Head of service calls for strategic approach to civil service operations for growth

The Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Folashade Yemi-Esan, has called for a strategic approach to civil service operations, to ensure sustainable growth in Nigeria.

Yemi-Esan said this in her keynote address on Saturday night, at the official launch of a book entitled: “Agents of change: the transformational journey of such a one” authored by Dr Olusegun Olasode, in Abuja.

She described the book as inspirational, saying that to elicit change effectively in Nigeria was a peculiar task, but one that compatriots must do, because the civil service was the nation’s engine room.

According to her, the civil service in Nigeria occupied a strategic position and ”if we cannot get it right in the civil service, then I do not know how Nigeria would survive”.

“I believe that we must institute systems structured that will last forever in Nigeria. Systems that even if we do not know are not there, the system will run itself and give us the desired effect.

“Whatever we are doing without a strategy we cannot win; although in Nigeria we have this saying that we are very good at developing policies, we are very good at developing visions.

“Our mission anywhere in the world, we are the best, but how do we implement all those things?

“The onus is on us as civil servants to ensure that the vision of the administration becomes our agenda, as a reality in our own time”, the head of service said.

She reiterated the need for a strategic approach in the civil service, while urging Nigerians to draw lessons from the book as agents of change, to promote national growth.

The author, Olasode said that book was centred on teaching the reader to recognise whether he or she had the capacity to make positive change happen, irrespective of levels and forms.

It may not be just to become president, governor or director of a company, but in every little space we could be agents to make something better.

“We all have talent, ability and gifts; we must apply them in the right way; we have better leaders who are younger than we the older ones.

“It is not about age, it is not about degree, it is about someone who has vision; leadership and strategy which must work together to make positive change happen.

“Every leader lays out their vision, but what the book talks about is to make that vision happen and what strategy they should adopt, to make that vision a reality,” Olasode said.

He further stressed the need to mentor young people at the early stages of their lives, so as to promote positive change in the country.

A clergyman, Pastor Kunle Shoyele, commended Olasode for publishing the book, saying that it would be a blessing to the world, citing portions of the Holy Bible to urge Nigerians to always seek divine wisdom to overcome situations.

“People have to be in charge, even when we do not have what it takes to be in charge. As long as it is good to be in charge or be in control, desire what it takes to be in charge.

“It takes wisdom, power and knowledge, to know what to do to be in charge,” Shoyele said.

The 132-page book centred primarily on discovering one’s potentials as agent of change.