Doctoral Degrees (Curriculum Studies)

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Browsing Doctoral Degrees (Curriculum Studies) by Subject "Adult education -- South Africa -- Bosbokrand"

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    The role of leadership learning in the developmental needs of the senior managers in a rural municipality : a case study in adult education at Bushbuckridge local municipality
    (Stellenbiosch : Stellenbosch University, 2015-03) Mkhabela, Lamson Zondiwe; Frick, Beatrice Liezel; Bitzer, Eli ; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Education. Dept. of Curriculum Studies
    ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Municipalities are entrusted with the responsibility of providing sustainable social services to local communities. Issues of capacity to facilitate the delivery of such services feature prominently in these municipalities where a number of communities have expressed their frustration and even anger at the slow pace of delivery of services, or the absence of such service delivery. The reported failure by senior municipal managers to facilitate the delivery of the needed services to communities motivated this investigation. In particular, the possible contribution of leadership learning in the developmental needs of senior managers in the Bushbuckridge Local Municipality was focused upon. The main knowledge claim in this study is that the proven lack of competencies and skills of senior municipal managers have much to do with the weak delivery of acceptable services to communities. Consequently, the study indicated the need to identify the developmental needs of senior municipal managers from a leadership learning perspective and to implement developmental interventions to possibly address such needs. The study was conducted in four phases. First, a number of pre-planning leadership learning questions were formulated, which were determined through document analyses and developing theoretical perspectives from review of relevant literature. Next, a needs assessment among senior managers was conducted. This phase was followed by the implementation of a planned intervention based on leadership learning principles. Finally, the potential success of the intervention was evaluated. The study revealed that although the municipality of Bushbuckridge has an acceptable policy framework that supports leadership learning, the leadership competencies and skills required for senior managers to facilitate delivery of municipal services to communities were lacking. The leadership intervention in this study had limited success due to systemic instabilities within the particular municipal system. The study showed that systemic stability appears to be essential for productive leadership development. It also showed that financial investment in leadership development or developmental interventions may contribute less to enhancing the performance of senior managers if a municipality lacks systemic stability. Given the reported large-scale systemic instability within local municipalities countrywide in South Africa, the results of this study indicate that capacity development initiatives are destined for failure if systemic issues are not addressed first.