organisations – ManagersMag

April 21, 2023

Under the umbrella’s veil : Effectiveness of National Health insurances is key to attaining universal health coverage

Under the umbrella’s veil.

Health insurance in Kenya has been strained for many years, due to the preeminence of factors like fraud, low income levels among the key consuming publics, cost of health care, lack of knowledge on medical insurance and a cumbersome claim settlement procedure. At a century when it’s need is so defined, medical insurance providers ought to develop affordable products to avoid locking out many would-be clients who cannot afford to pay costly premiums.

No one plans to get sick or hurt, but most people need medical care at some point. Because of the uncertainty in when one will get sick or hurt, the idea of health insurance was coined so it would help wrap these costs or offer one a variety of other benefits relating to someone’s pursuit for health.

Truly speaking, the idea of health insurance has despite the great advancements in healthcare not been we’ll adopted and has been secluded as a thing for people working in the formal sector. People who are not in any formal employment in Kenya don’t consider the incentives that spending on an health insurance scheme would bring. However, cumulatively, if a country is able to scale up its measures and have all people registered under such schemes it facilitates access to care for countless citizens, resulting in lower death rates and better health care outcomes. On a basic level, health insurance can mean the difference between sickness and health or even life and death.

Healthy people and young adults may feel they don’t need health insurance, believing it is an expense they can forgo because they are rarely sick and have never spent a day in the hospital. But accidents and illnesses can happen to any of us at any time. Without health insurance, we are responsible for covering all of our medical costs, putting us at severe financial risk.

Health insurance links people to a regular source of care, giving them access to an infrastructure and a network of providers who are able to work with patients in delivering comprehensive, continuous and coordinated health care services. Ultimately, people can live longer, healthier lives because of access to ongoing care. Most health care plans offer preventive services, providing many vaccinations and screenings at no cost, thus preventing illnesses and ensuing complications.

Unlike what many Kenya’s assume having an insurance covers preexisting conditions in the case that if you have a diagnosis before you enroll, you’ll still qualify for health benefits. With health insurance, it is much easier for both the patient and provider to focus on prevention and wellness as well as the management of acute and chronic illnesses, leading to better health outcomes and lower costs.

Universal health coverage.

Universal health coverage in Kenya is where the whole population has access to appropriate, promotive, preventive, curative and rehabilitative health care when they need it and at an affordable cost. In the country it’s flagship which happened nearly a decade ago, was to attain two goals, the first being financial risk protection and the second, access to needed care. Yet it also includes objectives related to equity in access, quality services and broader social protection.

Health insurance has currently been utilized as a mechanism for promoting progress to universal health coverage (UHC) in Kenya. However the goal is still several inches away from it’s fruition, as some people still deem it as a new concept introduced by the government to swindle them and immerse them in deeper financial voids. However even the stakeholders are stupefied on how they modify the scheme so it can become more appealing to the Kenyans working in the informal sectors and who arguably form the biggest cohort of unregistered Kenyans. In this light, the government is seeking exclusivity to see how the scheme can cater for larger citizens. The efforts have yielded minimal results though it’s not wavering in it’s devotion to accomplish the UHC goal regardless of the slow pace.

Given that remote communities are now the priority of most insurance schemes, as insurance firms are working to see how they lure them in, Kenyans should understand the implications of health financing reforms and their preferred design features considered, to ensure acceptability and sustainability. For this, it will be of great value that communities are educated and engaged to ensure that the NHIS is acceptable to the population it serves mainly by eradicating the misleading perceptions and educating many Kenyans on it’s unseen value.

However the insurance problem is widespread and plagues many African countries alongside Kenya. But still, to sprout a first-paced African continent, the governments themselves should consider how they rehabilitate their health care systems to provide effective financial risk protection for all, as part of universal health coverage (UHC). The 75^th World Health Assembly which happened last year, urged member states to “ensure that health-financing systems introduce or develop prepayment of financial contributions for the health sector, with a view to sharing risk among the population and avoiding catastrophic health-care expenditure and impoverishment of individuals as a result of seeking care”. Following on this call, the World Health Report for 2019 focused on UHC and identified the important role played by health systems financing in making progress towards this goal. And in 2021, the World Health Assembly re-emphasized the urgency of implementing sustainable health financing structures and the need to monitor progress towards achieving UHC. Several other initiatives have been put forward to support progress towards UHC.

