As NWSC continues to grow, sustainability is never far from its plans. In line with, teams comprising the Kampala Water Eastern Zone put their heads together and came up with strategies to increase billing in their Zone to 10billion.
Laying a 4 months’ strategy, the team committed to a final document that will act as a binding tool of action to realize the 10bn billing come June 2022.
The session, split into two started off with an interactive and engaging cocktail of activities including a Team building exercise to awaken the good people. This was followed by a networking session where members were tasked to identify those they had never engaged before. Once identified, they were to inquire what made them a resilient leader, prompting a variety of responses.
“The definition of success may be relative, but its ingredients are the same – Hard Work and Sacrifice is the reason why we are here today, to officially Launch Our 10 Billion Billing Drive,” stated the Senior Manager-KEZ, Ms Sarah Namuwenge in her opening remarks.
With the drive’s objective to a monthly Business turnover of 10Bn before end of FY 2021/2022, Ms Namuwenge revealed that strategies were needed both at individual and zonal level. This led her to task Branches/Individuals to consolidate their action plans into NWSC’S Corporate Plan. She spoke about the NWSC 5 Golden Indicator Strategy as highlighted in the NWSC Corporate Plan; Growing connections from 800,000 to 1.8m, growing asset base to minimum of 5trillion from the current 3 trillion, Reduction of NRW to 33%, Customer Satisfaction Index to move from 87% to 90% and lastly, to obtain a Staff Engagement index of 70%.
Elaborating on the last parameter, Ms. Sarah stressed the difference between staff engagement and staff presence. Engagement, she said, is the level of enthusiasm and dedication a staff feels towards their job while presence is the state of being present in appearance and bearing but not impactful in their work. The task therefore was for staff to assess themselves and endeavour to always add value.
As she concluded, she laboured to explain what the 10bn means for the Zone. “To move from the current 6bn billing to the 10bn billing entails all staff doubling their efforts in performance, time management is paramount and team work a must in order to achieve the 10billion in next 4months,” Ms. Namuwenge said.
In the action planned presented by the Principal Commerical Officer Ibrahim Walusimbi, key milestones designed to deliver set performances targets were identified as;
- Grow water sales from the current 1.3m to 2.3m
- Achieve a monthly billing of 10bn from the current 5.8bn
- Collect not less than 106% of monthly billing
- Achieve a monthly Response Rate if 70% up from the current 50%
- Reduce Debt Age from 2.2months to 1.5months
Speaking to the Team, The General Manager Kampala Water- Eng. Mahmood Lutaaya appreciated the staff and organisers. He then went ahead to emphasize team work, discipline and ambition with responsibility as some of the drivers to achieving the 10billion commitment for KEZ. Technology would also be a key driver in this campaign, with the utilization of IT application systems including Online New Connection system, Mapkit tools, Dashboards, E-inventory being encouraged.
Lastly, GM communicated that Management was considering matching ambition with responsibility. This meant that those willing to take on more risk will be given more responsibility.
Story by: Vivien Newumbe
