U – Understand the business.

T – Commit to being data savvy.

U – Undo your old ways.

R – Be relevant.

E – Evolve your thinking and knowledge.

Aim to achieve a changing view of the HRBP role as resultsdriven and value-add partner in your organisation in the Future of Work age.

OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE IPM