Alexander Powell had ...Three choices - agriculture won

Mel Cooke, Sunday Gleaner Writer

BASED ON his enthusiasm for the field, it would seem a safe assumption that Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) head Alexander Powell has deep roots in matters of the soil.

However, Powell, who has been head of RADA since 2008, tells The Sunday Gleaner that his first real contact with agriculture came when he attended the Jamaica School of Agriculture on scholarship, doing a diploma.

"At that time, I had three choices. I had the choice of going to Church Teachers' College (to do secondary level education); I paid for my gown and didn't go. I had the choice of going to CAST to do accounts; there was a broiler company that gave 13 scholarships for their anniversary and I got for Manchester, fully paid and everything," Powell said.

However, the roots did not go deep, as he said after getting the scholarship "I tried studying agriculture, but it didn't match me, so I went to Mona and studied economics. From studying economics I went into the private sector," he said.

Powell held various managerial positions. At Seprod he was general manager; he worked as assistant general manager at Facey Commodity; he was Thermo-Plastics' vice-president of marketing and national sales manager at Johnson and Johnson. "So my background is really in the social sciences and marketing, with agriculture resting somewhere; if you called on me I could," Powell said.

With a master's from Barry University (marketing, with finance minor) Powell was also lecturing at the University of Technology when he was asked if he could join RADA, initially for four months "to help streamline the whole operation" and then Powell applied for and was accepted for the chief executive officer position.

"It was very challenging and I like challenging posts," Powell said. "Any job I go to it will be done. That's one thing I am sure of. If I cannot do it I am going to leave.

"So we came here and we started a good number of things. We have been able to move in the direction of applying the managerial process to getting things done. We have been able to motivate people to a higher level. We have been able to drive the use of technology in agriculture," he said.

And that technological drive applies to not only the process of the actual crop cycle, but also reaching the farmers, far flung from RADA's offices. "We have put in our toll-free number, we have put in our text messaging service, we use Skype to communicate with people, we use 'webinars' to conduct seminars, we use geographic information systems and global positioning systems and so on," he said.

Tractors have also been acquired to assist in ploughing, reducing production costs.

culture shock

He issues a bold, broad invitation. "Anybody who wants to come to RADA to check on what we do they are free to come, because we do not do anything without following the right procedures. What we do, we do not take a year to do the things that can be done in three months," Powell said.

However, the pace at which Powell seems determined to go was not in step with some of what he saw when he came to RADA. "It was a real culture shock and for many days I locked myself in a room trying to say what was the strategy. I did not recognise that you could give somebody some work to do and then they say 'I did not get a chance to do it'. Because where I am coming from, if you do not do your work we almost have an unsigned letter of departure for you already. It is only to put in the date," he said.

But there have been changes and Powell says that over time, with a mixture of managerial approaches - he says he prefers the cooperative approach and to lead by example - he has been able to effect attitude changes.

"Take for example timekeeping. I don't come to work late. So I challenge anyone who comes to work and wants to sign like they come at 9 o'clock and so on. On account of that I will write them little notes, not for their file, but to say 'I notice that you have come to work late nine times in the last 20 days. If you don't want me to speak to you again about that again over the past six months, wouldn't you start coming to work early?' Because if I have to talk to you there may be actions," Powell said.

"It has worked very, very well."