This research explores the application of scenario planning to an engineering and project management consulting company based in Durban, South Africa. Scenario planning is used to formulate possible scenarios that this company' main client industry/ market may face in the next ten years. This application provides an opportunity for the consultancy to test if it is necessary for it to start pursuing other markets in order to minimize risk associated with its core market and mostly it prepares the consultancy for opportunities and threats that may exist but is currently not aware of. The research takes the following approach and sequence: . Introduction: The section gives a background into Bosch projects and the sugar industry. It also places me in the context of the research. . Literature Survey: In this section I review general thinking around strategy formulation, organizational learning, metaphors and system thinking. I also draw a link amongst these areas of learning. . Research Methodology: This section presents the methodology I followed in conducting the research. The research started with conversations with research participants followed up with questionnaires. The questionnaires were supplemented with one- on- one interviews with the participants in order gain more clarity on their responses. Scenario planning exercises were conducted with Bosch Projects' management team and the sugar industry participants. Three scenarios were developed with BP and another three with the sugar industry. I developed two additional scenarios for each group for my own interest. . Results Analysis: In this section I present the results of the research process. I start off by discussing the environmental scan analysis which describes the external environment within which the sugar industry operates. This discussion is informed by the results of the interviews with the participants. The general consensus was that the industry is faced with many positive possibilities. It also became clear that the industry is not taking full advantage of opportunities already available to them. In the same section I present the scenarios developed which highlight the challenges faced by the country and how they could affect the industry in the long term. . Conclusion: I then close off the research by making a conclusion that Bosch Projects has a positive future when viewed through the sugar industry lens irrespective of which uncertainties materialize but there are key issues which the company must address in order to be prepared for any of the eventualities. . Value: This research eventually revealed itself to be about learning to effectively lead a scenario planning session and what pitfalls to look out for when creating storylines. There is great value for people interested in finding progressive and well informed ways for strategy formulation. This scenario planning research is grounded on the concepts of a learning organization and systems thinking as the core drivers / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2010.

The purpose of this study is to explore pedagogic leadership from a systems thinking perspective. The aim is to develop an understanding that pedagogic leadership, from a systems thinking perspective, plays an integral role in improving the approach in teaching and learning and hence in students’ outcomes. Semi-structured interviews were used as a tool to solicit detailed information about the presence of pedagogic leadership from a systems thinking perspective in schools. This study was undertaken in three selected high schools in the South Durban region, KwaZulu-Natal. The respondents were the principals of three schools and, focus groups of grade 12 teachers and students. The research paradigm was based on the interpretative approach enquiry. Questions that were answered by this study were: • What are the key dimensions of leadership in learning and teaching? • How would these dimensions be evident in a school? • How can these dimensions be initiated, nurtured and developed? Findings revealed that there is: an absence of shared vision and sense of mission about students learning; a lack of commitment to mission realisation by staff and students; teachers are not empowered to manage the National Curriculum Statement (NCS); moral values are not instilled; teachers do not understand how students learn; and teachers are overburdened by administrative work which impacts negatively on their teaching. It is concluded that pedagogic leadership, from a systems thinking perspective, does not exist in the selected schools where the study was conducted. Although there is absence of shared vision, some schools are very active and perform well. The department of education is urgently required to address these issues as they form the basis of effective teaching and learning to improve students’ outcomes. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2009.

