INITIATIVE AT WORK

When working at a telecommunications company I was approached by the Recreation Manager to be a member of the Committee as the Secretary of the District Recreation Association, who were all senior managers. I also assisted with the organising of a Multi-Gym Committee and was appointed to be the Secretary of this as well.

I gave constructive feedback and ideas on how the Multi-Gym's every day management could function efficiently and the collection of funds. But also to increase its membership participation for the long-term and not just the initial start-up phase of the gym.

Within two months the Gym was up and running smoothly and had a waiting list of three months approximately.

Whilst at a publishing company, after three months I observed a gap in the internal communications that needed to be addressed because of the vastness of the organisation and not knowing who did what within the company.

After doing my research, I approached the Chairman of the publishing company and had a meeting with him and did a presentation of my idea.

I was successful in negotiating an in-house newsletter to be produced to increase information internally, the vision of the company and profiles on management and employees (today's intranet), to enhance the company's reputation.

This brochure could be given to clients to read about the quality of the organisation and its successes as well as using to recruit new staff. This idea was put into effect the following month and was received well by staff and management alike.

At a international company, I was given the project of assessing future growth and opportunities. I was given the task of overhauling and maintaining the Supply Order System and the Monthly Overtime Report.

Upon taking the project, I found the systems were being operated in a random manner showing inefficient use of control in distribution. There were no stock control in supplies, and discrepancies in overtime payments were occuring.

Therefore, my report showed that both these systems could be efficiently brought under control, thus it would have been beneficial to the corporation and the reduction of costs which could have saved the company over a million a year in labour and distribution costs.

I gave the report with flowcharts to the Chairman and management, and did a presentation to the operations managers to collaborate on the solution and establish the measure of performance for better working standards.

I also had a meeting with the systems and planning department executive in an informal meeting and was given the advice to implement any project "if you can't go the straight path, go around to get results."