Amid efforts to reform the Nigeria’s civil service to make it function optimally, Prof. Tunji Olaopa has identified the bane of the institution as the erosion of value foundation .
Olaopa who is the Chairman of the Federal Civil Service Commission spoke as a special guest at the 58th International Conference of the Chartered Institute of Personnel Management of Nigeria (CIPM) in Abuja on Tuesday.
Delivering his goodwill message, Olaopa noted that the “bulk of the bureau-pathologies that the civil service has been trying to cure through reform since 1974, have to do with the erosion of its value foundation as an institution. And at that, in a measure, that also compromises such public administration’s principles and values of neutrality, merit, impartiality, democratic accountability, to name just a few”.
To him, restoring the value orientation of the public service therefore becomes a significant reform mission that is connected with the overall task of modernising the structures, processes, procedures, operations, and resilience that it requires to be fast, agile, streamlined, and tech- and performance-enabled in the language of the World Economic Forum.
According to him, since the HR function is cogent in this whole dynamic, reform in the public sector must necessarily transcend just professionalising the HR function, or in building in line managers people management skills while relocating the function from the back to the front office.
“Indeed, public HR managers will be required to facilitate the institution of new HR model that harnesses performance management to install a new productivity paradigm not just in the public sector but in the national economy. In so doing, it will be required to deepen the skills and competences of public managers with regard to risk management, and in management and operation research”, he said.
Olaopa stated that all
this must be achieved within a learning culture that challenges the status quo, and helps to champion specific cultural transformation, one that is directed at translating desirable culture and public service values into new work culture that is at once creatively disruptive, and structurally transformative.
He lauded the theme of the conference which in his estimation spoke enormously to the direction that global administrative and HR practices are headed as well as the murky waters of the 4th and 5th industrial revolution.
“It also makes the imperative need to further consolidate the strategic partnership of CIPM with the public sector an irreducible reform agenda item”, he said.
Celebrating the CIPM for serving the nation and the body of HR professionals this defining annual conference in its 58th incarnation, Olaopa said that
over the years, the organisation had defined itself as a professional body that had intentionally extended its frontiers beyond the private sector, where it has its forte, to the many ramifications of engaging with institutional reforms of the public sector in Nigeria
According to him, the 58th Conference runs under the theme “Repositioning for Value and Impact” which to him underscored the significant place of CIPM in management training as “When we connect the theme with that of the 57th and the 2025 Conference ‘Reimagining the New World of Work’, one sees in CIPM a professional body which through the deliberate curation of its annual conference themes, demonstrates steadfast commitment to anchoring vital discourses, driving contemporary trends in management practice, addressing the paradigm shifts and emergent trends that are shaping the trajectory of the HR profession, in time and space.”
Stressing the relevance of CIPM to the Federal Civil Service Commission, Olaopa said that it was quite easy to see how the CIPM became a very critical institutional reform partner with the FCSC and the entire federal service in general.
” In pursuing the reform objective to professionalize its secretariat, to transform into an expert HR hub in the Nigerian civil service, and in deepening its gatekeeping role for the public administration profession, my Commission sees great value in its strategic partnership with CIPM and other development partners in the administrative reform business
Connecting the theme of this Conference to the remit of my Commission, it is easy therefore to rehearse the discourse, join other professionals and well-wishers, to celebrate the CIPM for serving the nation and the body of HR professionals This vintage and defining annual conference in its 58th incarnation”, he said.