The recent global economic challenges have drastically impacted several economic sectors across the world. As such, Eskom, the South African electricity utility, has experienced a number of changes, ranging from the organisational structure to the functional processes or models, to meet the demands of the volatile global market. This research acknowledges that the Eskom Transmission organisation, a division within Eskom, has interrelated departmental processes. However, the transition from the conceptual phase to the execution (implementation) phase had a number of misalignments. These manifested in the following challenges, amongst others: late execution and completion of projects which often results in cost overruns; poor quality completed projects; a high number of projects at execution stage with inadequately defined scope of work which led to scope changes during implementation; and a high staff turnover, particularly of project managers. As such, the project lifecycle model was adapted to address these challenges. This research focused on the change management principles that were followed in realising the new Eskom Transmission lifecycle model, and investigated the impact that this had on the people “living” with the new model as well as the inter-departmental relations, control mechanisms, attitude towards the management, and organisational performance. Available literature on change management, as well as some aspects of organisational behaviour, such as organisational performance, were utilised to try and provide an understanding of the above-mentioned areas of interest. The chosen and most appropriate methodology for collecting data was the qualitative approach as it allowed for descriptive and extensive information gathering. The researcher sought subjective information through human interpretation. For data collection, a comprehensive questionnaire for all the stakeholder groups was used, as well as documentation analysis. The data was then analysed and interpreted, which allowed for pertinent findings and recommendations to be made. The findings included the establishment that Eskom Transmission adapted Kotter’s (1988) eight stage model in implementing its new lifecycle model. The impact of Eskom Transmission’s new lifecycle model on the people “living” with this model was found to be premature to measure. However, an improvement has been noted in the definition of the scope of work for projects, possibly owing to more effective interactions between employees during project meetings and is an indication that the new model is a contributor towards improving Eskom’s organisational performance. Further findings included inadequate stakeholder consultation, which rendered the followed implementation strategy non-optimal; as well as varied stakeholder views on the support of the new lifecycle model for Eskom Transmission’s goals and vision. The latter suggests an opportunity for Eskom Transmission management to review the lifecycle model to improve its alignment to the division’s goals and vision in order to encourage commitment levels which, amongst others, impact organisational effectiveness. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2010.

The Gikongoro Agricultural Development Project (GADP) was implemented in Gikongoro in 1990 and terminated in 2001. It covered 83,508 ha with 250,000 habitants and had a target group of 42,000 farm families, with an estimated total budget of U$ 31.2 million. Its objectives focused on land development, increase of farm crops, environmental conservation and protection, stores and roads construction and bank loans for small farmers. Its expected impacts included the increase of incomes, enhancement of nutritional status and the resolution of the employment problem. The project was closed without achieving these goals. On the basis of this situation, the following research questions were raised: • How and to what degree did inadequate processes of management and evaluation contribute to the GADP failure? • How and to what degree did external environmental events prevent the GADP from achieving its objectives? • How was the participatory development approach used by the GADP in the process of learning? • What were the main causes that led the GADP to fail? • What could be done and what lessons could be drawn from this experience for the benefit of ongoing and future projects operating in Rwanda? The answer to these questions required a review of literature regarding project management and evaluation principles and organizational environment. The methods used for data collection included documentation, systems thinking, observation and interviews. Thematic analysis and systems thinking were used for data analysis. The findings located the reasons for GADP failure in different problem areas. The civil war of October 1990 and the genocide of April 1994, and frequent droughts, swept away the GADP resources. The GADP failed to identify the real needs of the beneficiaries (farmers), coordinate its stakeholders’ activities, and cooperate and communicate adequately with them. This resulted in delays and budget overruns. The failure to bring together management and evaluation caused the project to be ineffective and inefficient in its management of resources. The GADP closed having made no significant positive impacts on the farmers, especially women. To prevent future potential failures, it is recommended to introduce systems thinking in Rwandan higher education programs and to develop strong partnerships between public and private role players. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2011.

