An Introduction to Design Thinking

Advanced Public Finance Management focuses on how the public sector and its entities of various kinds make the best use of the vast resources entrusted to them in creating public value. Public sector accounting is a core body of knowledge supporting financial management. The purpose of this course is to impart public sector financial management skills necessary to function in public sector environments of low to medium complexity and low uncertainty. The course addresses governance and decision-making processes, government budgeting and planning, government financial reporting, financial analysis of government and not-for-profit programs, and public sector auditing.

Research has shown that regardless of level of staff, effective communication is a huge challenge. Problems emanate from whether what someone means is exactly what they communicate in their messages and whether what he/she exactly means in his/her communication is exactly what the receiver will hear. Often poor communication is a result of misalignment between the sender, messages being sent and what the receiver of the messages hears. This short course exposes participants to concepts of aligning the three critical aspects of communication, the sender, the message and the receiver, understanding barriers to effective communication and how to overcome them.

The primary objective of this training program is to equip participants with the necessary customer service skills and knowledge to provide exceptional customer experiences. By focusing on key areas such as effective communication, empathy, and problem-solving, the training will ensure that participants exhibit values of care to customers which in turn increases customer loyalty and satisfaction.

In an era where innovation is the cornerstone of progress: "Design Thinking" emerges as a pivotal methodology that transcends traditional problem-solving techniques. This interactive resource aims to introduce you to the world of Design Thinking (DT): a human-centred approach that combines creativity and analytical processes to tackle complex challenges and drive meaningful innovation.

The "Design Thinking Styles and Competencies" course aims to create well-rounded, proficient design thinkers who can navigate and address complex challenges with confidence and creativity. By understanding and embracing various design thinking styles and developing core competencies, participants will be better prepared to lead innovative initiatives and contribute to creating impactful, user-centered solutions in their respective fields.

The aim of Design thinking, a human-centred approach to problem-solving is to emphasise the importance of a human-centered mindset as the cornerstone of design thinking. By deeply understanding and prioritizing the needs, experiences, and emotions of those we design for, we can create more effective and meaningful solutions. Key components of this approach include fostering empathy, embracing diversity, and adopting an iterative problem-solving process. Through this course, students will learn to develop and apply these principles to drive innovative and user-focused outcomes.

The storage, maintenance, manipulation and security of data has become key to prompt, efficient and effective decision-making in organisations. The training focuses on exposing participants to IT related management of organisational information for effective and efficient operations.

Emotional intelligence relates to an ability to understand and control own emotions as well as understanding the emotional status of others. High EQ often translates into more effective leadership. “Researchers have shown that our success at work or in life depends on Emotional Intelligence 80% and only20% of intellect” (Cotras et al, 2012). Purposefully leveraging emotions for the collective smooth functioning and creation of a collaborative organisational culture is at the core of this training. It targets individuals who realise that building and maintaining positive relations with others is a pre-requisite towards enabling a suitable workplace culture and environment.

The aim of this course is to investigate and apply problem-solving techniques within the context of user-cantered design practice. Participants are equipped to harnesses inherent advantages of play, creativity, exploration, and expression to tackle significant business challenges, stimulate effective creative thinking, create solutions and adapting them to the current problems, develop ability to generate numerous diverse ideas and ultimately refine these into a single or select few ideas for prototyping, and examining a problem from six distinct perspectives, move beyond initial biases, encouraging exploration of diverse viewpoints.

On completion of the course, participants must show that they have a clear understanding of how the function Finance/Accounting plays in the running organisations. Executives are taught to analyse accounting information in order to make organisational planning and control decisions including contributing actively in matters concerning finance/accounting issues in their organisations. Whilst the course is not aimed at producing finance experts, it seeks to capacitate managers and leaders to be literate enough in Finance/Accounting to be able to make meaningful use of Finance/accounting information in their management and leadership endeavours in any other functional area and the general management arena.

The course gives participants detailed understanding of budget planning and preparation system to derive expenditure projections and to advise policymakers on the feasibility and desirability of specific budget proposals, from a macroeconomic or microeconomic perspective. It’s easier to control expenditures at the "upstream" point of budget preparation than later during the execution. Budgeting individuals determine where they want to be, how they expect to get there, and whether they can reach goals with resources they command. No individual or organisation has unlimited resources so budgeting increases the probability of achieving goals. This course ensures managers are equipped with such skills.

All managers are HR managers by virtue of them dealing with people to accomplish collective organisational goals. Even organisations with fully fledged HR departments, the ultimate responsibility for effective delivery of tasks lies with line managers. Gaining basic knowledge and skills on the best practices, procedures and processes when dealing with employees not only complements the efforts of HR departments but also creates workplace environments where employees contribute effectively to goals, feel recognized for their contributions, see opportunities for growth and work towards a collective vision. The short course also benefits organisations that do not have fully fledged HR functions.

To a greater extent, the success of any organisation dependent upon effectiveness of its leadership. The primary function of leaders is to ensure that the vision, goals and objectives of an organisation are accomplished. Accomplishment of organisational goals is thus dependent on the type, style and abilities of leaders in leading their teams effectively, efficiently and sustainably. This short course is designed to capacitate leaders with contemporary knowledge, insights and skills necessary to lead their teams towards accomplishment of organisational goals.

The role of front office personnel, secretaries, personal assistants and office managers has transformed over the years calling for acquisition of modern office management skills to give optimum support services to other organisational functionaries. The training exposes participants to modern office practice and computer skills in order to effectively and efficiently deliver results.

The need for proper handling of workplace disciplinary issues is paramount for employers to minimise or completely avoid employment lawsuits emanating from appeals against disciplinary hearing verdicts or decisions. Proper handling of disciplinary issues at the workplace also promote fairness, justice and trust between employees and employers when substantive and procedural fairness are practised and adhered to when administering disciplinary processes. The short training course targets mainly workplace disciplinary officials, disciplinary committee members and establishment-based appeals committee members, workers and works council committee members and individuals seeking to acquire and refine their skills when handling disciplinary issues at the workplace.

The need for safeguarding in organisations or institutions, Non-Governmental Organisations, Community-Based Organisations or Civil Society in general cannot be overemphasized. Safeguarding issues are increasingly becoming mandatory as pressure mounts on institutions to ensure measures are in place to prevent sexual harassment, abuse and exploitation. Across the globe, every organisation needs a safeguarding policy and employees/staff/management should be knowledgeable on what safeguarding is, what needs to be done to ensure safe environment for all, and last but not least, develop knowledge of how to design a safeguarding policy and how to implement it effectively. This is the thrust behind this course.

This Supervisory Development Programme (SDP) is designed to prepare and support new and existing supervisory staff to acquire and put into practice proficiencies that promote an engaged, highly productive and innovative workforce. Running for 7 days spread over 6 months, the SDP is a highly interactive learning programme bringing together theory and practice, contextual conversations on essential supervisory approaches, skills and knowledge including application of learned concepts at the workplace.