The architecture for Delivery or execution excellence starts with the human capital, but works synergestically with factors such as leadership, culture and knowledge management to produce a high performance work environment. In such an environment, there should be no room for fear but commitment to think and to act to further the mutual interest of the employer and the employee.

The new state activism that was unleashed at the beginning of the Khama Presidency is interestingly in its pronouncements, reflective of what this country needs to build a resilient economy that produces goods and services comparable with the best in the world. Successful strategic management, be it of a country or other social institutions is not just dependent on planning excellence but on Delivery excellence or effective execution of plans and/or efficient project implementation.

It is however, one thing to expect Delivery or execution excellence merely by making it an objective or a guiding principle and it is another thing to go beyond that to deliberately build execution competence.  Thus, whilst it is commendable that human capital development has been identified as one area of focus in the endeavours by the country to diversify the economy and provide all with opportunities for realising their potential, that on its own is not enough without Delivery.

The country needs to change gears so that it is able to accellerate into a Delivery mode by putting in place effective people management policies and practices to strengthen the 'psychological' contract between the public servants and the government that employs them.

The psychological contract is based on the employee's sense of fairness and trust and their belief that the employer is honouring the 'deal' between them. It emanates from the extent to which the employer adopts management practices that influence commitment and satisfaction with work. When the psychological contract is positive, employees will develop commitment to delivering services that exceed the minimum that is expected of them.

It is important that the leadership of the public service in Botswana distinguishes between those factors that contribute to a positive psychological contract and those that do not.  A positive psychological contract comes from feelings of fairness, trust and delivery which induce commitment to produce high value work.

There has been a growing tendency to draw attention to the legal contract between the employer and the employee in the public service. This tendency is visible in the fear mongering which is characterised by finger pointing and threats of dismissal which has become the new face of public management in the country.

The profession of human capital management was originally informed by the writings of Henri Fayol, Frederich Taylor and Marx Werber who promoted the 'one best way' of working'. The 'one best way' was about requiring employees to specialise in following rules set by management or carrying out the will of the 'rational legal authority'.

This enforcement approach influenced by Fayol, Taylor and Werber was relevant during the 19th century and indeed brought about production efficiency but it has ceased to be effective in today's knowledge based digital economy. Its remnants include bureaucracy which remains the number- one enemy to service excellence.

The Botswana public service is crying out for good leadership to restore trust and reconstruct the broken psychological contract which has been receiving severe battering when the legal contract took the forefront of public sector management a few years ago.

The ruthless efficiency required to enforce the legal contract has become a major preoccupation of Government enclave and this has inturn bred the curse of micro-management which is one of the fastest ways of bolstering dysfunctional organisations.

At the early stages, the focus on 'law enforcement' and the curse of 'micro -management' can energise people into action, thereby creating an impression that it is good practice, but it is not sustainable in the long term.

It is critical that public service managers learn that the sustainable productivity of their organisations or the performance of employees can no longer be extracted by shame guilt and fear which undermine the Dignity of the 'worker.' When workers are treated like cogs in a machine and are programmed to comply without thinking, they gravitate into obselescence.

It is critical that after planning, we measure the level of readiness of our organisations to successfully implement the plans. Plans and projects are implemented by people and unless people have the competencies required, there will always be a gap between what is desired and what obtains in reality. Trust and fairness are the bonds that create a positive psychological contract and enable employees to offer 'discretionary performance' which they can not be forced to, through a law enforcement approach.

There is a need to develop a much more connected and citizen-focused view of public service performance. Taking the customer perspective is critical in providing the right public sector services in a cost-effective manner. It is also important that we move away from viewing the management of performance as a compliance exercise or a risk to be avoided or minimised.

To effectively discharge its mandate, the public service must recognise that it depends on its human capital, thus public officers, especially those in leadership positions, need to ponder their own contribution to the performance of their organisations. After the pondering, they should commit to selflessly deliver high quality services to advance the developmental agenda of the nation. This is not romantic talk but a pragmatic message that should be implanted into the hearts and minds of public officers. Leaders in the public service must become activists in growing 'thinking performers' who consciously seek to contribute to advancing the mandate of their organisation.

Most will agree that the majority of public officers did initially bring their thinking capability to the world of work some time in the past but most can not remember when last they exercised thinking to pursue and accomplish work results. Public officers should become  'thinking performers' by not only adhering to high standards of service delivery but thinking outside the box and continuosuly challenging the way in which things are done in order to find innovative solutions to meet work requirements.

