Sultan opens IGCF, urges training of government staff
His Highness Dr Sheikh Sultan Bin Mohammed Al Qasimi, Supreme Council Member and Ruler of Sharjah, despite the nation’s recent achievements in applying best-in-class technology and processes to deliver policy and communicate with citizens, more efforts needed to train government employees, so that role models emerge from within the leadership ranks.
He made this observation while addressing international delegates and atendees at the inaugural session of the eighth edition of the International Government Communication Forum (IGCF 2019) in Sharjah on Wednesday.
Organised by the International Government Communication Centre (IGCC), IGCF 2019 runs under the theme “Behavioural Change Towards Human Development,” and has brought together prominent figures, top officials, thought leaders and government communication experts from around the world to discuss and explore international best practices.
Sheikh Sultan said, “Other countries have already deployed state-of-the-art communication systems. When these were brought to our country, we started facing problems in implementation because we didn’t properly qualify our government cadres on how these can be used to streamline activities and achieve beter results. This also caused ambiguity in the relation between government and community members. They were in a fix; taking a step forward and another step backward. So, we introduced specialisations in our universities, and today our government communicators are bringing international best practices to their respective departments.”
He added, “In the different government departments in Sharjah, there was some resistance to change initially, but we pushed forward to influence positive change and cadre training, introducing new leadership, processes and structures. Today, we are seeing positive results across departments. In January 2018, for instance, Sharjah Electricity and Water Authority (Sewa began implementing several new communication processes, which initially posed challenges, especially when it came to public acceptance. The community needed to be inducted into these new changes, which Sewa has done very successfully. We hope that, going forward, other departments will also do the same.”
Speaking on the occasion, Chairman of Sharjah Media Council (SMC) Sheikh Sultan Bin Ahmed Al Qasimi continued the theme of importance of educating citizenry through human-centric government communications to enable successful participatory governance.
Special Correspondent