The keys to managing and leading people and firms in the new age

Story by: Monique Senekal
Editing by: Francis Mdlongwa

Consultative and empathetic leadership, forging alliances to create economies of scale and of scope, embracing innovation, being communicative and balancing value creation for customers are emerging as key success factors of effective management in the digital age.

Modern management theory concurs with the new role of a human resources manager: to be proactive in managing change in an organisation. More and more, these managers need to act as strategists and contribute to the financial bottom line.

In the digital age, the modern HR manager needs to understand that the people of an organisation could be a key source of competitive advantage. As such, he/she needs to recruit, retain and retrain only the most talented people to ensure strategic management.

However, many top managers of companies who still follow traditionalist business models, even in change management, still prefer to maintain their control over subordinates and often dumb down any form of creativity. In addition, many executives supervising HR managers don’t see the need for drastic change either.

This is where the approach to media leadership training run by Rhodes University’s Sol Plaatje Institute for Media Leadership (SPI) differs: we integrate cutting-edge management theory into our practical training programmes and promote the need to embrace change management in all our learning and teaching.

The Essentials of People Management (EOPM), which took place at the SPI from 31st May to 4 June this year, focused specifically on the challenges of leading and managing diverse groups of people in a rapidly changing industry.

By the end of the week, participants agreed that great weight should be given to HR Orientation, and effective Change and Performance management in the workplace.

Thandisizwe Mgudlwa, a freelancer who contributes to Independent Newspapers Limited, explains why he now appreciates the importance of investing in staff orientation:

“When I came here, I thought I knew much about people management, but I knew nothing. I am taking back the shared experiences, education and skills learnt, in particular the importance and processes of HR orientation. In my ten years working in the media industry, I’ve never really been given that opportunity to understand the philosophy, culture and the history of the organisations I have worked for. Now I understand that it is my right, as an employee, to demand that the HR department and other relevant departments explain these until I understand.”

Jimmy Dhlamini, Station Manager at Thetha Fm, echoes these views:

“Orientation is key; employers need to ensure that the process of orientation is taken forward. There is much that media practitioners need to learn in terms of properly orientating people.”

Many young talented people today prefer to work for start-ups; promising undertakings rather than an established company because they like the entrepreneurial challenge and tremendous career opportunities. Two of our EOPM short course delegates, both relatively young, have left the SABC because they say they were fed up with top management who relentlessly “crushed” their creative spirit. They explain that top management often exclude subordinates in the decision-making process because they (management) want to maintain the status quo.

Nobathembu Kani, a former SABC radio producer, explains what the role of HR in change management should be:

“The greatest insight I have gained is that the vision and mission (of the organisation) should be clearly communicated with your staff, especially when change is taking place. We cannot only be told to do things, blind-folded. We need to understand and share the vision and mission; I speak from experience! Transparency should be in place. HR should take a more active role in the management of staff rather than simply playing a consultant role to the other departments. Motivation is very important as well; remuneration is not only monetary.”

Kani says doing this course has encouraged her to pursue her ideals in any organisation:

“Now, not only am I fully aware of how I fit into the organisation but I also see how I can be an element of change. I feel empowered.”

These EOPM delegates may occupy different positions in their respective organisations, they may be managing one or more people and have varying powers of authority, but they all agreed that the sharing of experiences and problem-solving techniques was one of the most rewarding aspects of the just-ended EOPM.

Bultcha Teguest Yilma, co-owner, Managing Director and Deputy Editor-in-Chief of the Ethiopian-based Capital weekly newspaper, provides further insight:

“I now realise, very importantly, that each department needs a customised Performance Management form; I cannot expect that every department fill out the standardised form because each department has a different role to play, with staff that have different job descriptions, goals and needs.”

Another key learning area for delegates is the importance of effective communication in order to achieve the goals of the organisation.

Yilma notes:

“I now know that effective and continuous communication is crucial; you may think you have agreed on a common goal, but people forget or get side-tracked; so time and time again you need to set up follow-up mechanisms – reiterate, revise and re-evaluate those goals to make sure everyone is on the same path.

