We need Leadership Response First thing first, there is need for our President to bring his leadership skills to bear and restore public confidence in the leadership of the country. Quickly, this can be done by giving message of hope backed by action but must go a step further than the usual state of the nation address. It should be tagged state of the economy address with actionable agenda by getting the people to quickly put some ‘early wins’ under their belt. Let me explain this further, Mr. President should play the leadership role that biblical Moses played when the people of Israel were at the wilderness, when food and water became a serious issue of concern just as we are experiencing in today’s Ghana. There have been serious complaints and murmuring among the people like the Israelites did to Moses in the wilderness. Some people are even calling on Mr. President to step down and resign honorably to safe the ship of the country from heading towards total collapse. There is no reason for such calls for now; I think the endurance level of some of our people is very low. What I think they should be asking is what solutions should Mr. President deploy that would take us out of this wilderness of economic hardship. The call on Mr. President to step down is not new, when Moses delays in coming down from the mountain, people gathered together and demanded for other gods. ‘When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, Make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.” (Exodus 32:1) In order to give quality advise to our President, I did some deep study of my Maxwell Leadership Bible and I got some stuff that are relevant and quite germane to our situation and these steps I will recommend to the leadership of our country. This talked about; The law of navigation: planning and structure As a good leader, Moses methodically arranged the tribal camps in the wilderness. He set the tabernacle in the center and arranged the priests around its four sides (North, South, East and West of the country). Then he symmetrically distributed the Twelve Tribes (In our own case Ten Regions) around the priests and Levites, (Regional Chief Executives) with three tribes on each of the four sides. We would do well to plan and organize as Moses did.
- Plan to plan. Give time for planning and organizing because we know as a student of management that Prior Proper Planning Prevents Poor Performance. Planning is winning.
- Determine your primary purpose. What’s the big picture? What are you trying to do?
- Assess the situation. Understand where you sit before trying to develop a strategy.
- Prioritize the needs. Make sure the team agrees on the most important goals.
- Ask the right questions. Ask about market, leadership, revenue, reporting, and evaluation.
- Set specific goals. Write goals that are realistic, measurable, and convictional.
- Clarify and communicate. Communication links planning and implementation.
- Identify possible obstacles. Mentally walk through all you are trying to pull off.
- Have an open system approach to your planning. Be sympathetic to your environment.
- Schedule everything you can. Get things on the calendar and set deadlines.
- Budget everything you can. Determine both the costs and due dates of projects.
- Monitor and correct. Progress is like a canoe trip; constantly adjust your course
- Study the results. Evaluation prevents stagnation and exaggeration. Mr. President should remember that, anyone can steer the ship, but it takes a leader to chart the course. You are the leader no matter the hush and cry in the system the buck stop at his desk. Mr. President should as a matter of urgency, address the nation by stating steps being Taking to revive the ailing economy. This must be specific and actionable with a short time frame Using SMART rule (Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Relevant and Realistic and Time Bound) as a performance measurement. Our people want to hear some message of hope like Moses did when he came down from Mount Sinai with two tablets of the testimony in his hand. Our own equivalent of tablets of testimony can be called “tablets of solution” for the ailing economy. The Tablets of Solution Some of the “tablets” to be ad- ministered now is how to work with the RCEs (Regional chief Executives) to create a minimum of 1,500 jobs per Region in the next two to three months through Agricultural Support Action Project (ASAP). Government
