IMPROVING LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT EFFECTIVENESS: THE ROLE OF LEGISLATION

1
IMPROVING LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT
EFFECTIVENESS THE ROLE OF LEGISLATION

• By Adv. Shirley Misser
• Presentation to the SMS Conference
• Cape Town
• 14 September 2007

2
1. Key Relationships Explored

• Leadership and management The role played by
  legislation in governing this relationship.
• Administration and the imperatives of the
  developmental state.
• The legal pillar and leadership/management
  debate.
• The transformational pillar and leadership.
• The psychological pillar and leadership.

3
What is Public Administration?

• Cora Hoexter the organs and functionaries of
  the executive branch of the state that are
  concerned with the day to day business of
  implementing law and administering policy.
• Close relationship urgency in delivering
  against an agenda that is transformational,
  developmental and democratic.
• In delivering need leader-managers, push the
  limits of possibilities within the law.
• Legislation, enabling, not an excuse for slow
  service delivery.

4
How legal compliance is viewed?
5
Adhering to Public Administration Principles

• ALL Constitutional principles for public
  administration must be adhered to.
• The human factor is pivotal compliance required
  that is also timeous, service delivery oriented.
• The developmental state activist and
  interventionist must be mirrored in the
  leader-manager.

6
2. Leadership and/or Management?

• Managers must be conversant with the applicable
  legislation so as to lead and direct.
• Management largely maintenance, necessary but
  not sufficient to optimise the developmental
  state.
• Need to move away from the uses of red tape over
  smart tape, locked in the mould of the old .
• Leadership more visionary and exploratory,
  necessary to support the developmental state,
  takes calculated risks, advances service delivery.

7
3. The Legal Basis

• Direct statutory framework
• - Public Service Act, 1994
• - Public Service Regulations, 2001
• - Collective agreements
• - Directives issued by the Minister of the
  DPSA

8
Macro Legislative Framework

• Section 195 of Constitution, sets basic values
  and principles
• Promotion of Access to Information Act, 2000
• Promotion of Administrative Justice Act, 2000
• Compensation for Occupational Injuries and
  Diseases Act, 1993
• Unemployment Insurance Act, 2001
• Public Service Commission Act, 1997
• Employment Equity Act, 1998
• Basic Conditions of Employment Act, 1997
• Skills Development Act, 1998
• Skills Development Levies Act, 1999
• Occupational Health and Safety Act, 1993
• Government Employees Pension Law, 1996
• Public Finance Management Act, 1999
• The Immigration Act, 2002
• (This list is not exhaustive)

9
Implementing Key Legislation

• Being able to implement these Acts are
  important, often implementation is weak shown by
  reviews from the PSC, Auditor-General.
• Problems rooted in many areas may be an
  unwillingness to comply, experience levels are
  thin due to high staff mobility, and poor ME
  systems.
• Procedural irregularities, shown in increased
  litigation against the state.
• Points to weak quasi-judicial skills amongst
  managers.

10
Constitutionally Mandated Legislation

• The Promotion of Administrative Justice Act,
  2000, is considered as one of the most
  transformational piece of Legislation.
• It puts the spotlight on fairness, justice,
  transparency and accountability.
• Allows for redress and checks abuse of power.
• Central to advancing the goals of the
  developmental state.
• Helps in the shift from management prerogative to
  management accountability.

11
PAJA and the Developmental State

• Critical to the functioning of the developmental
  state (DS) since
• It is premised on good governance, implies
  transparency, accountability and the
• right to redress.
• The DS expects innovative leadership, with
  decision-making subject to due process, review.
• The DS is people-oriented decisions need to
  empower, not act against, goes to the PAIA.
• DS is dynamic decisions can be challenged and
  the quality thereof improved.

12
What PAJA Requires?

• Clearly PAJA compliance is weak, as shown by
  various studies.
• Shift towards PAJA requires a fundamental change
  in how managers operate, enshrined in section 33
  of the Constitution.
• Government is expected to be citizen-centred.
• Constitution affords rights through the Bill of
  Rights, PAJA allows for the state to be
  challenged.

13
The Promotion of Access to Information Act

• Also poor compliance, appears that there is a
  persistence of the secretive society.
• In a functional democracy very little is
  top-secret, records can be called for scrutiny.
• Managers need to embrace this change and create
  transparent working conditions conducive to
  critique.
• These constitutional principles are echoed in the
  Batho Pele.

14
Batho Pele

• Behavioural Requirements
• Consultation
• (- the right to make representation)
• Information
• (- notice of the constitutional right to be
  given written reasons and
• - the right to appeal and review)
• Openness and transparency
• (- prior notice of admin action)
• Redress
• (- provide reason for admin decisions)

15
SUPPORTIVE RELATIONSHIPS PAJA, DEVELOPMENTAL
STATE, MANAGEMENT AND GOOD GOVERNANCE
16
4. Transformational Pillar

• Imperative that managers recognise their role in
  driving transformational policies of the country.
• Requires an involved, rather than detached,
  so-called professional approach.
• Management training must be contextualised to
  capture the transformational imperatives such as
  the 9 Constitutional Principles, PAIA, PAJA, the
  Employment Equity Act and Batho Pele Prnciples.

17
The basis of change SMS
18
5. Psychological Basis

• Often regarded as the most difficult shift as
  the new seems to have comfortably slipped into
  the mould of the old.
• Autocratic leadership style has to be replaced by
  a visionary, participatory one.
• Management style that is purely focused on
  compliance, without any appreciation for the
  importance of this compliance is limited.

19
5. Psychological Basis cont.

• Within the legal framework there is space for
  risk-taking and innovation, provided that these
  advance the goals of the developmental state.
• Need to be conversant with quasi-financial and
  quasi-judicial issues, as well as governance
  imperatives.

20
6. Conclusion and Way Forward

• Senior managers are expected to display more
  leadership, whilst also showing management
  competence.
• Excuses for delays in service delivery, blaming
  legal processes, cannot be entertained.
• Leader-Manager must show a high degree of
  activism, interventionism and creativity.
• Both formal and experiential skills are required.
• Need to reduce the high mobility that exists, as
  it prevents organisational learning and
  institutional memory from being developed.

21

• THANK YOU