By collaborating with health care providers, medical insurance providers could negotiate cheaper health care costs for their members. Medical insurance providers should carry out marketing campaigns and should also open more branches in rural towns so as create more awareness on medical insurance and its benefits. Insurers should also introduce discounts for clients with few claims to encourage prudent usage of medical covers which are often misused resulting to increased costs.

April 20, 2023

How US Department of justice is helping Kenya to bloom women law enforcers.

Management mag

At a close spectrum, the role of women in law enforcement is under-looked given the daunting context of the assignments. Particularly men are on many occasions the cherished workers while women are discerned as their support personnel in law enforcement jobs. Although some women have went overboard to beat their male counterparts along their line of duty, their substantial function in the duty is shadowy and not easily distinguishable. In the past, the army was merely a reserve for men while women were trusted to handle other menial jobs that were less pendant on courage and body stamina.

This beges the question; Could there exist an advantage that the gender surpasses it’s male countdimension. “Yes, it does – absolutely,” said Major General Jami C. Shawley at the Africa region symposium on women in security. He asserts that women have an advantage in the enforcement of the law through their natural reconciliation feats, hence very pivotal in peace keeping and security.

In the previous years however, the number of women willing to undertake law enforcement and counterterrorism security has rose significantly prompting the United States departments of justice and state to make a move to facilitate the women into greater succession.

In the regional symposium that commenced June 27 2022 ending on the 1^st of June, the U.S department of justice, the U.S department of state and the government of Kenya joined forces to explore their essence of women in security. The gathering, attended by approximately 70 security and law enforcement professionals from eight nations around the African continent, discussed more on enhancing regional and strategic objectives in empowering women as important, essential contributors to security, law enforcement, and counterterrorism.

Now with the weeks long forum women will significantly get a facelift in this line of work and get to understand agreeably, their distinct role in the realm. The symposium that brought together women leaders from 8 African countries, intended to provide a forum for African women in law enforcement lines of work, to undertake career development training, reinforce the growth of women in law enforcement while facilitating counterterrorism efforts.

“The Engaging Multinational Policewomen on Equality and Rights (EMPoWER) program represents the very best of the Department of Justice’s International Criminal Investigative Training Assistance Program (ICITAP)’s commitment to increasing women’s participation and leadership in law enforcement, which bolsters operational effectiveness, expands police institutions’ abilities to engage local communities, broadens the perspective of operating environments, and strengthens police response to crime,” said ICITAP Director Greg Ducot.

The summit exemplified a dire need for the support of more women to embark on the career. Previously while most women in the sector were hurdled in the offices mostly to handle paperworks, the forum’s presenter A.Army Major General Jami C. Shawley, clarified that women had an advantage in peace and security and given their enhancement they would help African nations in curbing terrorism and suitably executing the law.

Through the EmPOwer program the forum builds the capacity of women to combat terrorism by supporting them through leadership opportunities and inclusion in counterterrorism efforts. After successfully conducting the symposium in Croatia the ATA through the US embassy Nairobi Kenya, the US department of justice and the other bodies, amassed the country to garner more from professional women law enforcers.

The ATA program is the U.S. government’s exclusive counterterrorism training and equipment provider for foreign law enforcement agencies. As mandated by U.S. Congress, ATA should promote three policies has three foreign policy objectives: to build counterterrorism capacity of partner countries; to enhance bilateral relationships; and to increase respect for human rights.

April 20, 2023

CREATING BONDS, GETTING CONNECTED, FOR A PROFITABLE WORKPLACE.

