Six reasons for Africa's management gap
The African Management Initiative has identified six organisational and systemic challenges that need to be addressed if Africa is ever going to improve the overall quality of its managers.
Yesterday How we made it in Africa reported on the African Management Initiative’s (AMI) research that revealed that Africa is lacking high quality managers with the skills and competence to capitalise on the continent’s economic potential. However, to change the situation, one needs to understand the challenges. Through surveying educators, entrepreneurs, employers and investors across the continent, AMI has identified six organisational and systemic challenges that need to be addressed if Africa is ever going to improve the overall quality of its managers. 1. The middle management gap
“Africa’s most pressing problem is at the middle management level: the ‘engine room’ that drives organisations,” stated the report.
There is a huge skills gap between senior executives and middle and low level managers who lack exposure to best management practices. Organisations often recruit their senior managers from overseas as expats or from the African diaspora, and send their top home-grown executives to the foremost business schools for management development courses, providing them with international exposure. “Meanwhile middle managers are usually educated at home, and have had little in the way of practical training and experience,” continued the report.
As a respondent from a Nigerian firm illustrated: “At a senior level, I can get Nigerians from abroad. Juniors you can develop. But strong, quality middle management or lower senior, that’s where we struggle.”
2. MBAs are too expensive for most
Africa’s quality business schools and training programmes are expensive and with MBAs costing between US$5,000 to $25,000, only the few elite can afford it.
“The economics of the western business school model simply does not add up for most Africans, and any new effort will need innovative thinking to create a new price-quality paradigm to build flexible payment options, and to create more accessible products,” suggested the report.
A Zambian respondent said, “I have no idea where I could send my staff for training. I’ve asked around and haven’t come across any highly recommended local training company. I certainly can’t afford to pay the kinds of fees that the top South African business schools charge and I don’t think I’m their target market anyway.”
3. Rigid hierarchies a ‘cultural’ issue
Many respondents surveyed in AMI’s research said there is a need for a shift from strict hierarchies to meritocracies.
The report states that change would have to occur at an organisational level. As a respondent from a South African business school said: “Cultural influence appears to hamper the development of managers. The aspect of follower-leader has allowed African individuals to be much more capable at following, and executing under tight direction and command-control. But the challenge is that when faced with management they often struggle with authority, communication, results focus within a time-frame and then holding people accountable.”
The aim is to create an environment where innovation is allowed to flourish but managers are held to account. “There is little point in developing managers with initiative if they are not allowed to flourish,” said the report. A good start towards this would be to implement solid performance management systems.
4. Poor pre-tertiary education
According to AMI, basic primary and secondary education in Africa is of a significantly lower quality than in developed countries. "Employees often arrive at a managerial level without having developed the strong numeracy and literacy skills, IT proficiency and critical thinking competences required.”
As a respondent from a Rwandan business school said, “We inherit students who are at 5th grade English language – they are functionally illiterate. The challenges are huge.”
5. Operational systems: more tools, less muscle
Small owner-managed companies often fail to implement systems to reduce dependence on a strong founder or leader, explains the report.
AMI’s research shows that the problem exists because there is no systematic transfer of knowledge and a general lack of long term thinking.
According to a respondent from a Nigerian foundation, “We have so many mom and pop businesses that only grow to a certain level because they have no succession plan in place and no governance. We need more tools and less muscle. We have some really successful businesses, but when you remove the CEO, will it function? And is it functioning in a healthy way, according to international standards?”
6. Rural/urban divide
With urbanisation taking place all over the continent and the location of most business schools and training programmes being in urban centres, organisations in rural areas struggle to find, retain and develop strong managers.
A Ghanaian impact investor voiced this problem. “It’s really hard to find talented people that want to work for agricultural businesses. Young people in particularly just don’t want to work in rural areas.”
In order to address this problem, AMI said that “we need solutions that will use technology to reach remote geographies, and to creatively channel resources to rural areas”.