Healing an Organization: High Performance Lessons from Africa 1 (original) (raw)

What nations do business executives visit for insights about how water utility performance can be improved? What company might provide lessons and encouragement for managers? This short article describes how managers at the National Water and Sewerage Company of Uganda (NWSC) were successful in healing an organization that had become fragmented, un-focused, and unproductive. The key lesson is that while no single prescription exists for transforming a corporation, the basic ingredients are well known: thoughtful leadership, careful measurement, performance benchmarking e, open communication channels, strong incentive programs, and well-designed implementation strategies. These components do not always characterize stateowned enterprises, yet they are essential if the Millennium Development Goals for water coverage are to be achieved. Proverbs from Africa are used to reinforce some of the principles for reforming water utilities in developing nations. A person who never travels, believes his mother's cooking is the best in the world. (Kiganda). We need to travel further from home more often. Those who have grown up in wealthy nations cannot fully appreciate the challenges faced by institutions emerging from turmoil. Yet the same organizational sicknesses that have promoted inefficiency, bureaucracy, and complacency in Africa also infect businesses in the developed world-the difference is only a matter of degree. While the business strategies that are improving corporate performance in Africa are the same as those that make a difference in OECD nations, the dramatic impacts serve to highlight the universal elements of sound strategy. Reviewing the steps for healing sick organizations in dire circumstances provides both lessons and inspiration for those attempting to transform enterprises within countries at any stage of development. What can the developed world learn from Africa? First, Africa is not what the press characterizes as the continent of despots, disease, disaster, and despair. It is undergoing a transformation, as Charlayne Hunter-Gault (2006) states in her book, New News Out of Africa: Uncovering Africa's Renaissance. She identifies the political and social changes unleashed by a new generation of leaders. The purpose of this short article is to describe the parallel economic transformations engineered by new business leaders-highlighted by proverbs that capture insights from the region's oral cultures. In an era when globalization is driving