The Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) Command of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) has organised a capacity-building programme for its personnel aimed at enhancing the travel experience for passengers travelling through the gateway.
According to the Comptroller of the MMIA Command, Odide Kalu, the initiative is part of efforts to boost officers’ capabilities, ensuring that passengers and other airport users receive professional, respectful, and integrity-driven service.
Odide emphasised that the NIS is committed to service excellence and continues to invest in the capacity development of its personnel.
He highlighted that the command has been actively organising a series of engagement programs featuring leadership experts to enrich the knowledge and reorient the attitudes of personnel stationed at the nation’s borders.
The efforts are designed to ensure that travellers, whether arriving or departing the country, are treated in a manner that leaves a positive and lasting impression.
Speaking on the essence of the programme, The Command’s Public Relations Officer, Yakubu Yarus said human capital development is increasingly gaining traction in the NIS, as the training of officers has become one of the cardinal policies of the Comptroller General of Immigration, Mrs Kemi Nandap.
Describing the exercise targeting all officers of the command as the first leg.
Yarus said other layers of the training will be carried out in the coming days.
Facilitator/Lead Speaker at the programme, Mr Fela Durotoye urged the NIS personnel to recalibrate their perspective about service delivery, in a manner that projects their organisation in the best perception in the public eye.
Speaking on the theme: “Value-Based Leadership for Service Excellence”, Durotoye harped on key ingredients including humility, collaboration, respect, and appreciation as key drivers in achieving a lasting impression.
According to Durotoye, to make a huge impact on passengers travelling through the airport, NIS officers and men must pursue and build trust to have a good experience.
He urged Immigration personnel to adopt a paradigm shift in the way they render services to passengers/ travellers passing through the airport to offer the best experience.
Dorutoye urged them to add value by giving a good account of their conduct in a manner that will stimulate a good reputation, create outstanding records as well as engender respect.
He said: “The whole idea of this training for personnel of the Nigerian Immigration Service is to scale up their understanding of the best ways to demonstrate good horsemanship while dealing with passengers coming into the country to create a good experience.
“Airports as the first and last points of contact require that the personnel discharging duties in such places demonstrate the highest level of professionalism, show empathy, and conduct themselves in a manner that leaves a good impression about the people and the country.
“This is felt by the kind of impression passengers have about people deployed to discharge responsibility at such border posts.”
Speaking further, Durotoye said plans are afoot to consolidate training for the 14 agencies attached to the airport on how their personnel could achieve a single positive impression on service delivery.
He said: “The whole idea of this training for officers deployed to the airport is how they could add value to their responsibility as they attend to passengers at the country’s entry point. Given the huge number of passengers passing through this airport, the impression passengers have of their service experience remains critical.
“How do we choose people to give the best service experience? This requires us to continue to imbibe in the people. This is why we have embarked on a project called One Impression, for the 14 agencies at the airport to train the agencies’ personnel to uphold a pleasant impression.”
Also speaking, the second resource person, Mr Victor Ani- Laju harped on the essence of purpose leadership urging the personnel to cascade the lessons drawn from the training to their everyday responsibility.
Credit/NATION NEWSPAPER