Development projects are increasingly becoming tools to support developing countries to overcome their systemic barriers to development. International and bilateral development agencies channel billions of dollars in such projects or programs every year in hope to boost local development, but until now after decades of efforts and social investments no concrete development in those countries status have been spotlighted as a consequence of these. Rwanda as a small land locked developing Country in the heart of Africa has been allocated amount of grants and supports for many years and have been benefiting from an overwhelming international attention after the genocide of 1994 and one can wonder if these development programmes and projects have been of significant usefulness to the recipients. In such a move, this dissertation aims at systematically evaluating project outcomes through assessment of beneficiaries’ expectations grasped through a case study namely the Decentralization and Community Development Project (DCD) in Rwanda. It is also intended to provide a clear idea of what the project has achieved so far and what beneficiaries’ expectations were not met. In order to achieve research objectives, a systematic research method have been followed. It is therefore, important to recall that evaluation approaches as supported by Khandker and al. (2009), have evolved significantly, making difficult for an evaluator to choose the model or approach which is particular for a specific context suggesting that there is no universal and unique evaluation approach. In this research they were no move from this statement. Actually it was found worthy the use of a mixture of qualitative and quantitative research methodologies to capture the real outcomes of the project. In fact using qualitative methods helped to understand the key players who would have influenced the project implementation and by using quantitative methods and recording the recipients’ aspirations and the effective outcomes from the project. We hypothetically assumed that DCDP did not provide enough outcomes as expected by recipients and in order to prove that, collected data from a random sample of 96 people out of a population of 256334 and 80 answers were collected back. Several unstructured interviews were conducted with project key players comprised of the project team, the local government, and the government officials in charge of the project as well as the World Bank Country Office. Excel were used to analyse collected data so as to allow a better analysis and interpretation of the data. As stated in the main argument, assumption were made that the project did not meet the stakeholder’s expectations but some salient findings of the study proved this to be wrong. In fact, more than 80% people in the project area recognised the project outcomes significance to their lives. Furthermore, the result shows that the project had an important impact on the community. For instance, the DCD project improved considerably the life conditions of the population of the district’s population; as an example, the recipients acknowledged at 100% that the DCD project increased both the employment and the revenue in the district of HUYE. This have a huge meaning, because it is ascertaining the hypothesis that DCD project participated in improving life conditions of the population, while giving a whole meaning to the project in the eyes of all the stakeholders. The main recommendation of the study was about the usefulness on involving the recipients (beneficiaries) in all the project process, including pre-identification so that the project may tackle the real problems of the beneficiaries. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2009.

Leadership styles have been shown to have an impact on the success or failure of projects in organizations. Effective leadership is therefore required by organizations to ensure the successful delivery of projects. The study aimed at investigating the leadership styles utilized by women project managers in the Eskom Enterprise Division and possible barriers that prevent them from reaching top positions. The study utilized leadership theories as the theoretical framework and used the qualitative research approach. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 15 female project managers in Eskom Enterprise Division and thematic analysis was used to analyze the data. Certain leadership styles and characteristics were identified as being critical for successful project managers. The characteristics that these women project managers exhibit described qualities of transformational, democratic and people oriented leadership styles. The women project managers seem to be successful and there were a number of factors that contributed to their success. The female project managers did not believe that gender should determine their leadership style, but they believed that working as a project manager required certain leadership skills and competencies to meet the project’s objectives and the leadership style was not influenced by gender. Some of the barriers identified were: gender stereotyping, lack of qualifications, fear of not succeeding, family responsibilities and lack of networking skills and time. Most of the women believe that breaking some of the barriers requires that they should work twice as hard as their male counterparts, and that they should prove wrong the stereotype that men are better project managers. Furthermore, the findings show that Eskom has few women occupying top management positions. Eskom is still a male dominated environment even though initiatives for gender transformation exist. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2011.

The essence of this dissertation is to enlighten the client on those strategic options available for a financially viable energy source and is also aimed at increasing the electricity share of the energy market, which is currently approximately 25%. This dissertation focuses on the industrial sector of the economy. Energy sources available to the Industrial sector, namely coal, diesel, illuminating paraffin, heavy fuel oil, liquefied petroleum gas and electricity, were selected for this specific study and compared in eight geographic areas. These inland areas include Pretoria-Witwatersrand- Vereeniging (PWV), Bloemfontein, Pietersburg and Nelspruit, and the coastal areas include Cape Town, Durban, Port Elizabeth and Richards Bay. As the energy cost is not the only factor influencing the total cost of using a particular energy source, the objective for this study was also to evaluate energy sources on an effective cost basis, taking account of energy price as well as indirect costs and utilization efficiencies. The typical industrial application of steam generation was selected and the costs related to using various energy sources in this application evaluated. This study also considers critical factors likely to be taken into account by consumers when choosing an energy source, or deciding on an energy conversion, which includes Demand Side Management (DSM). DSM refers to a process by which electric utilities especially Eskom, in collaboration with consumers achieve predictable and sustainable changes in electricity demand. These changes are affected through a permanent reduction in demand levels (Energy efficiency) as well as time related reduction in demand level (Load Management) / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of Kwazulu-Natal, 2005.

