HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT IN THE EDUCATION AND HEALTH SECTORS IN BOTSWANA Naomi Patiko 201504165 Tsholofelo Luza 201504192 University of Botswana Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences ECO 463ABSTRACTHealth and education sectors are one of the primary aspects of development.
There cannot be attainability of sustainable economic development without extensive investment in human resource. Education enriches people’s understanding of themselves and the world while health improves the quality of their lives which leads to a comprehensive social benefit to individuals and society. They raise people’s productivity and creativity which promotes entrepreneurship and technological advances. Furthermore, they play a very critical role in securing economic and social progress thereby improving income distribution.KEYWORDS; Health, education, sector, human resource development and BotswanaINTRODUCTIONThis paper intends on highlighting the various causes of the insignificant growth in the health and education sector although a significant amount of funds is pumped in these sectors, it will also show the importance of the human resource development on the health and education sector to the socio- economic growth of Botswana. The paper will also focus on the various strategies that can be set into motion to rectify the issue of minimal development under the education and health sector.
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Human resource development should always be performance related, it’s goals should be aimed at improving the organization, individual and team performance, ‘Human resource development is concerned with the provision of learning, development and training opportunities to improve individual, team and organization performance’ CITATION Mic03 l 7177 (Armstrong, 2003). Human resource development is an interrelated process, integrated to organizational strategic goals, human resource management strategy and other strategies. All employees in the organization should be encouraged to learn, train and develop their skills and knowledge to their maximum capability, the organizations should also provide the opportunities and facilities for learning and development.
BACKGROUNDThe Botswana health system is made up of private for profit, private for nonprofit, public and traditional medicine practices. Formulation of policies, regulation, standards and guidelines for health services is determined by the ministry of health. The ministry of health is the major employer of health care workers CITATION Oat17 l 7177 (nkomazana, 2017). Health care system in Botswana is delivered through a decentralized model, primary health care is the pillar of the delivery system. There are three referral hospitals, seven district hospitals, 14 primary hospitals, 265 primary care clinics, 343 health posts and 861 mobile stops. The average life expectancy was 65 years in 2015 as compared to 54 years in 2001.The infant mortality rate in Botswana was 35 in 2015which shows a decline from 42 in 1990.
Botswana was ranked 55 out of 193 countries in the world child mortality rate in 2015.Education in Botswana is free and is provided by public schools and private schools. It is regulated by the ministry of education and skills development. Secondary education is neither free nor compulsory. There are also many private and public institutions of higher education.
Botswana has made great strides in education since independence with more people going to university.Botswana’s HDI value for 2017 is 0.717 positioning it at 101 out of 189 countries, the value has increased from 0.581 to 0.717 which puts Botswana in the high development category.
CITATION UN18 l 1033 (UN, 2018)The human development index is a summary of average achievement in key dimensions of human development. It is used to determine whether the country is developed.CHALLENGES FACING HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT IN BOTSWANAThe government of Botswana has invested a lot of money in the education and health sectors for so many years. However, there has been very little improvement in the human resource development of these areas. Botswana is facing major challenges when it comes to human resource development.
This section focuses on the possible causes of this stagnant growth of the human resource development in the health and education sectors.Lack of motivationThe health and education sector are dominated by the government and due to the bureaucratic administrative nature of government led organizations, it could be frustrating for public employees to realize their potential and work to their maximum capability. As a result, this could cause employees to have low morale or diminishing motivation to improve their skills and knowledge. For example, in Botswana public servants can go to a university to learn a specific course as a form of human resource development and normally it can take years before an individual’s request to go for this kind of human resource development. As such, employees end up not bothering to show interest or even request to go for these training and development courses.
With respect to that, motivation can be defined as the established forces that initiate, direct and make people persist in their efforts to accomplish a goal. Another cause of the lack of motivation is the low wages and benefits, the health and education are necessary and demanding sectors to be employed under but ironically the employees are underpaid. This fact is proven by the basic education teachers strike on 2008.
The primary and secondary teachers went on strike demanding their salaries to be increased by 12%; the strike took months before it ended. The resolution was a 3% and 4% increase which took years until it was implemented, the results were rapidly declining passing rate of students.Lack of accountabilityThe health and education sectors are prevailed by lack of accountability, the only form of accounting they have in place is appraisals which are ineffective and inefficient.
Under these sectors, the employees are not accountable to the public in case of negligence and poor performance. They only must account to a board of directors or their supervisors who are not directly impacted by the actions of these individuals, normally the people or public are given a diplomatic explanation which is usually ineffective, and these employees rarely get the maximum possible punishment for their incompetence. As a result, they end up not being inclined to improve their skills and knowledge because they still have their assurance and security of their jobs even if their lacking. IncompetenceThe Botswana qualifications authority has put up measures to ensure that students or schools offer courses that are accredited and demanded by the labour market but still their efforts are not enough. There is a mismatch of skills in the labour market and hence the high levels of unemployment in the country, the structure of the education is not evolving it takes too long to adapt to evolving world of both technology and business. Most students don’t have the competency to perform well in the workplace merely because they are poorly equipped to create their own employment and be productive because they are unable to relate the school curriculum to real life CITATION sun16 l 7177 (standard, 2016). There is too much theoretical than practical programmes being taught in schools which make students or graduates unemployable, employers are looking dynamic, creative and talented people who can take their organisation to the next level and compete globally.
