Cost cutting: FG urges civil servants to embrace innovation

The Federal Government has urged workers in the public service in Nigeria to embrace innovation as part of efforts to cut cost as well as ensure speed and efficiency in service delivery to the citizenry.

Acting head of civil service of the federation, Dr Folashade Yemi-Esan, made the call on Tuesday in Abuja while declaring open a two-day Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) training programme on “Radical Innovation” for over 80 public servants drawn from various ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) across the country.

The training programme organised by the office of the head of civil service of the federation in collaboration with the Oil Producers Trade Section (OPTS) had vice president, open learning, MIT, United States of America, Professor Sanjay Sarma among other resource persons to train the participants.

According to her, the two-day training would trigger the processes for transformation of the Nigerian Public Service from bureaucratic to an innovative Service.

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She noted that it was unbecoming of the public sector, which is expected to be the driver of the country’s socio-economic development to lag behind in innovation.

She said, “hence, as policymakers, we must all be future-oriented and adaptive to operational change so as to create value in delivery of services to Nigerians.

“It is in view of the aforementioned realities that the office of the head of the civil service of the federation organised this training with the aim of equipping participants with requisite skills and knowledge to drive innovation in the public sector.

“Accordingly, the training programme is expected to expose participants to some of the salient features of contemporary innovation and to lay out the philosophy, tools, procedures, and incentives that organizations especially those in the public sector can adopt to drive innovation,” she said.

Yemi-Esan disclosed that as part of the commitment of the Federal Government to drive innovation in public service, a service innovation department has been in the office of the head of service to be headed by a Director.

She added that government would also launch an innovative campaign to raise awareness on innovation, create an online innovation network that showcases existing innovation in the Service to foster knowledge sharing and the launch of a service-wide innovation workshop to educate staff on innovation which is the key objective of this training.

Mr Paul McGrath, Chairman OPTS, in his remarks, said he was delighted to identify with the leadership and staff of the Federal Civil Service in this effort to build a modern Public Service.

“Our member-companies appreciate this opportunity to support OHSCF in the provision of a world-class training programme as part of the activities under the Federal Civil Service Strategy and Implementation Plan (FCSSIP) 2017-2020,” he said.