Excellence will be the watchword for workers, employers and Government, when the annual Week of Excellence Programme is observed from Sunday, February 22, to Saturday, February 28.

It will be held under the theme: Bridging The Gap: Today???s Leaders, Tomorrow???s Prospects, and starts with a service on that Sunday at the Kingdom Empowerment New Testament Church of God, Cottage Land, St. George, beginning at 10:00 a.m.

Minister of Labour, Senator Dr. Esther Byer, will deliver remarks during the service.??During the week, a number of presentations and panel discussions will be held, commencing at 8:30 a.m. each day, for approximately 300 public and private sector partners.

Prime Minister Freundel Stuart; General Secretary of the Barbados Workers??? Union (BWU), Toni Moore; President of the Barbados Private Sector Association, Alex McDonald; President of the Congress of Trade Unions and Staff Associations of Barbados, Cedric Murrell; and Governor of the Central Bank of Barbados, Dr. Delisle Worrell, will speak at the opening ceremony on Monday, February 23, at the Grande Salle, Central Bank of Barbados.

There will also be a presentation by Lecturer at the University of the West Indies (UWI), Dr. Dwayne Devonish, on the Findings of an Empirical Study about Perceptions of Leadership Qualities/Traits and Factors Predicting Business Success among Youth in Barbados.

In addition, there will be a panel discussion involving Chairman of the Barbados Entrepreneurship Foundation, Chris DeCaires, and President of the Barbados Economic Society, Jeremy Stephen.??On Tuesday, February 24, the workshop will be held at BWU Solidarity House and Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Joy St. John; and General Secretary of the BWU, Toni Moore, will deliver opening remarks.

The topics to be examined include Maintaining the Fight Against Infectious Diseases in the Workplace; The Economic Impact of Infectious Diseases in Today???s Workplace; The Physical and Mental Impacts of Chikungunya and Dengue Fever on the Workplace and The Role of Nutrition on Combating Non-Communicable Diseases.

Discussions will move to the BWU Labour College at Mangrove, St. Philip, on Wednesday, February 25, and there will be presentations on Customer Service of Tomorrow; Benchmarking: Nurturing Best Practices as the Way Forward; Vector Control in the Workplace (Dengue Fever and Chikungunya): The Protocols and Maintaining the Fight Against Infectious Diseases.

The focus on Thursday, February 26, will be on business, and the speakers will include Minister of Culture, Sports and Youth, Stephen Lashley; Director of the Global Business Development at the Society for Human Resource Development of the United States, Robert Garcia and Lecturer in Management Studies at UWI, Dr. Paul Pounder.

The panellists for the working session on The 3 Fs ??? Finding, Funding, Formula, will be Executive Director of the Barbados Small Business Association, Lynette Holder; General Manager of Corporate and Commercial Banking at the Republic Bank, Sean Husain; Manager of Mega Power Ltd., Joanna Edghill; Senior Credit Officer of the Central Bank of Barbados??? Loan Guarantee Scheme, Joycelyn Holdipp; and President of the Barbados Entrepreneurship Foundation, Celeste Foster.

Friday???s workshop has been designed specifically for secondary school children, and they will gather at The Productivity Council to hear from Dr. Dwayne Devonish, Jeremy Stephen, and Training Officer at the Council, Karen Collins, who will speak on Potential, Preparation, Prospects: Yes I Can.

The week will culminate on Saturday, February 28, with an initiative entitled: Taking Service Excellence to the Streets, which is aimed at sharing information on how to develop personal excellence with Barbadian workers.

Officials from The Productivity Council, Office of Public Sector Reform (OPSR), the BWU and the Barbados Employers??? Confederation (BEC) will be involved in the promotion, which will start at 9:00 a.m. at the City of Bridgetown Cooperative Credit Union, Lower Broad Street, and will interact with people along Broad Street, Roebuck Street, High Street and Fairchild Street.

The Week of Excellence Programme was initiated in 2003, and emerged in response to the new market liberalisation and globalisation thrust, which increased the need for productivity-focused businesses and effective competitiveness strategies.??It seeks to increase productivity awareness and excellence across the various sectors and give stakeholders an opportunity to participate in critical dialogue on those issues.

Those organisations which were a part of the initial organising committee included the Social Partnership, The Productivity Council, the Central Bank of Barbados, the Barbados Statistical Service and the Congress of Trade Unions and Staff Associations of Barbados. However, it was expanded later to include the National Initiative for Service Excellence, BEC and OPSR.

sharon.austingill-moore@barbados.gov.bb

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