Our universities and tertiary colleges
offload tones ofthousands of graduates every year in labor market. Many
graduates hoped to securea decent job in formal or an informal sector, contrary,
reality dawn to them, and jobs become hard to come by. Themeteoritic rise of
unemployment paints a gloom and blurt picture on our country’s ability to
create employment opportunities to cater for ever out bursting and budding
demand. Kenya, like many countries in the worldis hard hit with this cancerous problem.
Always grumbling to fix this perennial problem, it turn out and become political
agenda, hotly debated by different aspirant on how they shall nip the problem
on bud once put on authority.Our expectations turn out to be just like any
other promise, no accountability hence the problem a political class.
In this paper I shall not dwell on the
causes or solutions rather than I shall delve on why most talented youths offloaded
from colleges, universities and other middle level learning institution are
taken for a ride by chimney owners. They are taken advantage, misused and
sometime their entire youth age is literally killed.
The abridgment of reasons why some
talented youths are ready to agree to take unfair treatment form some
organization is the fear of rocking the boat and move to venture on areas that
are not familiar with them. Familiarity creates content .Once these youths
change their mindset and view failure as part of the growth of the individual.
Traditionally, we were born and raised in an environment where failure was
viewed as outcast. Because our family and tradition dedicate for us what to do
we found ourselves to reciprocate the favors we did received to our small
siblings
Majority of family owned organizations
in Kenya are run in sycophantic manner. Organizations are artificial human beings.
They exhibit the human feature and one of them is growth. Organization grows in
cycles or generation. One cycle is equivalent to ten years .Organizations ought
to grow.A 3rd generation organization which can’t afford to pay for
her minor administrative cost speak volume about its leaders and followers .These
organizations arethirty years and above old.A deeper close look revealsthat,
these organizations have a total disregard and respect of their workers and
flawed the rules and principles of management. Because of its tyrannical nature,
theseorganizations imply crooked ways and means to stay afloat with cut throat
competition. They resolve by using anarchic means of head hunting from
progressive workers from reputable blue clips organizations. The main reason of
doingthat is for them to be seen having a remarkable outlook and turn around organization
performance. The puff of the pudding on the hefty and lucrative perks given to
these hunted workers lays a bitof which most of the times is poisonous .In their
first months of assignment, the managersexhume vigor and tenacity to turnaround
the company. They study the system in-depth and recommend invasive changes,only
to be soaked in the mediocre of the backward thinking owners and redundant system.
These managers, highly remunerated, driven in company fuel guzzler formscohort
to protect and guard their interest and most of the time take advantage of
owners’ lack of financial and management acumen. Thetendency for his or her
abuse is exuberatedby his or her arrogance and highhandedness. The company
becomes small personal container filled with small marbles, both wanted and
unwanted. In within the containers, the seemingly bigger marblesenshrined with
superficial authority exercise their power controlled. The bigger marbles
become indecisive and allow their intelligence to be misused. The irony of the
matter is that ,the owner usually thinks is too clever and crafty, but too
stupid to assess the worthy of the company .He use cash flow positions as the
basis of assessing the worthy of
business.
Any new entrant with the different
ideas and views that shall help to catapult the organization deteriorating
state and soar it to better level will meet gargantuan resistance ever
experienced. With your good intent and motives you will be labeled stubborn and
not cooperative .Any attempt to demystify their notion and ill preconceived
altitude towards what you’re doing and individualshall be followed with undeservedly
warnings and relentless and excusable reprimands targeted to silence and still
fear in you.
These intimidations tacks never end
there. Every movement and your personal live shall be put on radar. You will be
viewed in skeptic manner and when worse bore worse a point man shall be brought
in disguised to teach him the system as management trainee.When you are away,
bigger and fat managers meet to craft ill motives that sabotage your tangible
results.
There shall be a fierce cold war
fought to remove you from the middle manager level where you could exert
authority to low level to help you to implement the changes though at baby
steps pace. All these shall be cursed by a well-coordinated scheme to fixyou in
ever ending communication asking for financial information which at first place
ought to have been ready. The frustration takes toil draining the positive
energy and spurting myriads of teething problems that were subdued. These
problems snowball and disorient the well-functioning of organization. The
workers now become rudderless boats because the manager themselves are baseless
and lack the sense of purpose and reason why they are in the management
position.
Not having clear responsibilities and
clear line of command was a recipe of whole system is a failure and concealed
luck of responsibility. We just work for salary .That is common notion across
organization. We work for salary disregard of productivity .So long you show
yourself in the office ,drink tea ,produce zero results, and surf and face
book, you take home more than one .How absurd the system it was ! There was no
job satisfaction .No impetus to be creative and find tailored solutions for
routine problems. The duplications of duties were order of the day. An attempt
to solve routine
In any organization were excel replace
the customized system or off the shelvesystem is another indicative sign of
just another failed system
Sycophants and bootlicking busybodies
Sycophants and bootlicking busybodies
are used as the avenue of down upward as mode of communication. At this point consider
communication as dead as dodo.These friend to the owners are self-seeking,
egocentric and they don’t accept divergent views. They will erect walls around
the already walled owner and make it stiffer to be accessible .This will make
sure human resource section is as dead as dodo and renegaded to a tea girl
.Human resource isintegral section that
real friend to the owner . It should be real and factual to the owners that
human resources is not a preserve of the family member .This does not mean a
family member cannot be human resource manager, however merit should take front
seat in selection .The owner can influence the outcome of selection process of
human resource, but this could be more detrimental to the organization than the
intended motives of owner of filling every position from henchmen and tribe
men/women. The company now becomes a vehicle to propagate shallow and
anunproductive agendas such as a launch pad for political career. The people
will be hired regardless of human resource manager’sadvice. This shall be done
on the pretext of massaging the ego of other Politian’s who want their people
hired .These people are either business associates or bigwigs in the government
who pull the short when comes to government procurement. So it becomes a catch
game of give and receive, perfect scenario of it’s our turn to eat culture.
The
most qualified cadre of diligent, intelligent and smart workers are ditched in
wasted, used and dumped dustbin .All along, the perception of these group of
qualified members usual is to work to transform the organization put aside
their personal interest and preference for the best