Crown Agents has been working with the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) in Nigeria since late 2011 to support them to build their capacity. So far, two separate training courses have been delivered in the UK and we now look forward to furthering this successful relationship.
In April and May two groups comprising members of the FIRS Board of Directors came to Crown Agents' training centre in Sutton to take part in two training courses; Combating Corruption & Developing Organisational Integrity and Inspirational Leadership & Team Building.
Both courses, attended by 13 and 21 delegates, were extremely well received and overall feedback was highly positive with delegate comments affirming it was "an enlightening course", "very exciting" and "professional". Lesley Craig, a trainer on the Inspirational Leadership course, was particularly impressed with the groups' enthusiasm and commitment to implement ideas from the course. In addition to the training in Sutton, Crown Agents Tax team also ran a week long Revenue and Business Forecasting training session for the FIRS last April.
We are now working with the FIRS to deliver an elaborate training programme on Facilities Management, to be organised in the UK and include various site-visits demonstrating best-practice in Facilities Management. Although this subject is not the type of training Crown Agents Training typically delivers, we were keen to accommodate this request from one of our key clients and produced a solid proposal and indicative programme which has since been accepted by FIRS. The two-week course is likely to take place in early 2013.
Furthermore, Crown Agents Tax Team has been working to help VAT Administrations in Africa (VADA) to write their strategy and policies. We have also provided the last four technical workshops to VADA members. Considering the current VADA president is a FIRS Co-ordinating director, this is a solid example of how a successful partnership can lead to further collaboration in many areas.