Women in Finance and Entrepreneurship Series

On the 16th August 2023 which was the 3rd week of our webinar series we were joined by Aneesa Safi, Tsholofelo Molise and Nombulelo Nyathela. The ladies shared their insights on the public sector; the challenges, the positives and how best to combat the challenges.

Background of the Speakers

Nombulelo Nyathela is Chief Director responsible for External Relations and Communications at Infrastructure. Her responsibilities include coordinating and managing the overall stakeholder and international relations programme for Infrastructure South Africa as well as communication, brand and reputation management of the organisation. 

Aneesa Safi is the Head of Audit – Group Functions and COE’s at Standard Bank. Has experience in the public sector space as a Finance Management intern and subsequently joined internal audit department of SOEs.

Tsholofelo Molise is a Chief Audit Executive at Dr. Ruth Segomotsi Mompati District municipality responsible for 3 local municipalities and the district municipality; has over 15 years’ experience in the Public Sector and is the deputy chairperson of Chartered Institute of Audit, Governance, Oversight and Leadership in the Northwest Province.

Lessons Learnt

The Public sector is a big employer in the country and one of the major challenges to public sector management in South Africa is the decline in social values. Values such as integrity, honesty, dependability, fairness are gradually disappearing from the public service. The public sector has policies in place to counter the negatives however there needs to be a strong independent monitoring system in place. Good control system is only as strong as the people behind it, there is a need to recognise the role of Internal Audit and other stakeholders, i.e. whistleblowing lines become important in ensuring that continuous monitoring is conducted. 

To ensure accountability systems and to promote transparency, the following areas were identified by the speakers:

• PMS system: A proper management system assists in linking strategy to delivery, which assists in identifying any gaps and ensure timeous delivery of key performance areas. This also allows for effective consequence management.
• Consequence management: has been implemented for some time although it is not at an ideal level, there is room for improvement when it comes to monitoring and ensuring that reimbursements are made in cases where losses are suffered by public institutions due to negligence of public officials.
• Co-dependence on stakeholders: In the public space, there is a lot of co-dependence to ensure service delivery thus key performance areas of one department is linked to performance areas of another department. There needs to be a clear line between administrators and politicians. The message relayed by administrators should always be honest and reflective of status quo.
• Promote Transparency: Public institutions are in their nature transparent, so publications seek to speak to progress of the programmes and budgeting related to programmes, and this is available in websites and other public platforms. Transparency should be elevated to ensure that communication is available to all stakeholders as and when needed. Public sector in its form needs to be transparent all the time, information should be availed to stakeholders.
• Communication: Communicate what is true and real, that’s what makes the big difference between political leaders and administration, as honesty is required for service delivery.
• Public participation: Municipalities take their communities through its operational plan for the coming year as another tool to promote accountability and transparency. More is required to bring awareness to the public on how they can access available documents from Public Institutions.
• Being authentic and having purpose: Above and beyond the public policies and procedures put in place, it’s important for public officials to know themselves, their values and what they want, as these are major factors in ensuring they bring about positive change and not simply adopt the negative culture associated with the public sector.
• Urgency: There needs to be an increase in the urgency at how service is delivered, this is a lesson that the public sector can gain from the private sector. Infrastructure is an important component as it’s at the heart of service delivery.
• Policy Development: The political will does not coincide with current policies, in as much as awards need to be made to women-led organisations, the state cannot compromise on its integrity, as due process needs to be followed.

Although the public sector environment may be viewed in a negative light, it is responsibility of current women leaders to encourage young people to join and bring forth contributions and ultimately make the environment better. Women need to be able to take up leadership roles and to drive the change. Being bold about contributions in the workplace is very important. Affiliations with professional bodies that are there to regulate the public sector is also an important contributing factor to encourage positive participation.

The public sector landscape is different when one is participating in it from an audit level as one tends to critique on the inefficiencies when there are existing policies and procedures in place.