It’s coming up to my two-year anniversary at the City of Cape Town as a Flowstar, and what a ride it has been.
Because I pride myself on completing my work to the best of my ability and always being available to offer assistance, guidance and advice, I’ve often found myself quite proud of the work I’ve accomplished while at the city.
However, I’ve also had to learn a few hard lessons along the way.
Be flexible
The municipality is constantly under pressure from residents. With approximately 25 000 staff members serving all the inhabitants of Cape Town, residents can (occasionally) be forgiven for thinking their needs need to be attended to at once. Their urgency often affects the e-communication unit’s work as we either need to provide information directly to residents via website feedback, or we need to assist a department that requires information uploaded immediately because a resident has complained of the lack thereof.
That’s why I’ve learnt to always be flexible, whether it be with the list of tasks for the day or in my way of thinking.
You simply never know when you’ll receive an instruction from the mayor’s office to complete a task immediately. And when the mayor wants something completed, it’s in your best interest to drop everything else and do it.
Be prepared
Head of e-communication Martin Pollack has immense faith in his staff to showcase and put into practice their knowledge, whether digitally or in person.
I’ve learnt that he could call upon me at any moment to complete a task or present my solutions for problems to a variety of stakeholders, be they executive directors of the various directorates, mayoral committee members or even the city manager. And in the bureaucratic and hierarchical institution that is the City, it is heartening to know that I, just a contractor in their eyes, can be heard.
Manage change
The City has undergone a major rebranding and shift in its way of thinking – from “The City that Works for You” to “Making Progress Possible. Together”.
The shift in ideology empowers residents and the municipality to work together to achieve success, and allows residents to take some responsibility for improving infrastructure and services in Cape Town.
With the rebrand has come a lot of change to the way the e-communication unit performs. We have handed over some of our duties to the brand-implementing agencies and, while initially we found the working relationship quite challenging, we have learnt to embrace the strategy and all work together towards the common goal: producing a user-friendly website that can assist in empowering residents with information and take some of the strain off the City’s call centres.
Take time to connect
While the members of the e-communication unit all sit close together, we can all become incredibly focused on our work, and disconnected from each other. This is why all of us have made it a point to get together for lunch from time to time to reconnect.
We take a walk outside (sometimes a dash in the rain), recharge and refuel – and we simply do not talk about work during our lunchtime.
While it’s not always possible for the entire unit to take the time for a lunch outing, it is always satisfying when we do; it brings us closer as colleagues, which helps us to address various work-related concerns at any other point.
