For every advert published for teaching positions, the Uganda Education Service Commission receives thousands of applications in hard copy from teachers across the country waiting for an opportunity to join the government payroll. With a permanent staff count of just 64 persons, sorting through tens of thousands of applications year-in-year-out has always been a tedious and unforgiving task that is prone to human error.

Among other duties, the Education Service Commission is constitutionally mandated with recruiting and appointing all personnel in the education service for various education institutions in Uganda. For the most part, the Commission’s work revolves around processing applications from prospective teachers and non-teaching staff. Last year alone the commission was tasked with sorting through 35,000 applications.

‘This work is tedious, costly, prone to human error, and tiresome. Many times, files are misplaced or lost and scattered all over the place due to lack of storage,’ says Sophie Nantongo, Undersecretary Education Service Commission.

With the uptake of the digital revolution across all sectors including education, the fortunes at the Education Service Commission are changing.

‘In a bid to improve our efficiency, we have decided to go digital. However, going from manual to digital typically undergoes several significant changes. Manual and digital are two very different ways of managing operations. Manual operations are typically done on a batch basis with a lot of repetitive tasks that rely on human judgment and skill for the outcome. Digital operations, on the other hand, are built around rules-based processes where decisions are automated. We have a long change management and behavior change journey ahead of us’, Sophie Nantongo says.

Indeed, the transition from manual to digital at the Education Service Commission is no longer a question of whether to transit; but rather how to make the transition as fast and as efficient.

Staff Training and Creating Buy-in

In theory, the transitioning may appear easy but putting it into practice is where the actual work begins.

‘Customization of the system is the doable part. Training, adoptability and usage are the more serious tasks,’ says Lillian Bukenya, Principal Officer ICT, Education Service Commission.

As with all change management, training and creating buy-in of all staff is paramount. Lack of effective training could lead to a degradation in performance which may hurt the recruitment procedures.

‘Our recruitment process has various sections and stages of approval. While many of the key approving members have a good understanding of how the system works, the digital skills and literacy among our staff vary greatly. There is still need for more refresher courses and system support, but I am confident that we are off to a good start,’ adds Lillian Bukenya.

Training on a digital system is different from conventional training. To incorporate the varying digital literacy rates one-on-one targeted trainings were used. While this method was slower and more time consuming, it is expected to be much more efficient.

Setting up of Regional Hubs

Besides training needs of staff at the Commission, there are also challenges with digital literacy as well as access to digital infrastructures among many of the teachers who are the prospective applicants.

Internet availability and infrastructure in the rural communities where many of the applicants come from was a foreseen recruitment challenge. To mitigate this a network of digital hubs within Northern Uganda and West Nile region have been setup to provide local access to the platform without incurring the cost of traveling to Kampala.

‘We train and interact with teachers here every day when they come to set up their online teacher registry. Can you believe some teachers are afraid to touch a mouse worried that it may break?’ says Sharif Munguci, Buti Royal Digital Hub administrator.

This is a clear indication of the low digital literacy levels amongst the applicants the commission serves. To address this constraint, digital hub administrators have been trained to assist the teachers to access the platform. With these regional hubs, the risk of lack of smart phones or digital skills is eased and in the long run the digital skill set of the applicants is built.

Like many at the Commission, Sharif is convinced that as applicants continue to use this soon-to-be mandatory digital system to apply for jobs, their digital skills will grow. They will then be able to use other digital platforms in the country such as tax payments to Uganda Revenue Authority, accessing their National Social Security Fund accounts, and other Public Service Systems.

Looking to the future

It is widely known that convenience is one of the perks of digitalization. In rural communities the opportunities precede convenience to incorporate inclusion, economic relief and social benefits. For example, women, youth and refugees who would usually not have the opportunity to apply for jobs because of the distance and cost implications can now apply for jobs in the comfort of their home communities. The pool of qualified applicants grows and staffing needs can be met faster and more efficiently. A process that would usually take seven to eight months can now be concluded in three months or less.

Staff shortages in schools across the country will be significantly reduced, and the confidence in the recruitment system of the education sector is expected to improve.

However, the success of the platform is reliant on critical drivers. Partnerships with key stakeholders such as local government officials, education institutes and the applicants themselves is what will make this transition process seamless.

Training institutions are a good training ground for this system as the students of these institutions are the clients of the system. But most importantly the support from the government financial and ICT regulators shall continue to play a big role.

With many government sectors going digital right now, it seems like the future of recruitment will be digital or nothing at all. The COVID-19 pandemic is a key indicator that digitalization is taking over the world. In the education sector a web-based recruitment system allows applicants and recruiters to process jobs from anywhere at any time. As the whole world continues to hope for the best, a digital recruitment platform is one of the benefits that would be available in this sector post the pandemic.