The power and influence that large businesses enjoy in the areas of wealth creation, and in broader societal and environmental issues generally, is unprecedented in human experience. This dominance however, has its detractors in the form of diverse stakeholder groups, some of whom are sceptical about the social, environmental and corporate governance behaviours and performance of large organisations. High-profile cases of corporate misconduct have fuelled a crisis of legitimacy in the minds of some of these stakeholders. As a consequence, these stakeholders are demanding higher levels of transparency, accountability, trust and integrity from organisations, whilst also acknowledging the fact that these organisations must remain economically viable. Business leaders and analysts are increasingly appreciative of the potential value that can be created or conserved through visibly endorsing incrementally higher standards of social, environmental and ethical behaviour in their organisations. Progressive and responsible organisations across the world are either contemplating, or have already implemented, corporate responsibility programmes. These organisations include banks operating in the South African financial services industry. This research contends that various issues and trends are driving changes in banks operating in South Africa. One driver of change is an imperative to reduce the reputational risk profile amongst these banks, and has caused most of the larger South African banks to embrace corporate responsibility programmes to some extent. This research deals with an emerging and important dimension of corporate responsibility in the banking industry in South Africa, namely supply chain corporate responsibility. The primary objective of this research was to explore and describe the state of supply chain corporate responsibility programmes and practices in the banking industry. Specifically, it investigated and analysed how these programmes have been structured and implemented, the challenges that such programmes have encountered, the maturity of these programmes in these banks, and the outcomes of these programmes. The research was conducted in a phased approach, and followed a typical business research methodology. A literature search was conducted in order to reflect on the context, background and components of the wider field of corporate responsibility, the major drivers of change in the banking industry in South Africa, and the emerging role of procurement functions as the champions of supply chain corporate responsibility in these institutions. This included procurement departments' roles as facilitators of supply chain corporate responsibility programmes in their organisations. In addition, the literature search identified potential opportunities, challenges and pitfalls associated with supply chain corporate responsibility, and cited examples of best-practice supply chain corporate responsibility programmes in various companies. The research problem statement, the research framework, and the primary and secondary research objectives for this research were then compiled. A questionnaire was drafted, seeking to elicit views and comments on the state of supply chain corporate responsibility amongst selected respondents in the banking industry in South Africa. Once responses to this questionnaire had been received, the results were recorded and analysed, conclusions were drawn from these results, and recommendations were complied for future research in this area. The research revealed and concluded that supply chain corporate responsibility programmes are not mature or extensively developed in banks operating in South Africa. An aspiration-adoption gap exists, between what banks aspire to do in regard to supply chain corporate responsibility, and the programmes that they have implemented in practice. While banks that implemented supply chain corporate responsibility programmes have identified those areas in their procurement cycles that corporate responsibility impacts upon, important and best-of-breed supply chain corporate responsibility steps and practices have not been implemented in these institutions. Supply chain corporate responsibility programmes were considered to be able to create or conserve business value amongst banks operating in South Africa. There was a broad appreciation amongst these banks that supply chain corporate responsibility programmes should deliver nett positive results and value in their organisations. However, supply chain corporate responsibility programmes do face various significant challenges and pitfalls. These challenges and pitfalls need to be addressed and resolved if supply chain corporate responsibility programmes are to deliver their rightful value. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2007.

