Profiles in leadership
DDGs are working hard to ensure that GCIS is the pulse of government communication
Government Communication and Information System (GCIS) is known for being the pulse of government communication, having excellent stakeholder relations and upholding high standards when it comes to governance.
This is all because it is in the hands of experienced senior managers who have an intricate understanding of the department and vast experience in their areas of work.
Communicating government messages
As a professional communicator who started her career when South Africa gained democracy, Tasneem Carrim is entrusted with the responsibility of ensuring that the department delivers on its twin mandate of providing information to the public in order to better their lives while at the same time coordinating and leading the government-wide communication system.
She is the Acting Deputy DirectorGeneral for Content Processing and Dissemination, a branch that oversees three Chief Directorates including Products and Platforms, the Communications Service Agency, and Policy and Research.
The functions of this branch include conducting research to assess how government should inform the public's communication needs monitoring media coverage of government programmes from a communication’s perspective, as well as providing strategic guidance on the evaluation and analysis of print and electronic media to contribute to professional and timeous government communication.
The branch is responsible for all content that GCIS produces, including with the platforms it uses to disseminate information and research.
“We write content messages for other departments and we generate content for the public through our news platforms using information from other government departments. We have a role in directly communicating to the public,” Carrim explained.
While overseeing the branch and all of its components and the ad hoc requests it receives is a demanding role, Carrim still has time to appreciate the working environment.
“What I love most about GCIS is that no matter how much we fight internally, we are very much like a family. It is a very fair environment. It is not punishing. I am lucky to be working with amazing professionals in the branch and even beyond,” she said.
Carrim has had the privilege of working in this environment for the past 10 years.
She joined GCIS as a Chief Director for Policy and Research, having started off her career as a Communications Officer in the Presidency in 1994.
Carrim worked her way up to Deputy Director, before joining local government as a Director and later the South African Revenue Service in a Chief Director position.
She has an Honour’s degree in Industrial Sociology but decided to pursue a career in communication research.
A decade of learning
Spending a decade at GCIS has taught her a few lessons on the governance side, such as the need to constantly develop people.
“We must be managing people in such a way that it gives them an opportunity to grow,” she said.
She is proud of the work being done by GCIS employees despite the limited resources available to them.
“We have very few resources, we are being stretched all the time. So we must realise that compared to what the resources are, we are doing an amazing job and the employees are the best resources,” Carrim pointed out.
She added that GCIS lost posts and budget from its baseline to aid the creation of the Department of Communications and has struggled to recover since then.
"Despite these limitations, we have soldiered on. We have a growing presence on social media through which we keep the public informed and government's newspaper Vuk'uzenzele has continued to grow from strength to strength, moving from a daily publication to twice-a-month."
However, she said she would like to see the organisation achieve more impact.
“We do a lot of the right things but I am not sure if we are doing enough to achieve impact. I would rather see us do fewer things with more impact,” Carrim explained.
She called for GCIS to be acknowledged for the important role it plays.
“If we could get more recognition from the political principals,
including National Treasury and the Department of Public Service and Administration, about the work that some of the people at GCIS do, it would be good ... Across the system we have a low recognition of the status of communication, so GCIS is always the last one to get resourced,” Carrim pointed out.
She added that a number of issues raised by the Comtask 2000 Report had not been addressed as yet.
“Some progress has been made, such as the policy GCIS has developed to help standardise the deliverables of communicators and a scorecard that helps their superiors manage their performances
better. These tools are available for communicators to make use of,” said Carrim.
Good governance is key
In another branch at GCIS, Keitumetse Semakane is hard at work ensuring policies are applied consistently – a key factor that has led to the department achieving five clean audits.
Semakane is the Acting Deputy Director-General of Corporate Services.
“It is important to apply policies consistently because when you are consistent you will win the respect of everybody,” said Semakane.
The functions of his branch include providing strategic leadership in financial administration and supply chain management.
He is also responsible for ensuring that the organisation has professional project management services along with providing strategic leadership planning
and monitoring processes.
Semakane also provides guidance to the GCIS information technology department.
His favourite role is providing leadership in the application of the Human Resource Management Strategy.
Prior to being appointed as the Acting DDG, he was the Chief Director for Human Resources.
“In all the directorates that I oversee the one that I enjoy the most is Human Resources. This is an area where I learnt to understand how people need to be managed in an organisation.”
Training and development also falls within Semakane’s branch.
“I have produced a lot of graduates due to our internal bursary scheme. This shows that education is very important. When you improve your education and knowledge, you become more effective,” he noted.
Semakane added that his second love is finance and supply chain because of his no-nonsense approach when it comes to spending government funds wisely.