“Also, I don’t have a management background, I have an economics background. So in taking part in this course, I now understand why I fight with my Finance Manager who is also my HR manager. Now I understand it may not be because of a competence problem, but rather an ability problem. Now I know I really need to hire an HR person.”

For Besizizwe (Bheki) Mdhluli, Communications Officer at Naledi Municipality, the most important lesson on the course was retaining and refitting experienced staff:

“I’ve come to realise that in the changing media landscape what is important is that you don’t just retrench staff members, but seek alternative positions for them in the workplace so that you can retain (seasoned) workers.”

Often delegates who come on our short courses feel inspired to transfer the lessons they have learnt from SPI to their organisation. Mdhluli plans on organising a formal presentation:

“When I am back at my organisation, I will speak to my manager, try to organise a sort of conference to teach what I have learnt on this course to the handful of people I manage, and to the rest of my organisation.”

Some delegates simply feel inspired to be better relationship builders.

Denise Mhlanga, Editorial Assistant/Journalist at LiveOutLoud Magazine, explains:

“You definitely need to know yourself as a manager; your strengths and weaknesses. Also, don’t assume you know the needs and wants of your employee; talk to them, ask questions.”

SPI believes in the importance of continuous management training to achieve strategic awareness and to link strategic thinking with implementation. It is a requirement for all large companies as employees cope with new ways of doing business.

Kenya races ahead of SA to provide varied media menu

By Francis Mdlongwa

A mobile phone company is hurriedly assembling editors and journalists to staff its digital media content distribution hub; a 24-hour television network has been launched both online and offline; and nearly half a dozen private television stations have sprung up.

Welcome to the ‘new’ Kenya. It’s good news for Kenyan audiences, though not necessarily for the incumbent traditional media houses.

The East African nation is quietly racing ahead of South Africa -- long regarded as Africa’s leader in economic, political, military and other fields -- in providing a rich and varied media menu to audiences.

Kenya’s largest mobile phone group, Safaricom, has started hiring editors to comb through local and foreign media to “localise and customise” news stories and information for its mobile subscribers, who, according to the firm’s half-year financials to September 2009, were 15 million in a country of 40 million people.

Could Safaricom be thinking of extending its news service to include deploying its own journalists to cover stories within Kenya and in neighbouring countries? Watch this space.

A new private television station, Kiss Television, which describes itself in Facebook as the “hypiest new TV station in Kenya”, went on air late last year to provide non-stop, 24-hour music for Kenya’s huge youthful audiences.

Operating both offline and online, Kiss serves up a diet of the latest hip hop sounds, rhythm and blues, soul and gospel music. Viewers and listeners phone in or SMS the station or go through the net to select a music video of their choice, which then automatically queues up to play, like the juke box of yesterday’s good, old world.

As well as relying on advertising, Kiss Television’s business model is based on sharing phone-in revenues with its telecoms partner.

Safaricom’s bold entry into journalism and of Kiss TV into the broadcast sector are but only the latest signs of a rapidly growing and dynamic media industry in Kenya since the 1990s liberalisation of the broadcasting and telecoms sectors there.

Safricom’s action in particular has many editors of Kenyan newspapers, radio and television stations worried because it potentially raises significantly competition for audiences among media firms in an already highly segmented and hyper-competitive market.

As David Maingi, head of corporate affairs at Nation Media Group (NMG), the largest media group in East and Central Africa as measured by market capitalisation and media presence in that region, told foreign journalists visiting Kenya recently:

“Kenyan editors are scrambling in all directions searching for answers as to what to do next, wondering about the impact on their media of Safaricom’s entry into the journalistic content market. No one can tell yet what it will be… but we have already been losing a sizeable slice of our market to the current heightened competition.”

As well as the state-run Kenya Broadcasting Corporation, which owns radio stations and a television service, Kenyans now wake up to watch around seven private television stations, most of which broadcast 24 hours across the nation, and to listen to several dozen radio stations, also run by private capital.