The existence of good bonds between employees creates a comfortable niche for workers an organization as they find it more satisfying to work together as a family. In the case where such bonds are nonexistent, employees lose focus and concentration as their minds are always clouded with unnecessary tensions and stress.

Every individual at the workplace shares a certain relationship with his fellow workers. Human beings are not machines who can start working just at the push of a mere button. They need people to talk to, discuss ideas with each other and share their happiness and sorrows. Mostly this is close to what is called human bonding, a process of development involving a close interpersonal relationship between two or more people. However, while human bonding concerns more with filial ties like between family members or friends, it can also develop among groups, including sporting teams and workmates more because these people spend quite a huge period of time together. Bonding is a mutual, interactive process, and is different from simple liking as its the process of nurturing social connection. In a human workplace it’s very key.

Because an individual cannot work on his own, they will always need people to be around to assist in tasks or even to chat with to speak up on some disturbing issue. If an organization is all empty, it is obvious that employees will not feel like sitting there and working. This emanates from the concept that isolated environments do demotivate people and even go further to spread negativity around them. That is why it’s very necessary that people become extremely comfortable with each other and work together as a single unit towards a common goal.

Bonds especially those between blood-tied people like family members is characterized by emotions such as affection and trust. However even with employees who over a long period of time sit alongside each other in the office, the likelihood is that their bond grows to something big relatable to that of family members. Shared activities also compel them to forming a personal relationship which in turn confers the workplace with a ‘family feel’ culture who’s usefulness include more satisfied staff, improved productivity and retention levels and better workplace accord and dynamics. Ultimately whether employees in an organizations ever gets to choose to embrace such a culture is entirely dependent on the decisions of their workplace as well as on its organizational goals.

However employee bonding is not something to surmise, as it can help coworkers learn more about each other and facilitate a more open work environment. That’s why it’s so important for teams to find ways to bond with one another. Understanding the ways employee bonding keeps your team communicating effectively, can help you determine the best ways to build stronger connections.

Employee bonding is particularly about that moment when coworkers connect, grow their relationships and become better collaborators in the workplace. Often its policies can lead to happier and more productive employees, which is important to creating a positive work culture and strong, effective teams. Employers, managers or supervisors can schedule opportunities for employee bonding for whole departments or organizations, but team members can also plan employee bonding events for small groups and teams, too. According to a CIPD survey, over half of employees want a workplace culture with a ‘family feel’. Yet despite this, just over a quarter describe their current workplace as such. This is because employees must coworkers get to know each other better possibly through ways like learning more about your coworkers’ work styles, personalities and personal interests so as to collaborate and work together better.

When such familial scenes are allowed to breed within offices, they improve team performance as workmates can relate in different ways including through understanding and respecting each other’s strengths, weaknesses and interests, which can help you all delegate and complete your work more efficiently. Also unlike when someone is on their own, team’s are more suitable to celebrate a workers achievements which greatly boosts an employee morale by enabling them to feel more satisfied with their workplace.

Through building bonds, workers are more inclined to not only maintain a focus in their line of work but to also think creatively by thinking innovatively. group brainstorming sessions as an example of how bonding stimulates innovative thinking can be wielded in the office, easily in occasions like conference room conventions.

Bonding in remote working

Companies with remote workers should find ways to have these kinds of meetings. There are many ways coworkers can get to know each other on a deeper level while at work, after the workday ends or in another professional setting. Team-building games, Team lunches, Personable meetings, Regular acknowledgments, Game tournaments, Charity events, After-work meetups

Team building and employee bonding may look different when working from home, but it is still possible and useful for employees. Ways through which remote working employees can pull up this very important bonding thing, entail Video conferences, Coffee talks, Team meals and Water cooler chatroom. However, video conferences are the more richer form of bonding than all the others as people can talk on video conferences and their peers can see their nonverbal cues such as posture, facial expressions and physical gestures. Video conferencing may help employees communicate better since nonverbal communication can improve the way people relate, engage and establish meaningful connections with one another. Holding regular meetings via video conference helps team members feel connected while brainstorming, making decisions and providing progress updates.