Lagos moves to minimise waste in public service

L-R: Mr. Lekan Okediji, Mrs Tope Akomolafe, Dr. Benson Oke and Mr. Aruna Ayodeji in group picture during the training on Tuesday.

The Lagos State Government has moved to minimise waste, error and increase productivity in public service by engaging civil servants on ISO International standard training.

Speaking at a three-day specialized training for civil servants on Tuesday in Ikeja, Lagos, Southwest Nigeria, Commissioner for Establishments, Training and Pensions, Dr. Benson Oke said the ISO International Standard ensured that products and services were safe, reliable and of good quality.

“For business and government, they are strategic tools that reduce costs by minimizing waste and error and increasing productivity. They help government to access new markets, level the playing field for developing countries and facilitate free and fair global trade.

“In this era of severe global financial constraints, there is an urgent need for government to be shrewd and methodical in expending public funds. By directing its energy on the tripod, the Ambode administration has demonstrated that investments in certain critical public sectors could have a multiplying effect on a whole wide range of other areas,” he explained.

According to Oke, the objective of the specialized training, with the theme: “Adapting to Change, Efficient Resource Planning and Scheduling, Panacea for Optimised Public Service Delivery,” was to leverage on a deep understanding that public service delivery was more than just about ‘bottom line.”

“The course will use service improvement techniques used by large global corporations to show how they can be used and add real value in the public sector,” he said.

He said the course would show what excellent public services of the future could and should be like, helping those who were policy makers in government ministries, local government and devolved institutions, focus on what they should be planning and developing.

Oke stated that the specialized courses had been tailored to suit the need of the public service to ensure that senior officers and policy makers across different levels of government could plan, introduce and evaluate the most up to date modernization thinking in service delivery, moving away from the notion that citizens were just passive receivers of services but could be part of the solution in transforming the frontline and driving down cost and waste.

The Consultant, Vitech Trainers, Lekan Okediji said the programme was meant to increase the efficiency of civil servants in service delivery, saying that any institution that failed to develop its human capacity, that institution was planning to fail.