Cedar Financial & Management Services

22/01/2026

We will be rolling out professional trainings for corporates and individuals for 2026

27/03/2019

Team building activities and events should be interwoven in your company culture.
Effective teamwork has been proven to offer a myriad of benefits to your organisation, such as more productivity, higher sales, better team cohesion, happier company culture, less employee turnover and more loyal employees.
There are various ways to promote teamwork, but there are three main reasons why team building should be done off-site rather than in the office because:

You Can Utilise Physical Exercise
Office buildings are typically crowded and offer little room to move, which is why it is nearly impossible to introduce physical exercises in an indoor environment.
Why do physical activities help promote team building?
Because “there’s incredible value in working together in a different realm,” according to one source.
In “a physical challenge, like getting people over a wall, the team has to capitalise on people’s logistical minds and physical strength.
Such exercises allow team members to see each other in a different light and abilities emerge that may not be apparent in day-to-day budget meetings.”
Plus, physical activity gets our natural chemicals, called endorphins, pumping, which lead to better moods and an all around good time.

Promote Creativity
We are all so used to the insides of our offices, that it’s become boring and mundane.
However, meeting with colleagues in a different environment to build teamwork can spark our creativity.
For example, an outdoor area such as a park or botanical garden can provide access to trees, nature, birds, the sky and falling leaves.
These elements can foster an element of relaxation and a different outlook, helping employees connect better and improve their working styles.

More Relaxing
The office is always full of distractions, from checking our emails to having clients unexpectedly show up, it’s difficult for employees to fully concentrate on team building when they are at their workplace.
No matter how you look at it, the office promotes a certain need to be proper, professional and formal.
An offsite meeting allows employees to drop the formalities and truly relax and unwind.
Whether you choose to hold the team building activities in a bowling alley or a local restaurant, the ability to be offsite will help the employees see each other in new lights outside of the workplace.
When individuals are more relaxed, they are more open to getting to know each other, asking questions and forming relationships that can benefit office life.

Henry M.S. Kamata, PhD

06/09/2017

Dear Reader,

Employee assessment is being done on staff members around the world, but not every manager is familiar with this practice.

What does it mean to assess your staff, and what benefits can it offer your company?

Read on to find out!

What is Employee Assessment?

Employee Assessment refers to collecting data about employees and then evaluating it based on specific objectives.

Often called performance assessment or performance review, these procedures involve tests, evaluations and (sometimes) feedback.

What Type of Employee Assessments are Available?

There are a multitude of ways to assess employees, such as:

Pre-Hire Tests

Pre-hire tests assess potential new employees to verify their hard (expertise) and soft (personality) skills before committing to hiring them.

Employers have different strategies when applying these tests; some narrow down the pool to a few candidates, and then administer the tests to them, while others ask all applicants to complete the testing.

With new technology, many employers are including links to pre-hire tests right in the online job advert, and then using software to w**d out applicants based on their answers.

Performance Evaluations

Another type of employee assessment is done on existing employees to monitor their performance levels.

Traditionally, these were conducted annually, specifically for compensation and promotion reviews, when managers would go over the staff’s accomplishments to determine whether they have earned a higher title or more wages.

More recently, employers started implementing performance evaluations into everyday life at the office.

Managers work together with their sstaff to create measurable benchmarks to correct or improve the staff’s skills, behaviour or efforts, and then track that daily.

The main caveat that many employers miss when it comes to effective performance reviews is the need for succinct feedback back to the employee.

It’s not enough to observe the behaviour; the individual must know how their efforts are playing out to try and improve or be satisfied if they are on the right track.

Benefits of Employee Assessments

Less Employee Turnover

One of the benefits of employee assessments is less turnover because pre-hire tests allow employers to eliminate candidates that will not make good additions to the team.

These assessments provide good insight into the hard skills, such as acumen and ability to perform certain tasks, as well as soft skills, such as personality, drive, motivation and ethics.

Based on results from the assessments, managers can make intelligent hiring decisions to select the best candidates for their team, which will prevent them from having to terminate employment if a candidate failed to live up to their expectations.

Better Productivity

Employee appraisals promote productivity in the workplace by setting clear plans for staffers, which allow them to clearly comprehend what is expected of them.

In appraisal meetings, employers can provide help to their subordinates in the help of training or mentorship programmes to help them excel in the chosen objectives.

These efforts lead to increased productivity and profits for the company.

To your success!

Sean

Henry MS Kamata, PhD

Managing Partner - Cedar Financial & Management Services

The Leadership & Management Training Specialists

Telephone: (265)993359054

Email: [email protected]

Our in-house management training courses are bespoke and designed and delivered exactly how you need them

15/03/2017

Faciliting a workshop for HR practioners - Talent Management & Suceesion Planning

01/02/2017

Business process improvement (BPI) is a continuous effort on the part of a company's leaders to advance and better its core mechanisms of running the company.

Whether the goal of the improvements are to raise sales, cut costs, or better develop employees performance levels, BPI is the strategy that encourages leaders to document current processes, analyse how to improve them and then track results.

There are three steps involved to create a successful outcome, which are:

Create A Blueprint
This step is imperative to focus on the details of the change, and not lose sight of the goal in mind. This strategy is especially important for bigger changes that can affect the entire company.
For example, if your IT department is planning to change the computer systems your office is utilising, that team alone will handle the change.

However, it will impact the entire company by forcing them to learn the new system, creating a time for them to be offline while the change occurs, and having them troubleshoot issues with the new upgrade, if they occur.

Therefore, it is important to create a blueprint for each change so that all employees can be aware of the plans, and plan accordingly.

