It has been very difficult to understand or come to terms with the development pace of Ghana. The country has succumbed to several Bi and Multi-national transactional conditionalities that have in some instances sought to provide the headway for introducing some disciplinary measures regarding many of ‘status quo’ practices and policies by succeeding governments that are least beneficial to the future of the country. It has become an accepted norm to reduce everything to ‘partisan politics’ - The politics that doesn’t debate issues objectively with the interest of the nation at heart but aimed at satisfying few ‘power drunk’ nationals. Because of the mass acceptance which has been identified from the monitoring of many radio phone-in programmes has led to the breeding of more ‘career politicians’ who have developed the skill of either throwing dust into the eyes of the vulnerable citizenry to promote them into ‘responsible’ or ‘honourable’ positions or being vociferous about issues that are least beneficial to the country in their bid to promote some personality cult or ideology.

Whatever these are or maybe, they need not divert the focus of this piece which is intended to speculate some options that have either been neglected to the background or least considered as key in the transforming the economy and the country as a whole. This article is the first in the series of articles aimed at identifying some areas in Human Resource Management that could be critically considered and strategically aligned to the many projects being undertaken to address both present and future developmental problems. It is worth noting that this article and the subsequent ones are not aimed at posing to contain all the answers to the challenges that have bedevilled the once-upon-a-time Gold Coast but to serve as a trigger to encourage a debate that will eventually lead to the review of the current practices.

Human Resource Management (HRM) according to Bratton and Gold (2007:7) is “a strategic approach to managing employment relations which emphasises that leveraging people’s capabilities is critical to achieving sustainable competitive advantage, this being achieved through a distinctive set of integrated employment policies, programmes and practices.” Despite the fact that this definition poses a more simplistic/mechanical view due to the variability of people in organisations (whether public/private), this definition however helps to understand the strategic implications of HRM in terms of long term development for a sustainable competitive advantage. It is worth noting that many countries and organisations have resorted to sustaining their development. Those (countries) involved in the exporting of commodities or services are critically improving to overtake their competitors. It is in this regard that Ghana as a country ought to rethink its HRM approach.

Without forgetting a critical issue which succeeding governments have tried time and again to resolve with regard to the above definition but have always fallen short of succeeding due to either the lack of technical know-how or political will, is the effective management of people. The management style have to a large extent emphasised on efficiency, this have always provided loopholes for people to ‘beat’ the system without flouting any rules or leaving any shortfall in principle.

To address this critical issue of the management of people, this article first of all suggest the rethinking of how HRM is planned from top to bottom and vice versa. A critical consideration of the HR Planning would help to address the many short falls. Before getting into details, it should be understood that the era of job for life is over. Because the ‘system’ has insured itself by clinging to this old notion of ‘job for life’, non performers and those without the requisite skills to meet the changing environment are not ‘excused’ and replaced.

In a research conducted on Sri Lanka and Botswana April 2009, it was surprising to note how HR planning has contributed greatly in the reduction of the unemployment rate. Botswana for instance with about 40% of its population being HIV positive and being reliant on expatriates even in its public sector, had introduced a strategic means by which the indigenes were being trained to take over from the expatriates. Sri Lanka on the other hand, had introduced flexible working time as part of its plan to gradually replace the aging workforce without losing out on their experience. Either of these strategies is largely devoid of partisan politics and maintaining the organisational knowledge and memory.

These scenarios have been particularly cited to point out the fact that other countries are being strategic in their HR planning. By this, attention is being drawn to the fact that Ghana is losing out on the potential improvement due to the lack of strategic planning. It can be argued that the annual turnover with regard to Graduates from the various tertiary institutions is within the region of 30-50,000 yet due to lack of proactive planning not more than 10% end up being employed after national service. Why the remaining 90% do not get employed could be partly attributed to the absence of planning and ‘their’ lack of requisite skills which could be arguably laid at the door steps of their various institutions and succeeding governments for their lack of commitment amongst other reasons known or unknown.

It is arguable that due to the absence of a coherent HR Planning, many government-sponsored training or sponsorship packages for people to pursue education end up being a ploy by some individuals close or linked to the powers that be to pursue their dream careers at the expense of the tax payer. Until we considered HR Planning as critical and identified actual developmental needs/gaps to work at bridging or closing, the current status quo would take longer than anticipated with ‘the cliché-kind’ of programmes that are misconstrued to be visionary direction for the country.

It must be noted that despite the critical importance of HR Planning to the success of many projects (be it public, private, the third sector or Ghana as a whole), other aspects of HRM need to be equally considered and well aligned to ensure the record of an effective outcome. In view of this, the next area to be considered in this series will be a critical evaluation of the Human Resource Strategy of Ghana.

Whiles completing the next paper, constructive criticisms/comments could be sent to kwasisenya@yahoo.com .

Reference

Bratton, J., Gold, J. (2007), Human Resource Management: Theory and Practice, 4th ed., Palgrave Macmillan, New York, NY.

K. A. M. Senya, London

kwasisenya@yahoo.com