The competition for audiences is already stiff and it seems certain it will get tougher in the coming days, weeks and months.

The television stations range from K24, owned by Kenya’s emerging media tycoon and Nairobi University journalism graduate Rose Kimotho; to Nation Television (NTV) and Kenya Television Network (KTN).

NTV is owned by NMG, publishers of the once best-selling Daily Nation and several other newspapers, and KTN is owned by Kenya’s Standard Media Group, which also publishes several newspapers, including the daily Standard.

The news-driven television stations are modelled along the lines of the Atlanta-headquartered Cable News Network and the BBC World Television Service.

But I was most impressed by their fiercely-independent and balanced news, and their well-researched and packaged in-depth news analyses which would be the envy of many people “Down South” and elsewhere around the world. More so in today’s world which is largely dominated by “sound-byte” journalism that gives little meaning and context to the news!

One indicator of growing competition among media is the fact that the daily circulation of the Daily Nation is now around 100,000 versus 200,000 five years ago, Maingi said, noting the big negative impact of the internet and of several media companies that have sprung up in Kenya.

“Through research, we are constantly trying to understand why we are losing these readers,” he said.

“The internet has obviously had a huge impact because it offers free news, but we must re-position ourselves and constantly re-evaluate and renew ourselves if we are still to be the most desirable media leader in this region.”

While it is arguable whether a majority of “monied” Kenyans have access to the internet, it is clear that its advent, combined with new “sensationalist” newspapers which Kenyans brand the “gutter press”, plus new radio and television stations, has significantly raised competition among media for segmented news audiences.





One of the challenges for NMG – indeed for most media around the world– is for the group to work out whether it can make more money out of advertising by going totally online, as the Christian Science Monitor in the US has done, or continuing to serve its audiences with a fuller package offline.

Experience so far from the US shows that newspapers which have moved part of their content online are getting an average of only 12% of their advertising income from this platform – this is despite the fact that most American audiences are online (A year ago, South Africa’s Mail and Guardian reported that its online edition was contributing around 15% of total income).

Of course, the situation in Africa is vastly different, with most audiences and advertisers still relying on the hard-copy editions of newspapers.

In the developed world, advertisers have not exactly followed content online, partly because the advertisers themselves can now go direct to customers using both online and mobile solutions.

One other key lesson for traditional media in the ‘age of discontinuity’, to quote C Christensen, is that they must not willy-nilly jump onto the bandwagon of the digital media platforms, throwing away all the good work which they would have done in the past to be successful.

Yes, they need to experiment and innovate with digital media and never be left behind, choosing what works for their media firms and market. But they need to do much more to perfect their core business (eg being a market leader in investigative journalism or in financial markets reportage) which would have fuelled their success.

Whatever platform media firms choose to use, audiences will still require content that is highly relevant to their needs and wants, is exclusive and helps to improve their lives and is presented accurately, truthfully and in a fair and balanced manner.

Yes, because of the migration of large segments of audiences to digital platforms, especially mobile, it is crucial for a media firm to be present there to experiment with how it can innovatively serve audiences while also making money.

South African media, especially print, should learn a lesson or two from their Kenyan counterparts. One of these is that South African newspapers should take bold steps to prevent a situation like that of the Daily Nation, whose circulation has halved in just a short five years.

There is also a lesson for South Africa from the mushrooming Kenyan media. South Africa needs to move faster in liberalising its broadcast sector so that more players can come in, not just to make the numbers but to add value and diversity in content in a rapidly fragmenting industry.

Sixteen years after South Africa’s freedom, the country south of the Limpopo still has just two main national broadcasters, a development which severely limits audiences’ choices.

Although pay-TV broadcasting licences have been granted to several companies, we are yet to see these come alive and offer a diverse range of content and programming which fosters healthy competition and hopefully gets the nation truly engaged in discourse about how it wants to live and to be governed.

Indeed one could argue that most South Africans can hardly afford to have access to pay television, so there is a need to open up the broadcasting sector to more free-to-air channels for the general public.