Assigning Teams & Leaders
When planning to make a change, managers need to consider who will be affected by the change, as well as who will be carrying the changes out. You will need to figure out who will implement the developments, and who will test it out.

Teams will need to be assigned, as well as team leaders who will oversee the process, and report to you.

Test, Test, Test
Rather than making an enormous change at once, make small changes and test them.

If your IT department is changing systems, try it out on one department first before rolling it out to the entire firm.
Also, implement the upgrades during slow times for your organisation, such as holidays, rather than the potential of taking everyone offline during your busy season if an error occurs. Continue to test the upgrades and the employees using them, to make sure that everything is working properly, and everyone understands how to use the new system.

Remember that business process improvement is a team effort that requires communication, honesty and teamwork on the part of each and every employee.

To your success!

18/01/2017

A functional review is an in-depth look at how your organisation works: how it gets things done and achieves its goals, including the formal and informal systems that drive it and the problems that reduce the result. It's necessarily done from the outside, taking an external perspective, but it requires a deep immersion in the workings of the organisation.

The main activity is talking with people, across all levels. In smaller organisations that could be literally everyone. There is also an element of formal analysis that may include financial structure, market positioning and product development.
The results are usually – surprising. And at the same time, familiar.

In most organisations there are better ways forward and there are people who know something about those ways, but all the individual perspectives have not been drawn together into a clear picture. Often, the ideas and knowledge of workers have not been given enough weight. Sometimes there are just one or two missing element.

The result is usually a shift in perspective that opens new doors. It can be envigourating and refreshing.
Typically a functional review takes two to three months to complete and many more to implement. It's likely to be the major internal management thing of the year.

To complete an effective functional review requires a great deal of very varied, practical experience, a solid theoretical background and a good dose of creativity.

Cedar Financial & Management Services is well placed to support any company or organisation in its endeavour to reposition itself through organisational functional review. We have a team of well experienced consultants that have worked on a number of functional reviews and strategic planning assignments.

29/10/2016

Facilitating an Employee Life Cycle and Talent Management Workshop organised by ECAM (Employeers' Consultative Association of Malawi) at Sunbird Mount Soche.

21/09/2016

Many leaders strive to be great managers, but they simply don’t have the skills and training on doing so. Unless one was trained by a great mentor, or took specific management courses, it is hard to figure out how to effectively lead a team of people.

What can be helpful in the quest to improve management skills is to incorporate a management model into the daily routine. Today, I would like to share a few thoughts on one management theory that would help leaders and managers in effectively lead people in an organisation.

THE HUMAN RELATIONS THEORY OF MANAGEMENT

This particular theory took hold in the 1920’s during America’s industrial revolution. Previous theories only looked at task-related behaviours, but professor Professor Elton Mayo held the Hawthorne Studies to prove that the workers, not the machines, were the central aspects to focus on to improve productivity.

This is one of the most important management theories to date, as it specified the need for managers to focus on their employees for a happy workplace. It's about people! Don not lose this focus that people are important and strategic component in your organisation that could give you the competitive edge over your competitors in the market.

Basically, this explains that individuals want to be a valuable part of a group, and if they believe that their efforts are recognised, they will be loyal to the organisation. People must be recognised for their contributions to the organisation.

You may have the best machinery and equipment, the latest technology for your processes, the technical expertise or the financial resources to run your business BUT if you ignore the people aspect of your business, you have missed everything. Value your people, and let them feel valued and you will reap the fruits bountifully. It's about people.

16/08/2016

Cedar Financial & Management Services was engaged by Rural Livelihood Economic Enhancement Programme (RLEEP) to develop a Cooperative Development and Management Training Manual. This was a Training of Trainers (ToT) workshop at Sunbird Lilongwe on the Cooperative Development and Management for RLEEP field staff, RLEEP partners and Business Development officers from 6 district where RLEEP was implement the programme.

Dr Henry Kamata ably took the participants through a 5 Day training workshop. It was a high intensive workshop that equipped participants with knowledge, skills and expertise in Cooperative Development and Management.

If are involved in dealing with smallholders farmers, and farmers' association, groups or cooperatives is one of the vehicles you are implementing your programmes, Cedar would be a reliable partner that would add value to your programme interventions.

15/08/2016

Strategic Planning - Strategic Planning for Bottom-Line Results

"However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results." Winston Churchill

Can a strategic plan truly yield bottom-line results? Or is it just a waste of time?

The answer to both questions can be yes. It's critical to plan for success. More importantly, there are steps to follow to make it happen.

Most businesses don't do any strategic planning. And, of the ones who do, most treat it as nothing more than an academic exercise. This is unfortunate. With some effort and a willingness to make hard decisions, it's possible to create more than just strategy.

It's possible to realize bottom-line results from a well-developed strategic plan that is then put into action and followed through.

Strategic planning can be a staggering waste of time—if you allow it to be.

Strategic planning was a management phenomenon in the late 60s and early 70s. It was being hailed as "the fountainhead of all corporate progress." Everyone, it seemed, was doing it—or in danger of being left in the dust by the competition.
Then something happened. CEOs began questioning the effectiveness of strategic planning. One anonymously referred to it as "a staggering waste of time." Another called it "basically a plaything of staff." And strategic planning began to fall out of vogue.

What changed? How did strategic planning-once the road to corporate nirvana—suddenly become a C-suite pariah?

Cedar Financial & Management Services offers a complete set of tools to help organizations of any size develop a successful strategic plan. These include SWOT diagrams, strategy maps, balanced scorecards, value chain analyses and many more.

We also provide number of resources to help your organization develop a successful strategic plan.

Contact us, and we will be glad to be of service to you.