Good day to you all after what may have been a restful long weekend for the majority of us who were able to commemorate the International Labour Day. I trust it was restful and also gave you sufficient time to attend to personal time with loved ones.
It is almost serendipitous that I get to pen this article this week. I hold this belief for two reasons, the first one being the dark cloud being cast by the almost incessant coverage of geo-political tensions being brought to our living rooms on the plight of the modern-day worker; second being the commemoration of World Press Freedom Day. I salute all of those hard-working individuals in media rooms for their tireless efforts to be the instrument of advocating for plurality of ideas as crucial members of civil society. This is an often misunderstood and demonised profession. Lucius Seneca, a famous Stoic philosopher, once made the assertion that we often suffer more in our heads than in reality. This fraternity brings this narrative into context.
I have been pondering why Botswana has not been able to capitalise on its efforts to be the Shared Services’ Hub for Southern Africa. One must remember that foreign direct investment into any economy is either looking for efficiencies (allocative and productive), population (market), and resources (human and natural). In our previous attempts to create viable economic growth in sub-sectors of management and consultancy services, we have seen some flight of jobs to other markets due to issues that one may want to attribute to efficiencies of scale.
Countries like India, South Africa, Kenya and others in the emerging world have come into their own in attracting sub-contracting services for multinationals in the provision of services not limited to contact centres specialising in collection and recoveries, sales and after-sales activities, development work on coding for applications, specialist hubs offering cyber security, knowledge management and data centres, as well as group or specialised management clusters that provide strategic oversight for other subsidiaries across the continent. The economic impact of these services has seen some of these economies sustain their demand for skilled manpower.
Why Botswana? Why Now? Botswana has previously been applauded for having the ‘right stuff’ to serve as such a hub in terms of having a highly skilled population that speaks with the right tonality and diction to service the developing world. Our relative cultural homogeneity and hundred-to-one shot probability for suffering civil unrest which could upset institutional investors have also been a key selling point. This is a big plus for service availability for those wishing to relocate their shared services.
We also have a friendlier labour movement compared to other areas and regions as demonstrated by the recent violent protests in Paris, France. This is also coupled with a relatively stable Internet service countrywide with a lesser impact on the power crises and a higher likelihood of natural disasters that run amok in other regions.
I believe this is a strategy that needs to be revisited to ensure the long-run financial sustainability of skills transfer and technology permeation and diffusion in our country. Any strategy looking to secure jobs globally will be impeded if we adopt a silo mentality towards implementation. This will therefore require collaborative efforts through Public-Private Partnerships between industry, government and multilateral trade organisations.
About Me
Montwedi ‘Monty’ Bakwena is a Digital Transformation Professional focusing on customer experience strategy, digital operations integration, channel migration, and public-private partnerships.
montwedibakwena@changemasters.co.bw
info@changemasters.co.bw
WhatsApp: +26774987072
@LinkedIn _Montwedi Bakwena
