Transformational Leadership Concepts, a behavioral and attitudinal change advocacy group on Sunday 27th March 2022, held its first Time Keeping dialogue for the year where the speakers have encouraged Ghanaians to have a change in perception and attitude about time and be time conscious.
The virtual dialogue which was organized to coincide with Ghana month was under theme ‘’Time as a national resource’’ and had the Chief of Adidome and Convener of the group, Togbe Kwasinyi Kakakloko Agyeman V as the chairman.
The event was hosted Mrs Georgina Asare Fiagbenu, a communication for development advocate. The speakers for the dialogue were, Nana Kwasi Gyan Apenteng, a communications and culture consultant and Mrs. Comfort Ocran, a Motivational speaker and Author.
Expressing their views on the theme, speakers spoke about the concept of time from the cultural and organizational perspectives. They shared how the disregard for time has cost the lives of several Ghanaians through road accidents and the severe implications of lateness on the productivity output of workers and by extension, to the economic growth of Ghana.
The speakers observed that, whiles other people in different parts of the world are making good use of their time, those of us in this part of the world are not utilizing this important resource well.
Nana Gyan Apenteng, admonishing especially public officials on their poor attitude towards time especially to public events, he identified the concept of Self-importance as the main driver of lack of punctuality of public officials. He said ‘’ Leaders should arrive early at events. Elsewhere, the important person is even the first person to arrive at the event first and therefore.’’ ‘’Our public officials must regard time as a very important national resources and respect it at all times.’’
On her part, Mrs Comfort Ocran quoting biblical passages and recent happenings around the world shared that, time means different things to different people at different locations. Explaining the differences between a time and a season, she said ‘’ for me, time talks about a hard stop and a season talks about the period’’ she further identified two perceptions of time as seen by cultures and encouraged participants to recognize the importance of both perceptions and prioritize things that must be done at a given moment or time.
The speakers therefore called on participants to sign a social compact to be time abiding, event organizers should endeavor to provide details about the event they are organizing to their speakers as well as speakers who for some peculiar reasons may not be at a particular program on time, should give some allowance to event organizers to proceed with the event without their presence.
The event was attended by traditional leaders, professors, professionals, and students.
The Time keeping initiative is being undertaken to help in creating a better Time Keeping culture in Ghana. It was launched to improve the chronic lateness and lack of respect for time and timekeeping in Ghana. The national timekeeping initiative is targeted at policy makers, media , legislators , event organisers, corporate leaders, politicians, teachers, professionals, the youth , civil society and behavioural change agents.
