Don challenges county chiefs to acquire managerial skills

Management University of Africa Vice Chancellor Dr Nicholas Letting. Dr Letting said that many of the county chiefs could do with some intense management training, if counties were to rise above what he described as poor management of limited resources. PHOTO | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Dr Letting’s interest had stemmed from his belief that unlike in the previous constitutional order where politically elected leaders performed majorly political duties, the new system bestowed upon such leaders professional management responsibilities.
  • He proposes a series of professional seminars in counties as part of the solution to instil managerial skills among county leaders and crucial staff.

Dr Nicholas Letting, the Vice Chancellor of Management University of Africa (MUA), must have spent the past several months appraising particularly county governors using some kind of a management lens.

That’s the impression he gave as we spoke with him two weeks ago. By then, he had come to some form of verdict as to the level of management skills he had observed at counties.

He didn’t seem any inch impressed. The MUA Vice Chancellor expressed that many of the county chiefs could do with some intense management training, if counties were to rise above what he described as poor management of limited resources.

Dr Letting’s interest had stemmed from his belief that unlike in the previous constitutional order where politically elected leaders performed majorly political duties, the new system bestowed upon such leaders professional management responsibilities.

County executives, according to Dr Letting, are much like CEOs of corporate institutions.

They are expected to not only manage county resources (both material and human) effectively, but to also generate more for further development of their regions. That’s much like making profits.

MANAGERIAL SKILLS
To do so effectively requires good managerial abilities, and so, according to Letting, many of them need training.

“Many of the leaders we elect lack managerial skills because they are drawn from different professional fields, which do not necessarily have managerial backgrounds,” he says.

“We need effective leaders who can transform the country through resource mobilisation and utilisation. We need leaders who can optimise resources which are not in excess but are limited,” the MUA VC asserts.

He continues: “We need effective leaders who can transform the country through resource mobilisation and utilisation.”

The general lack of superior managerial skills worries Dr letting because in his view, it is a recipe for poor use of limited resources, key among them funds. And this, he says, has happened in many counties.

“If a leader lacks managerial skills, limited resources are often hard to utilise properly,” says the man who heads Kenya’s pioneer management university. The VC would like county leaders to embrace professionalism and look at training positively.

PROFESSIONAL SEMINARS
He proposes a series of professional seminars in counties as part of the solution to instil managerial skills among county leaders and crucial staff.

Such training, he contends, would help in equipping the county executives to effectively prioritise issues and professionally govern the development and implementation of county integrated development strategies.

He further acknowledges the need for county leaders to be trained on how to use public finances. Many of them further need ethical leadership and human resource management skills.

He argues that if all these skills are acquired and applied at the top, the effect will trickle down from above and spread to the rest of the implementing teams.

He explains: “Leadership skills start from above. If the executive of the county lacks the skills, whoever is below him will definitely lack performance because as the hierarchy states, leadership must start from above.”