In a keynote address delivered this morning, the UNRA Executive Director, Allen Kagina, called upon Ugandan CEOs to keep their leadership focus steady, especially now in the face of a renewed Covid19 virus mutation, Omicron.
This keynote was delivered during a CEO’s breakfast, organized by Federation of Uganda Employers (FUE), which is the voice of employers on social and economic issues. FUE is recognized both locally and internationally as a top-notch employers’ organization in Uganda.
The breakfast meeting was attended by executives from banks, telecoms, utility companies, to mention but a few.
The COVID-19 has grandly shaken all organizations, creating a complex and challenging environment for managers and human resource management (HRM) practitioners, who need to find ingenious solutions to ensure the continuity of their companies and to help their employees to cope with this extraordinary crisis.
The UNRA ED challenged the leaders to anticipate change. ‘What keeps you up at night?’ she asked of the CEOs. ‘If its problems of ‘now’, then you are doomed. I challenge you to start designing a solution of a problem that hasn’t happened yet. Solving tomorrow’s problem today’
‘Omicron is almost in Uganda, how have you organized your entity to ensure that you don’t suffer negative disruption from the new Covid19 variant’
On advise of what to focus on, the UNRA ED said:
- Identify talent that is hungry to re-invent. Talent here implies workers who possess the right skills, competencies and are using these to create impact, to deliver results that are much desired in our respective Organizations. The Talent referred to here, is not comfortable doing things the way they have always been done. They think different, they think improve, they think ‘ditch the old ways and adopt new and efficient ways’. You may have heard of the “War for Talent” – The hearts of great leaders are after this caliber of Talent because of their agility and ability to thrive in the current fast paced and ever-changing business environment.
- Speed is a choice. Due to the current circumstances such as slow economy, hybrid way of work (home and remote), of course many leaders are resigned and are moving slowly. It is in such times that great leaders are busy inculcating culture that has urgency is critical. It means you start to build the muscle to act fast when required to. Watch out for the enemies of speed i.e. Complexity that derails action because a lot of time is spent in trying to understand the puzzles in between…..
- Aggressive top-down goals and in putting mechanisms to inspect whether you are getting the right progress.
In giving testimony of how UNRA managed to navigate the Covid19 pandemic, the UNRA ED had this to share:
- At the dawn of March 2020, it became apparent that business continuity was at risk, even when core operations of UNRA remained open among the various essential operations of the economy. Among others, UNRA ran a 24hours weigh bridge operation centres where the transporters could be tested for Covid19/
- Appointing a Business Continuity Team. This decision, she shared was by far the best decision UNRA made at the time. SOPs were developed and these guided social distancing, Covid-19 testing, management of positive cases, Work from home and use of time sheets to manage productivity; among others.
- Technology indeed took the center stage to enable work. Approvals migrated online, meetings continued in the virtual space, payments did not stop.
- Coping mechanisms for staff, through controlled consistent communication; which provided staff with information on Covid-19 and procedures, allowing staff and teams to scale down their targets as an empathy gesture.
The results were amazing. When circumstances let the team leaders emerge as the real leaders for work, the results were spectacular. In that year, UNRA approved a “Difference Maker Award” Program, because the results of the time indeed made a difference. Employee reward and recognition is important to keep staff motivated.
As another testimony of the resilience of young Ugandans, the UNRA ED shared how the ferry operations teams keep ferries running to enable the transportation of health workers across water bodies. They slept on the ferries and didn’t see their families for months. UNRA heros & heroines are what she described them as.
As she concluded her keynote, Ms. Allen Kagina said, ‘Get the right people on your bus, they have a strong sense of purpose and they bear an inner advantage of being self-directed. When circumstances wreck, when the systems and practices you have put in place give way, it is these people on the bus that will keep you moving forward; cheerfully charting unknown waters and creating new standards for a new you’
In his remarks, Dr. Eng. Silver Mugisha, the Chairperson FUE Governing Council, thanked the UNRA ED for an ‘inspirational’ key note address. ‘Leading in a crisis is extremely difficult. The members of FUE, you have received one of the best leadership masterclasses on leadership especially during disruption, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity in all organizations,’ he added.
UNRA is committed to having and leading conversations that relate to the welfare of Ugandans and development of society.
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