The Barbados Postal Service is poised for a major overhaul over the next five years, as postal officials mull a blueprint to modernise the service and expand its role beyond traditional mail delivery.
Minister of Home Affairs and Information Gregory Nicholls announced the initiative during the opening of a customer service training programme for postal employees, held in collaboration with the National Transformation Initiative (NTI) on Wednesday.
(Photo Credit: Lourianne Graham/Barbados TODAY)
He did not disclose specific details of the nature of the reforms.
Nicholls described the training as preparation for one of the biggest transformations in the modern postal service’s 175-year history, and urged postal workers to embrace the changes:
“The government has chosen to lead, and that is why we are going to pursue a bold vision for the Barbados Postal Service, one that I have described from mail delivery to national connectivity. I have submitted to the postmaster general a blueprint of how that transformation programme will look over the next five years.”
Staff will also have an input into shaping the transformation before the next steps are taken, Nicholls said.
“I’ve asked her and management to comment on it, to critique it. Even let your staff have a say in how that is to be constructed so that we can build a transformation model that works for all of us. I hope that we can get into discussing it soon. From mail delivery to national connectivity, those are six words, and they capture a profound shift in how we think about the postal service.”
He stressed that the Barbados Postal Service will no longer be just about mail delivery, but will connect people to opportunities, entrepreneurs to markets, communities to government services and small businesses to regional and international communities “through reliable logistics, digital innovation, and trusted public service. In other words, the Barbados Postal Service must become far more than a postal operator”.
He said achieving that vision would require significant investment.
“It must become a modern national connectivity service. That transformation requires investment. It requires better technology. It requires stronger logistics systems. It requires modern facilities. It requires new partnerships. It requires innovation.
“But above all else, it requires people because no matter how sophisticated our technology becomes, no matter how modern our abilities become, no matter how many services we introduce, none of these investments will achieve their full value unless the people who represent this organisation every day are equipped, motivated, and inspired to deliver excellence.”
The transformation will introduce new technologies, systems, responsibilities, and opportunities for employees, urging them to see themselves as partners in the process rather than observers.
Director of the NTI, Dr Allyson Leacock, said the purpose of the training programme, dubbed the Art and Heart of Service, goes beyond customer service.
The focus is on serving from the heart rather than treating service as transactional, she said.
“We are going to add to the arsenal of skills that we know you already have because, as the Barbados Postal Service, you are our very best friends…you are custodians of all that matters for us. Mail is more than an item; it is a promise that you execute with great skill and distinction.”
Dr Leacock told the postal workers they are joining an international movement embracing new values in a digital ecosystem. She stressed that through this movement their mindset is just as important as their skill set.
“In demonstrating the values of a new generation, a new digital ecosystem that requires all of us to shift how we work, and that is what this training really will capture: the importance of the mindset alongside the skill set.
“The digital ecosystem requires all of us to be digitally literate and for us to get there and enjoy it, and use it as a tool that gives us more choice; we hope to share with you the power of the culture of transformation, how culture and transformation work. The culture of consideration through disability etiquette. The personal excellence that I demonstrate in my deportment, my personal branding and communications, and then the core of how we work in our ethics and integrity.”
Postal services in Barbados date back to 1663, when the British Post Office established a packet agency here. But it was not until August 1, 1851, that the first Post Office Act was passed to create the modern postal system. By April 1852, it had begun issuing stamps and organising inland postal delivery.
(LG)
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