Business leadership principles vital to corporate governance- Lagos Commissioner

Lagos State commissioner for Establishments, Training and Pensions, Dr. Akintola Benson-Oke says integrating contemporary business leadership principles into the corporate governance model of the Lagos State civil service was crucial for optimum performance.

He said the current administration is targeting making public servants in the state globally competitive hence the need for training and retraining.

According to Oke, this is the only way by which the state government can build capacity for efficient service delivery, noting that the days are gone when the public would accept anything from the government.

“We must be challenged to aspire to the high standards of governance that the citizens expect from the government,” Oke said, adding that as the ones responsible for the formulation and execution of the government policies, the officers of the state civil service were expected to open their minds to new ideas.

The Commissioner, who spoke at a two-day training session for different categories of the state workers, with the theme “integrating contemporary business leadership into the corporate governance model of the Lagos State civil service’, Thursday, in Lagos, said the public was increasingly craving for satisfaction, which should not be taken for granted.

He said the goal of the State government was to satisfy the citizens by closing the knowledge gap, hence the continuous training of the civil servants to put them on better pedestal to rightly inform and guide the public about the processes in governance.

“By providing the citizens with the information they need on how to process a request in an easy-to-use resource, the citizens can adequately prepare to complete their transactions and the processes in one visit. Officials are to ensure that the citizens have a positive experience interacting with the government.

Providing the citizens with information regarding government budgets, for example, can contribute to constituents feeling that they are part of a community development process, and as such, cultivate citizen buy-in,” said the commissioner.

Benjamin Omoike