NSSF targets talent pool to restore confidence

The State pensions manager, National Social Security Fund, is hiring close to 20 top managers in a move aimed at restoring confidence eroded by years of fraud and plunder that have seen contributors get poor returns.

NSSF is looking for professionals to serve in its re-jigged executive suites — with the creation of at least five new departments — under a staff restructuring conducted over the past one year.

The hiring is meant to inject new blood in key departments, especially Finance, Administration, Human Resource and Information Technology, which were found at fault by a November 2008 audit by the Inspectorate of State Corporations that unearthed more than Sh3 billion losses linked to weak investment decisions.

In an advertisement in local dailies on Wednesday, NSSF is looking for 19 managers to serve both in existing and new departments.

They will serve under the five freshly hired general managers.

The Fund has set up four new departments: Capital and Money Markets, Marketing and Brand, Ethics and Integrity as well as Strategy and Change.

NSSF managing trustee Alex Kazongo who took over the Sh80 billion workers’ pension fund in May last year told the Business Daily the recruitment is part of a raft of radical changes in management.

“We are on a new platform that requires a pool of key managers who can drive both the investment agenda as ensure the Fund is run prudently, ” said Mr Kazongo who is seen largely as a turnaround manager.

“We want to position NSSF as an outfit that is devoid of losses and mismanagement, a focus that can only be achieved by refreshing the structure to have people looking at risk, strategy and general investment, ” he said.

Business Daily has learnt that in the new look management structure, current managers have been asked to reapply.

The exercise, informed by a job evaluation conducted by audit firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) will see several departments hived from current ones.

Five regional managers will be hired while two others will handle property, a key investment vehicle for NSSF.

Management experts said the re-engineering at NSSF is an indication of a renewed effort to put proper structures in responding to calls for better governance and to build workers’ investments.

“It’s clear NSSF’s management has been in a shambles for many years. It has become important for the organisation to put the right people and structures in place to drive its strategy,” said Dr Mark Ogutu, a management lecturer at the Kenya Methodist University (Kemu). “For NSSF, its job is cut, it must invest workers contributions prudently for the best returns. That requires the right structure and the right people, ” said Dr Ogutu.

The creation of a position for the manager handling ethics and integrity is seen as the clearest signal the Fund was keen to addressing graft and governance loopholes, which have been blamed for years of plunder.