By Edwin Philip
University administrators have been described as the image makers of their universities, as they formed the backbone of the daily activities of the institutions, from dealing with the students to working with management.
This was reiterated during a paper presentation by the Registrar of Abubakar Tafawa Belewa University, (ATBU) Bauchi, Mr Kabiru Garba Aminu, at a workshop for Junior University Professional Administrators of Nigerian Universities.
Speaking on the topic the Rudiments and Techniques in Writing Minutes, Reports, Internal Memos, Circular and Decision Extracts, Mr Aminu said, whatever an administrator does affects the reputation and image of the university.
“So if you do a good memo, you are building the image of the university, if you are writing outside be sure you are writing the right thing, whatever you do it is the image of the university, when you go there it is the image of the university that you are selling” he said.
He implored university administrators to master the art of writing, cultivate a good working relationship with their seniors, as not doing so portray such as an administrator as arrogant and regarded as insubordination.
The ATBU Registrar, advised his junior colleagues to always share their writings with their bosses and other colleagues for their inputs and corrections so as to put up a good representation of the office and institution.
“I started as a green horn, the first time I wrote it was kept aside, but now I am training people on how to write, I want them to be committed, to be determined, not to think that they can not do it, they can do it, he added.
According to him, ” be precise and concise, use formal language,be detail and straight to the point, don’t feel bad when someone criticize your writing”.
On his part, the Registrar of igbinedion University Okada Edo State, Mr Ahola Orgeh, lecturing participants on Embracing Technology for Enhanced Administrative Efficiency, said that Information Technology (IT) is the current trends in managing and administering institutions such as the universities.
” It is about university administration and new trend of digitization, how we can catch up with the current trends, how we can you use internet to enhance our productivity in our work place, we know that if you talk about IT, someone will be thinking that you are talking about those people in core IT situation room, but IT applies to every facet of life, including university administration” he said.
He described administrators as the custodian of University records, “we are custodians of University records, begining from when the student is prepared for admission, when we received them when they come in, we maintained them when they are around and we bid them farewell when they are leaving for good or for bad’ he said.
According to him, It is keeping this records that sometimes becomes a problem, because over the time this records are in papers and they fades or get lost, or they get stolen, somebody who has an issue of discipline, will want to find a way to remove his information from the file, or even staff who have disciplinary problems will want to go to the file and remove things from there.
Adding that if this records are kept in paper form, they are subjected to human manipulations, environmental factors, such as fire incidents, flooding or anything that can affect the records, saying that the University is moving away from that to a new era, where records are digitize, kept in a digital form faraway from human manipulations.
Speaking on the advantages of being IT compliant and savvy, he said that it makes work easier, less personnel, less stressful to the individual more efficient, it also makes work more transparent.
Mr Ahola Orgeh, however advised the junior administrators to embrace digital technology as it will make their work easier, they should train themselves, get certificated to catch up with the modern trend and not necessarily waiting for the university to fund them as the future of administration lies on IT
Participants who took turns to ask the resource persons questions were given answers for the efficient working of the University system.
The three day training workshop for junior University Profession Administrators , which drew participants from over 13 universities across the Federal, States and private universities in the country, which took place at Bingham University located along Keffi Abuja Express way, Karu with the theme: Effective Administrative Practices for Enhanced Productivity is the University”, featured keynotes addresses, paper presentations, breakout hands-on seasons, questions and answer sessions, was aimed at refreshing the university administrators for optimal productivity.
