MEET THE STAFF SERIES

From N10m to N16m, My Tenure in Luggard Remains the Most Nostalgic - Muhammad Gana

CCD: Can we have your brief profile please?

MAG:
My name is Muhammad Ahmed Gana. I had my early education in Kaduna, I attended Ahmadu Bello University Zaria where I obtained my first degree; I also have a master’s degree in public Administration. I was employed in this Company on 1^st September 2015.

CCD: What is it to be Supervising a Service Center?

MAG: Well, it is a mixed bag; an honour of being call to service amongst many and a serious challenge. In other words, it has both the positive and the not-too pleasant sides.

CCD: Can you share it with us?    

MAG:The good side of it is that we’ve been able to make remarkable in revenue generation. By this I mean we’ve been able to make steady growth in our cash collections, that’s on the good side. Like the first time I was appointed as a supervisor, that was as far back as December 2015,

I was deployed to Nasfat Service Center, that is Hayin Banki, I was able to make a collection of 2 million naira in the first month, but by the time I left, I was able to grow the collection to about 6-7 Million naira monthly. We were able to block a lot of leakages, we were able to establish a good relationship with the community  despite the fact that it is high density area, we were able to win the trust of the people and that really assisted us in achieving our targets as at then. So also in Constitution Service Center, we did the same thing; we reduced the rate of energy theft thereby reducing the losses we incurred on the feeder. The losses on that feeder was significantly reduced by the time I left the Service Centre. So also when I was at Lugard Service Center, we did a lot of work pertaining reducing losses. In fact that was where I had my best collection so far in Kaduna Electric. I met an average monthly collection of 10 Million naira, but before I left there, we set a record which is 16 Million naira with 10 Million naira on just pure billing.

 CCD: What do you consider as the most challenging part of supervising people and managing customers?

MAG: Well, managing people is a very difficult task, you need to study people, know their strengths and weaknesses, their values, emotions, etc. You need to apply social phycology in dealing with people, you need to know what makes them productive and what hamper their productivity; we need know if their domestic issues are affecting their official engagement, so for you to be able to amend the situation, so I think it’s been so far, so good.

CCD: So what’s your total Customers Population and classification in Dawaki?

MAG: Well, we have a total customer base of about 2,750 that’s the active customers and as for the classifications, we have both the residential and a handful of commercial customers, but the majorly are residential customers. 

CCD: How do you ensure fairness among your workers?

MAG: Dawaki Service Centre has a mixture of both the middle/working class customers and the ghettos. Just recently, some clusters from Rabah Road Feeder, were transferred to Dawaki. so what we do in other to be fair to all is, for each and every SR that has a cluster in the GRA part, we make sure that we also give that same SR a cluster in the ghetto side so each and every one of the three SR’s in Dawaki have their green customers, yellow customers and they have their red customers as well. So we segregate the customers in Dawaki into three broad classes; we have the Green, Yellow and the Red and each and every SR has green, yellow and Red customers. In addition, we work as one team even though with different roles. So whenever one team member have any issue, he/she having escalated the issue to me, we will now sit down and look at it, fashion-out  how we can assist if it’s something that is within our operational jurisdiction in the Service Center and where it is outside our jurisdiction, then we will escalate it to the Area Office and the Area Manager has been very helpful and attends to all issues taken to him promptly.

CCD: What do you consider as your major achievement since you assume duty in the Service Center?

MAG: Well, that’s a Million Dollar question, I will say the unity of purpose, synergy and co-operation among the team members. I have been able to achieve a lot in terms of managing my staff; in all the service centers that I have been, there has never been a day that we had any rumble between staff so I can score myself excellent pertaining that, I was able to see that we have the unity of purpose in all the 5 service centers that I have been service center manager. The most memorable achievement that I will like you to know is my cash collection record in Lugard Service Centre, because there I met an average monthly collection of 10 Million but I had an achievement of taking that collection to like 16 Million naira then I left Lugard Service Center a fulfilled Manager.

 CCD: Any Appeal or Suggestion to Staff or Management?

MAG: The only appeal I have is to our staff; we should have the fear of God in everything we do, we should know that whatever task given to us is a trust and there will be a day that we will stand before Almighty God to give account of our deeds. As for the Management, they should ensure the implementation of the recently approved condition of service.