It is a matter of public record that public health services in South Africa are facing challenges. Frequently one will hear of shortages of doctors, nurses and other health professionals. The shortage of clinical staff is advanced most often as an important cause of these challenges. In addition, the reason advanced for the predicament is that public health services are underfunded reflecting the constrained financial environment in which this country finds itself. While all of this is indeed correct, a factor that is largely ignored is that as a consequence clinical posts are prioritised over what are regarded as less essential non-clinical posts. Again while this appears to be a…
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Elon Musk and management lessons
I have recently finished reading the 2023 biography of one of the most controversial people of our time, Elon Musk. Hated by many and loved by others but a person about whom very few have neutral feelings. His support for President Trump, notwithstanding their recent fallout, and his outspoken dislike of what he perceives as “woke” has heightened the dislike of many for Musk. To an extent, this has overshadowed his significant and wide ranging achievements from Tesla which has pioneered electric vehicles to SpaceX and Starlink which have eclipsed in many respects the National American Space Agency (NASA) and other communication networks. The biography highlights the complex nature of…
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Oversight and governance versus Management
Recently pronouncements by both the Minister responsible for electricity within the national cabinet and the chairperson on the Eskom Board drew to my attention the differences between oversight, governance and management. In both cases they appeared to make statements that in my initial thoughts belonged with management rather than a politician and a board chairperson. It is often a sensitive issue when management is faced with a managerial politician or a board that seeks to take management decisions. Eskom, in South Africa, is a State owned entity (SOE) (also defined in the the Public Finance Management Act as a Major Public entity) that provides almost exclusively the electricity that powers the national…