As 'thinking performers', public officers should keep in touch with citizens or other stakeholders through purposeful networking in order to understand public needs. Without understanding the situation of citizens and stakeholderrs, the public service cannot effectively enhance its level of preparedness and readiness to deliver on the obligations to meet those needs. Knowledge of customers enables the performer to think of service improvements that can advance the social and economic situation of the country and its people.

A 'thinking performer' is contrasted in the literature (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development) to a 'wish-list dreamer' - who is a thinking non-performer who may have ideas but does not act to turn them into reality; or an 'automated bureaucrat' - who is a non-thinking performer who does only what they are told and nothing more;  or a 'lifetime liability' - who is an employee who neither performs nor thinks. Now ponder that as an individual!

Our leadership needs to know that the country's developmental agenda does not need 'automated bureaucrats' who do what they are told and nothing more. Neither can the country be moved forward by 'wish-list dreamers' or even by 'lifetime liabilities'.

Thinking and performance go together. French philosopher, Rene Descartes once said: 'Corgito ergo sum' or 'I think, therefore I am'. He also cautioned that 'Common sense is the most fairly distributed thing in the world, for each one thinks he is so well-endowed with it that even those who are hardest to satisfy in all other matters are not in the habit of desiring more of it than they already have.'

I call upon the public service to embrace the concept of the 'thinking performer' and enlist the hearts and minds of employees so that they strive for continuous improvement in service quality and efficiency.

Some studies have revealed that there are fundamentally three groups of employees: a minority (about 20 %)  that is engaged, loyal, productive and committed;  the majority  (about 60 %) who are non-engaged, but perform the minimum required work whilst lacking emotional bonding to the organisation; and another minority (about 20 %)  that is actively disengaged or physically present but psychologically absent.

The public service must introduce annual engagement surveys and use the results to put in place interventions for rainsing engagement levels rather than continue to breed fear.

In addition, there must be a barometer to measure the level of adherence to professionalism or the extent to which public servants have embraced the values of transparency, deligence, loyalty and others.

By engaging in selfless performance, public servants would foster public trust and create an environment enabling the prosperity of individuals, families, organisations and the economy as a whole. It is the desire of citizens of this country to be given high value services that make them stronger and more capable of living more enriched lives.

This would only remain a pipe dream unless we grow integrity and professionalism in service delivery and enable the blosoming of strategic leadership.

The public service needs to shift from a focus on architectural improvements and integrate human capital development into the core of reform. Yes, we need to maintain and innovate the systems we have deployed to deliver public services, but equally, we need to ensure the people understand and play their role in the system.

It is not just Botswana that has undergone transformation from desert to a prosperous nation. History has recorded human progress from the age of stone implements to one of digital technology.

The country continues to journey on its developmental path and has implemented various reform initiatives which have delivered good results, including improving the public service's contribution to the economy. However, let us not decieve ourselves, the results of such iniatiatives are mixed with scope for improvement in many public sector organisations.

Alongside public service reform, we have over the past few years witnessed an upsurge in a scary culture of fear in the public service characterised by overzealous obsession with threats of sanction as a way of communicating citizen expectations and facilitating new ways of service delivery.  Whilst there should be no hesitation in taking corrective action in situations where performance does not meet national standards, let correction be targeted at performance and not against people and their dignity. Corrective action should be done within a framework of positive discipline which allows people to grow and develop in a learning environment - an environment that allows them to make mistakes in search of creativity and innovation.

The public service must put in place stronger levers to drive improved productivity and efficiency. On top of everything it must build a resilient leadership capital across all levels to give meaning and purpose to work. A writer by the name of Studs Terkel once observed that: "Work is about daily meaning as well as daily bread; for recognition as well as cash; for a sort of life rather than, Monday-through-Friday sort of dying. We have the right to ask of work that it include meaning, recognition, astonishment and life".

Public sector performance is a vital issue which should continue to be prioritised if Government is committed to increasing the standard of living of Batswana. It carries significant economic implications with far reaching impacts not just for the wider economy but on the daily lives of Batswana.

The blunt reality is that poor performance is costly. Good performance not just saves money, but lays a solid foundation for our future. Public officers have an obligation to keep the public sector honest about its performance as well as keep themselves and the system accountable. There is need to keep challenging the thinking of public officers about whether you are using system levers to their full potential.

Finally, public servants should continue to give free and frank advice to the political leadership and do so in a persuasive way. They should assist decision-making by identifying the key decisions that need to be made whilst providing what the evidence tells you, including what possible options exist and what the political leadership should do, in their best professional judgment.

* Jowitt Mbongwe is a former journalist and currently a leading managemnt consultant in the areas of strategy, organisation development, change management and human capital strategy.You can call him at 3935758 - Global Consult.