A management seminar for Myanmar’s civil servants (Jun. Jan. and Sept., 2013)
PREX has been commissioned by the Sasakawa Foundation, a public interest incorporated foundation, to conduct two dispatches of specialists (in June and January) and a seminar in Japan (in September) this fiscal year. Through this seminar, the efforts are aimed at fostering human resources that contribute to the development of Myanmar by improving organizational management functions among senior managers in Myanmar’s public sector. The idea is to transfer the knowledge and experience in Japan and other Asian countries to Myanmar.
A workshop on organizational management at a training facility of the Union Civil Service Board on the outskirts of Mandalay. The instructor is Arata Mitsumatsu, a consultant.
Toward human-resource development in Myanmar
The administration of Thein Sein, which was inaugurated in March 2011, is aiming to transform Myanmar into a democratic state open to the international community. As various forms of assistance from Western countries and international organizations flood into the country, in order to employ the aid efficiently and to make Myanmar a member of the international community, it is necessary to improve its organizational management abilities, to nurture outstanding human resources tasked with running the country, to effectively utilize these human resources and to efficiently run the administrative bodies.
Initiatives by the Sasakawa Foundation
The Sasakawa Foundation has been continuously tackling human-resource development for Myanmar’s civil servants since fiscal 2002, a year when international assistance to the country was extremely low. Yet after grasping the country’s circumstances and receiving requests from its government, the foundation launched a three-year project focusing on “organizational management” in fiscal 2012.
Now in the second year of the project, PREX has been commissioned by the Sasakawa Foundation to implement it.
Workshops in Myanmar
Workshops were held from June 24-28 on themes related to organizational management including “Introduction to Management,” “Abilities of Management” and “Leadership.” Held at the Union Civil Service Board training facility on the outskirts of Mandalay, the workshops were targeted at 20 civil servants.
Rather than just holding lectures by all of the specialists, the activities involved the exchange and compilation of various opinions and then presentations of their content during the time allotted, after the participants were divided into groups for the discussions. In Myanmar, seminars are mainly based around lectures, and so the participants were hesitant at the start although we were able to develop a flow of active discussions as more were held.
Myanmar had high expectations toward this project. At the ceremony to mark its start, the director of the Union Civil Service Board was in attendance, as was the vice minister at the closing ceremony.
Sixteen of the participants attended the seminar in Japan in September.
Yoshiko Miura, International Department
