El màrqueting com a mentalitat i font d’orientació

terms of school building process

This section fulfils the research objective: Evaluate the interaction between the Ministry of Education and its stakeholders with regards to the school building process.

The interaction between the Ministry of Education and the stakeholder interviewees has been characterised with the lack of transparency and openness as well as constructive communication. Interviewee 1 Governor mentioned the rigidity of the administration which was about not being flexible and context-sensitive:

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First is the rigidity which means that the administration suggests policies and procedures and demand strict adherence to them in all circumstances. It is also when the administration does not give individual freedom which usually happens when there is a doubt about the development of employees Interviewee 1 Governor

Interviewee 1 Governor also added the lack of transparency and the presence of unqualified people made things more complicated and impacted the interaction with the administration:

Lack of transparency in dealing with finance or timeline may lead to the failure of the project and the loss of resources. Appointing unqualified people will also have its negative consequences as well as not being realistic in terms of deadlines, cost, and quality. And the capacity of implementing the project.

The lack of transparency makes it difficult to access the project-related files or be aware of what is going on:

The problem which may face us is that there is no transparency and easy access to all the files and documents. We may think that everything is OK but then we discover that the land is connected with another plan and that it belongs to another department.

Interviewee 2, Councillor attributed the lack of communication and interaction between the Ministry and stakeholders to the hierarchal pattern of administration where the high-position person on that hierarchy is meant to give orders and be obeyed while the task of the lower- positioned person is to listen and obey without asking or discussing:

In Iraq, there are a number of limitations for this stage which are related to the nature of hierarchal authority which depends on the person of a higher rank to give orders that should be carried out by the lower-ranked person. A dialogue is not usually established between persons. Also in Iraq working together is not available in the sense that everyone want to work separately to get credit from the higher-ranked persons

In other words, according to Interviewee 2, Councillor, bureaucracy and the hierarchal relationship are the features of the relationship with the Ministry.

Again bureaucracy is the basic problem and the hierarchal relationships among members of department and organisation. Interviewee 2, Councillor

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The lack of the team spirit is absent and every stage involves “many sides and every side works alone without the co-ordination with the other” Interviewee 2, Councillor

The lack of team spirit was also expressed by Interviewee 3 Educational officer who focused on the importance of the team spirit and the necessity to work as one team:

That there is no co-ordination between the departments in the sense that everyone does their work independently of the others. There is not sharing in the opinions or perspectives. We all need to draw upon the skills and experience of each other from within the Ministry and the partners and suppliers. We all need to define and justify the need of building new schools and agree and quantify the benefits that will be produced from the project. We need to agree on a defined plan. But as I have mentioned the challenge is that most of us are not used to work in a team. Interviewee 3 Educational officer

Interviewee 3, Educational officer, emphasised collaboration instead of competition. Everyone is competing with others to gain benefits from the higher-rank people:

We are not used to work as a team and we all have the competitive spirit rather than collaborative one. We all need to prove we are good to those who are ranked higher than us. We do not collaborate because we are afraid that the others steal our success. But this era requires us to behave differently Interviewee 3 Educational officer

Interviewee 4, Architect also emphasised the idea of transparency and agreed with the other interviewees that transparency is essential and having communication with the administration can make a lot of difference in terms of school building delivery. Transparency enables everyone be aware of the funds, the procedures and every project-related issues:

Very little transparency can be found between stakeholders and ministries. We need to know about the funding, the difficulties and limitations. Planning to build a school is a so sensitive matter which can be affected by a lot of things if there was no openness or directness. Planning based on non- understandable issues will lead to the failure of the project and the sequence of many disappointments in later stages. Interviewee 4, Architect

Interviewee 5, Procurement officer is critical of the hierarchal patterns and the too formal relationships between the stakeholders and the Ministry. This hampers any attempt to get the correct information about the project budget and the other issues:

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Sometimes I need to negotiate with people who are ranked higher than me in the hierarchal pattern where formal language and formal relations dominate. Also, getting the right information about the budget and funds is also important because this makes it clear to me to perform in the light of the available budget Interviewee 5, Procurement officer

The obstacle of the communication between the stakeholders and the Ministry is created by the hierarchal patterns and the buearocratic mentality that dominate the landscape of school building Interviewee 6, Finance Officer “We are ruled by a hierarchal patterns and a buearocratic mentality” Interviewee 6, Finance Officer.

Interviewee 11, procurement officer, mentioned a problem that is related to distant areas in Iraq which is centralisation which means that people in those distant areas should go through a very long and complicated process to sign a document or a contract in the capital:

Everything should go through the capital channels and then come back to us which is a waste of time, we do not have a lot of facilities because we do not live in the capital and this a problem. We need the permission from the centre to do anything so the difficulties start from the planning stage.

To sum up, the interaction between the Ministry of Education and the stakeholders is weak due to the hierarchical nature of administration which imposes a special kind of behaviour where the superiors do not listen to or negotiate with those of the subordinate who have to obey and keep silent. The spirit of team is also lacked and any success in the project is attributed to the individual or people in charge and not to the employees.