“I like good governance; hence we always get clean audits,” he said.
Good stories
Semakane has been at the department for 23 years and has
nothing but good stories to tell of how the organisation has evolved.
“When I joined this organisation it was called the South Africa Communication Services (SACS). I was one of the first black directors to work for GCIS,” he recalled.
He was the Provincial Director in the Gauteng region from 1995 to 1997.
Prior to joining GCIS, he was one of the first public relations officers in the North West Department of Education.
Semakane has a Master’s degree in Education and has also worked as a teacher and a radio DJ at Motsweding FM.
He describes himself as a seasoned communicator who just happens to head corporate services.
When the process started of converting SACS to GCIS Semakane was asked to head up administration.
“During that time the organisation experienced a large number of people resigning and most of them were senior managers.There was no one to head administration and salaries had to be paid, administration had to continue. I was appointed to head the administration sector. I am the one who converted people from being employees of SACS to being employees of GCIS,” he recalled.
In 2002 the department was expanded and he was appointed the Chief Director of Human Resources.
“When I was the director for administration I found the department in tatters in terms of audit findings. I looked at the outcome of the audit report and at each and every finding. I read it line by line, looking at where we went wrong and how we could improve. This is how we were able to turn things around,” said Semakane.
He added that some of the biggest challenges facing GCIS is how to do more with less.
“People are overworked. When they do exit interviews they complain about getting burnout due to the amount of work that we do here,” said Semakane.
His message to GCIS staff on the milestone of celebrating its 20th anniversary is that they must continue to be an example to other government departments.
“Let’s continue to shine ensuring that we give people everything that they need. Informed leaders take good decisions,” he added.
Building stakeholder relations
The third branch at GCIS is Intergovernmental Coordination and Stakeholder Management, which is headed by Acting Deputy Director-General Michael Currin.
He started off his career with the department 27 years ago as a Communication Officer.
In his current role, Currin is committed to ensuring that the organisation builds stakeholder relations with other government departments and different community organisations in the country as well as the media.
His branch has four Chief Directorates which include Provincial and Local Liaison, Media Engagement and two Cluster Communication Support components.
The branch provides leadership and strategic advice to provincial and local government communication systems.
Its purpose is to strengthen the system of government communication and implement development communication through, unmediated communication. It does this through sound stakeholder relations and partnerships to ensure that the public is informed about government policies and programmes to improve their lives.
The programme also coordinates the roll-out of the Thusong Service Centre programme as part of the government-wide access strategy.
According to Currin, it is important to build a strong team and to be informed of developments in
one's area of work.
“The greatest thing is to read. You have to read the policies, and programmes and documents that are written about the work of government,” he said.
He said he is proud of what
GCIS has achieved over the past 20 years.
“We have inherited the culture of a progressive, democratic and professional government communication operation that has stood the test of time over 20 years. It is a history that we must jealously guard and actively develop further,” said Currin.
“We have a wonderful legacy built on a very strong journey towards a democratic, people-centred government communication service, we cannot forget that. Sometimes we have to celebrate our achievements. If you do not celebrate your achievements you become disillusioned,” he added.
Currin said that GCIS has to become the best communication force in the next decade and that its staff have to be the reason why people have hope in South Africa.
Highlights at GCIS
Currin has many memorable moments during his nearly three decades at GCIS.
He was involved in the creation of the Multi-Purpose Community Centres, which are now called the Thusong Service Centres. It is here where local, provincial and national government as well as other sector service providers offer services and developmental informational to local communities.
Currin was also part of the government delegation that travelled to various countries on a project to assess the institutional arrangements of GCIS.
“We understood that we had done very well in the first decade as GCIS but we thought there were more things that we could do to strengthen the manner in which the media is engaged by government. We had also looked at the degree in which the messaging of government can be more coherent domestically and internationally,” he said.
Out of that review, GCIS ended up with three branches including the Intergovernmental Coordination and Stakeholder Management, Content Processing and Dissemination, and Corporate Services.
Another significant event during Currin’s time at GCIS was the funeral of the former President Nelson Mandela.
“I had not slept for a week. On the day of the funeral, the hearse was driving from the airport to Qunu. I was standing on the side of the road. It was a moment of reflection and I was filled with profound sadness. Not at a familiar level, but because it was a flashback to 1994.
“My father had also passed away recently and I was very close to my father. I suddenly felt like the country has lost its father and no one is going to hold its hand no more. It was such a strange moment yet so symbolic,” he said.
Currin holds Master’s in Professional Youth Development and a Master’s degree in Education specialising in Youth Work Policy in South Africa.