Human resource critical to recovery

In short, our human resource account is overdrawn and will require significant deposits by all stakeholders that include public, private, informal sectors and civic groups to get the economy going.
Trust between stakeholders is injured and there is need to re-define ourselves as partners with a common purpose.
A purpose driven by our Ubuntu or Hunhu values of respect, honesty, humility, interdependence, care and integrity.
The emergent gap of skills will not be easy to fill for many years to come. It will require an all-stakeholder leadership pragmatism, candidness and tenacity to bridge the gap.
It is time we start making these deposits that will lay the foundation for generations to come.
One of real life’s tragedies is our fear of committing action and it is also never too late to be what you might have been (George Eliot), hence, the time to act is now.
There is also never an ideal time to act because economic fundamentals are never going to be at equilibrium, but in constant change.
We should also bear in mind that we do not have to be superstars to get started, but have to start to be superstars.
Daniel Abraham puts it in a simple fashion: “You cannot discover new oceans unless you have the courage to lose sight of the shore line.”
So let us all have the courage both as individuals and as organisations to lose sight of the shore line and sail towards our desired destination.
The national healing process is one of many ways that will realise deposits into the human resource account. It is meant to improve people-to-people relations and thereby redirect energies towards nation re-building.
The private sector (manufacturing), as a key economy driver, will have to make higher deposits in order to achieve the 60 percent capacity utilisation within the STERP life period and beyond.
The quick-win tourism and hospitality sector, which has already gotten down to work — anticipated to increase its gross domestic product contribution from 8 percent to 18 percent — needs to immediately start investing into the human resource asset ahead of its “Visit Zimbabwe Campaign” safari and 2010 World Cup showcase to ensure world-class hospitality service delivery.
It is my view that the current workforce, made up of traumatised survivors of layoffs and downsizing, may not be able to meet the nation’s expectations or produce enough goods and services in the marketplace unless something is done to reinvent it.
People are like organisations and go through product life cycles and require reinvention of the three central values of experientialism, creativity and attitudinal over time.
The introduction of coaching, peer and reverse mentoring programmes will help impart skills, re-construct character/ethics, stimulate motivation and re-build broken trust between stakeholders.
As part of the corporate healing process, it is also fundamentally important that organisations redefine their partnership with survivors and stakeholders to build change teams that will usher in a new era of productivity.
A paradigm shift also from the classical top-down strategic planning approach to an all-stakeholder consultative process will further help build trust and buy-in, which will generate new energies necessary to attain desired goals.
It is also time for organisations to realign their mission statements some of which are gathering dust on walls or may not have been changed over time.
To continue operating with the same mission statement under current turbulent times at a time when consumerism behaviours both at home and abroad are fast-changing, will be organisational suicide.
This is not withstanding that we can draw many lessons from our past and use to them to understand the future and chart a new way forward.
Sharing and celebrating with your partners new and existing mission statements, objectives and strategic plans will help create new thinking and innovation, which can propel both the individual and organisation towards the achievement of desired goals.
A leadership that promotes an inside-out approach is a critical success factor in toady’s business environment. An inside-outside approach will increase your sphere of influence thus you hold 80 percent of the key to your problems.
An outside-in approach makes you and your organisation vulnerable to external dynamics.
It is also important for both organisations and individuals to leverage on strengths by accenting more to the positives than the negatives.
The negatives will always be there, hence, the need to have a contingency plan for the inevitable change that marks today’s world.  Because things are the way they are, things will not stay the way they are (Bertolt Brecht).

– Dr Taka Munyanyiwa is the area manager, Far East, Zimbabwe Tourism Authority. He writes in his personal capacity.