In the nineties, the new political dispensation in South Africa ushered in an era where power and relationship structures of government would be people centered. Section 23 of the Constitution provides for fair labour practices, and subsequent employment laws gives effect to these constitutional rights. Laws introduced new structures and procedures that required greater cooperation. This required a change in mental models, while transcending past unfair labour practices and moving towards more harmonious relationships. Labour Relations is a relatively closed system, because the rule of law is specific about the outcome of a particular action. The Labour Relations Officer is only required to mechanically apply the legislation and policies when providing guidance and support in the organisation. The success of the Labour Relations Officer may be measured by the degree to which they make themselves redundant; that is the extent to which policies, structures, systems and processes instituted and the advice given, allow other managers and supervisors to manage their people on their own. While the transactional role and competencies for Human Resources practice are easy to define, the substantive issues like labour relations are less clear and there is no consistency in the manner in which labour relations is structured, practiced and managed. Prior to the new employment laws, government departments operated on a staff rotation system. Employees were placed in labour relations through the rotation and placement exercise. As a result Labour Relations was staffed with administrators without the appropriate qualifications, skills and experience. Labour Relations is located within the Human Resources Section in the Government Departments in KwaZulu Natal. At the commencement of this study I was employed by the Provincial Department of Housing as an Assistant Manager. The employer and employee relationship was poor, and this was evident by the number of grievances and disputes. Advice was not provided timeously by Labour Relations and advice was also not accepted by management, thereby resulting in disputes. Unions complained that they were not consulted on matters of mutual interest and Labour Relations was accused of being rigid around employment issues. Labour Relations Officials were also viewed as being "partial" because they actively participated in the discipline and arbitration process. The Department of Housing fell under the jurisdiction of the General Public Service Sectoral Bargaining Council, and even collective bargaining was entrenched in the "us and them " mentality. Issues for negotiation were on the agenda for months as the parties were not willing to compromise. The purpose of this study is to explore the emerging set of competencies for Labour Relations Officers operating within the General Public Service Sectoral Bargaining Chamber in KwaZulu- Natal. Competencies refer to the set of knowledge, skills, abilities and behavior. This qualitative study was undertaken through conversation interviews with Labour Relations Officers, employees and unionists that operate within the jurisdiction of the Bargaining Chamber. The intention of this study is to add value to the practice of labour relations, by assisting Labour Relations Officers to re-invent themselves as the champions of transformation. Furthermore this research would be of value to labour relation's and Human Resource Management staff and students. NOTE: 1. For the purpose of this study the title of Labour Relations Officer and Labour Relations Practitioner are taken to mean the same thing. 2. Reference to the Labour Relations Officer in this study is in the masculine. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2005.

The purpose of this study is to explain the dynamics of the interaction between the different stakeholders at Mangosuthu University of Technology (MUT) from a student development point of view. The study is conducted in order to develop an effective communication system that can assist in the management of relationships. The literature review presents an analysis of key documents. It focuses on the management of relations as well as the role that is played by communication in this regard. The systems approach provides a theoretical framework that guides the views of the researcher. Chapter Three outlines the design and procedure of the study. The research approach adopted by the researcher is qualitative and is based on a case study, which is Mangosuthu University of Technology. The following research methods are applied in the study; that is, the analysis of documentation, observations and a focus group, together with the application of questionnaires. Chapter Four presents a combination of qualitative and quantitative research data. The first part of the chapter focuses on observations that were made by the writer over a period of six months. This is followed by the analysis of the questionnaire. The last part discusses the responses that were elicited from the focus group. Chapter Five leads to the conclusive section of the whole study and it is an extension of Chapter Four in which the results of the research carried out are presented. The findings reveal that a systems approach has a significant role to play in assisting an organisation in managing relations. This approach recognises the existence of inter-relations between different parts of an organisation. The study concludes that MUT needs to take steps to create a knowledge-based institution where there is flexible learning, available anywhere, anytime and on any topic. / Thesis (M.Com)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2009.