It is often said that without learning there will be no wisdom, and without wisdom we will always be trapped in the prison of our past and become victims of a continuously changing future. In this environment of rapid and unprecedented change, what is valid at one time may become invalid in another time. Similarly, what is relevant in one context may be irrelevant in another context. As we move to the information age, information and knowledge have become important organisational resources. Knowledge is now recognised as the driver of productivity and economic growth. With knowledge becoming the unlimited and fundamental input for success, people are expected to increasingly work with ideas and concepts. As purveyors of actions and knowledge their important contributions are intelligence, talents and mental creativity. Organisational effectiveness will thus be increasingly dependent on its ability to attract, utilise and retain people with talent and knowledge.
The light of this development, knowledge-based workforce forms the ultimate capabilities required by the public service. Knowledge-based workforce refers to result–driven, focused, productive, creative and innovative team. It is thus pertinent for public service leaders to ensure that the culture for continuous learning is pervasive in their respective organisations and become instinctive and natural among the officials.The culture for learning would also encourage the public service to be more open to external views and should not be afraid to learn from international experts, think–tanks as well as the community, since we have no monopoly to wisdom. Being open to disagreements and criticisms are virtues that should also be encouraged.In the effort to attract and retain people with talent and knowledge. The new systems should be devised to attract the best citizens and the best brains to join the civil service. This would require flexibility in terms of requirement at different levels of entry points into the service. This approach we believe will help to re-brand the Public Service as the Employer of Choice attracting the best talent into the civil service. We do hope the proposal is still being actively pursued by the relevant agencies. Another approach to develop the knowledge-based workforce is through mentoring and continuous training. In grooming good leaders, it is significant that they learn to lead from relationship with senior leaders who have served as coaches, mentors, teachers, and above all, good examples. In addition, young leaders more often than not learn to lead far more from tacit rather than from cognitive knowledge – as apprentices of “masters”.
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