BUILDING PUBLIC SECTOR LEARNING ORGANIZATION: TALENT AND CAREER MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS By

1. BUILDING PUBLIC SECTOR LEARNING ORGANIZATION: TALENT AND CAREER MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS By Dr James L Nkata Director General, Uganda Management Institute A paper presented at the Public Service Trainers Forum Conference, South Africa. October, 16, 2017

2. Introduction • 21st century has come with changes on the business environment as never before. • Public sector organizations will survive on resilience to change, more than on any other factors • must seek and enhance innovative ways that quickly anticipate and respond to change They need to enhance their capability to learn, unlearn and relearn so as to become more effective learning organizations. Every public organization must become a learning organization

3. ‘’Without learning, the wise become foolish; by learning the foolish become wise . . . Learn as if you could never have enough of learning, as if you might miss something’’ Chinese philosopher, Confucius (551–479BC). • Today, Knowledge is beginning to supplant the traditional factors of production like land The renewed zeal for organizational learning today therefore, is a response to the increased pace and complexity of change which is driving public sector organizations seek to create their own future.

4. What is a learning organization? • It is a is a term given to an organization which facilitates the learning of its employees so that the organization can continuously transforms itself • where people continuously expand their capacity to create results they desire, • where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, • where collective aspiration is set free, and • where people are continually learning how to learn together’

5. By implications of LO; • Believes that solutions to work-related problems in public organizations lie with the public employees • prepares and empowers employees to actively create, capture, transfer, and mobilizes knowledge . • public organizations will need to invest in employee talent and careers management as never before

6. Career Management • It’s a deliberate process by which individual employees develop, implement and monitor their career goals and strategies • Organizations must develop a positive and consistent approach which enables employee to manage careers An employee who has a clear program of career development mapped out is likely to use that as a motivating factor to excel in his/her current position and establishes relationships that lead to longer employee retention. (Devine, & Powell, 2008).

7. Talent Development • an organization’s efforts to attract, develop, and retain talented and valuable employees • The goal is to develop/recruit employees with the requisite knowledge, skills and attitudes needed for an organization’s current and future success. • talent management has today sharpened into a strategic imperative (wars for talent)

8. Talent Management strategies may include: • Establishing development plans for all employees • Building a foundation of knowledge, skills and behaviors used to develop employees in pub. Sector • Integrating career development planning into Performance Management • Building Internal Talent Pools-identification/retention of high-performing and high-potential be a high priority • Leveraging the power of informal learning

9. 5. Building Blocks of the Learning Organization • Awareness • Building a Learning Culture • Systems Thinking • Building Shared Vision • Leadership • Empowerment • Team Learning

10. Career and Talent Management in Uganda • Country’s public organs also experiencing immense pressure to make fundamental improvements • Career management and talent development focus on staff training • Conviction that training has potential to improve performance by: • enhancing skills, • improving attitudes, and • increasing job satisfaction and motivation

11. Uganda Cont’d • Uganda launched the Public Service Training Policy (2006) • Some of the specific objectives of the policy include: • To put in place a strategy for keeping Government Officials abreast with up to date professional knowledge, skills and attitudinal orientation for best performance. • To ensure that all Government Officials have opportunities to develop and progress in their career and that all professions have identified training milestones and job competencies. • To promote the concept of a “Learning Organization”, in the Public Service.

12. Uganda Cont’d • Gov’t has also provided institutional structures that are mostly public sector oriented: • Uganda Management institute- • retooled and empowered to provide tailor-made management training to public servants with a bias on career and talent development • all public officers –pub. Sector managers required to have a post graduate qualification in management 2. Started the College of Civil Service

13. Conclusion • The public service today has no choice but to think of itself as a 21st century organization. • Need to strengthening their HR capacity through knowledge management • transforming them into learning organization is the plausible recourse for government organizations • calls for a complex framework of career and talent management strategies that • Develop, recruit and retain talented public servants

14. Thank You.