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENTThe main purpose of human resource development is to make better employees by strengthening knowledge, skills and abilities that they already have. Human resource development is a necessary tool for economic growth and developmentDevelops competency in employeesIt leads to increased productivity as workers will be more efficient and therefore the organisation will run smoothly. It leads to development of skills, there is a need to invest heavily in human resource development because as a developing economy there are issues of excess labour supply and a shortage of highly trained and skilled personnel especially in the health sector.Creates Opportunity for Career Development Career development is described in terms of fit between individual and organizational goals, noting that career development focuses on the alignment of individual subjective career aspect and objective career aspect of the organization to achieve the best fit between individual and organizational needs as well as career roles CITATION Mar14 l 1033 (Dijk, 2014). It is important because there is a rapid increase of uncertainty in the labor market which has left people guessing about their employment security and it also gives employees a source identity.
Instrumental to employee commitment and job satisfactionJob satisfaction is important because a person’s attitude can affect their work commitment. Human resource development can increase employee commitment and job satisfaction which leads to higher productivity and lower turnover resulting in higher revenue. When employees feel that the organization has their best interest at heart, they often support its mission and work harder to achieve its objectives. Therefore, employee commitment and job satisfaction will be increased.It is a tool for economic development.Economic development is the growth of the standard of living of a nation’s people from a low income economy to a high income economy. When the local quality of life is improved, there is more economic development.
Human resource development in education and health sectors is critical for a country to achieve sustainable economic development because the health sectors improves the mental and physical wellbeing of people. An excellent mental and physical fitness is a required and key feature in order to have an efficient and effective human capital. Education deals with systematically giving instructions to people in order to enlighten them and equip them with the necessary and required knowledge and skills to contribute to economic development. As such health and education sectors lead to increased productivity which contributes to the country’s GDP per capita which ultimately leads to economic growth.RECOMMENDATIONSAlthough Botswana has made great strides in the progress of education, the skills acquired by the graduates are not adequate to meet the needs of employers.
Botswana is currently facing high unemployment rate among the youth which is around 35% hence there is a need for improving the quality of education and access to job training that will equip workers with diverse skills that would make them employable and increase productivity hence fostering economic growth. It is very crucial to also improve the quality of basic education especially of those schools that are not performing well in some rural areas of the countryThe government should try to increase access to job training programs that will lead to a reduction in the skills gap in Botswana .Recently there is the internship programme but it’s not able to accommodate all graduates in Botswana hence there is a need for more similar programs.Policies should also be implemented to ensure that the vocational training institutions collaborate with tertiary institutions and research institutions to promote science and technology Botswana is faced with a shortage of healthcare workers, which is worse in primary healthcare. The government should train health workers adequately and distribute them equitable all over the country, incentives could be given to encourage them to go work in rural and remote areas.
There are high levels of low job satisfaction and low levels of motivation among health care workers the fore there is a need for organisational transformation with the focus on staff and leadership development in all levels in the health sector in Botswana. CITATION Oat17 l 7177 (nkomazana, 2017)Training; Training strategies that have been found to be effective in the recruitment and retention of health workers in public health system and rural areas include rural origin of students, training in rural areas.Mentoring and coachingMentoring is a formal or informal work related relationship between a person of lesser experience and a person of greater experience. The mentee is commonly mentored for bigger roles, or to share experience with employees in new roles or who are new to the organisation. It facilitates a junior’s professional development and used on young professionals with high career aspirations. Some researchers have indicated that informal mentorship programs are more effective than formal mentorship programs. It is important to establish mentoring in the health and education sector because it enhances the mentee’s career advancement, it also provide visibility in the organization.
Coaching is the structured activities between a coach and a coachee to assist a coachee to learn more and to facilitate performance at work. The role of coaches is to help the people they are coaching to identify their goals, ways to achieve these goals and also to give feedback to those they are coaching. Mentoring and coaching are important to the health and education sectors because this can help boost the employee’s confidence and in the case of the mentor or coach a sense of power and authority which can increase productivity since there is someone following in their footsteps.
It is also important for the mentee because it can give them a sense of belonging and they always have someone on their side especially when the individual is a new recruit or transferred to a new location. It can also help boost subordinate- supervisor relationship which will inevitably increase productivity hence development of the human resource development in the health and education sector. CONCLUSIONThe government of Botswana has invested a lot of money in the education and health sectors for so many years. However, there has been very little improvement in the human resource development of these sectors, according to the human development index for the past 27 years Botswana has only managed to incur a 23.3% increase in its human resource development. Botswana is facing major challenges when it comes to human resource development which include lack motivation, lack of accountability and incompetence.
There is a great need for the health and education sectors to have an effective and efficiently functioning human resource development because it develops competency in employees, it creates opportunity for career development and also instrumental to employing commitment and job satisfaction. Bibliography BIBLIOGRAPHY Armstrong, M. (2003). handbook of human resource management. Dijk, M.
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