Capability Enhancement: Why Entrepreneurs must place premium on Human Capital for Sustainable Growth – A FODDS Capital Perspective.

Capability simply refers to the potential, means and resources that is inherent and essential to an entity – human and/or organization to carry out a function. Put plainly then, capability enhancement as reinforcing or augmenting the requisite skills and tools an enterprise has identified as important to its operation, productivity and growth. It is a process through which the workforce of an organization is equipped with the theoretical and practical knowledge of “what needs to be done” for the primary purpose of improving the efficiency of organisations, this does not exclude the adoption of on – the – job building mechanisms.

Let us examine the individual as an integral and focal part of the enterprise.

Competency is that which qualifies an employee for a job. The capability of an enterprise largely depends first on the gross expertise of individuals to carry out tasks. It is the deciding factor as to whether you will be handed an employment contract or not. Pause for a moment – ever noticed multinational or blue-chip companies and how they project the optics a part of their website with people who make up their team? This is because it has become imperative for people to know who they will be going into a business relationship with.

In contrast with the above, many MSMEs in Nigeria ignore the educational background of their employees for several reasons, this ranges from finance and scale of business to even issues bordering on the fact that most owners of MSMEs have little or no education themselves. More diminishing is the fact that many MSMEs in Nigeria ignore capacity building workshops, seminars and professional courses for both employers and employees.

Nonetheless, the capability of an enterprise does not rest solely on the intrinsic prowess or dexterity of individuals, but also very consequential is the environment and every mechanism that he works with.

At FODDS Capital we up-skill businesses we partner with through change, technology, innovation, mentorship and training programs, business analysis and strategy, as well as providing the tools and systems.

Many MSMEs (especially micro enterprises) in Nigeria do not appreciate the need for developing a business policy towards capability enhancement within their enterprise. While many of such enterprises have no idea on what the concept of “capacity building mechanisms and processes” are, a few others do know and engage in the process, but not anchored on a well-developed system.

For example:

Two businessmen sat at a table, one of them is the CEO of Company A and the other the MD of a human resource and leadership consulting enterprise – Company B. As they came to the end of their discussion, the CEO said, “you see my friend, if I spend my company’s wealth on staff training, they might seek better external offers due to their newly acquired qualification”.

The CEO then paraphrased his statement into a question “I know this staff training is good but what if I train my employees and they leave for other companies, is that not a loss?”. MD replied, “what if you don’t train them and they stay?”

To curb this thought process, few companies in Nigeria now make training available and necessary for employees, very few make this available for new hires, with bond agreement and conditions to be fulfilled.

Capability enhancement eases processes of an enterprise since the organization knows the expertise it lacks and what it is in search of.

Among the numerous benefits are:

improved technical knowhow;
efficient managerial initiatives;
competency development;
effective organizational system;
high level of professionalism;
performance and process enhancement; etc.

In conclusion, capability enhancement is value, and it is not less a value as financial capital. It is the key to growth of any business organization.

http://www.foddscapital.com/why-entrepreneurs-must-place-premium-on-human-capital-for-sustainable-growth/