User:Nguni52/Rabelani Dagada

Rabelani Dagada

About the Author

Early Life

Rabelani Dagada

Rabelani Dagada was born in Alexandra Township, Johannesburg, South Africa on 23 July 1971, but spent most of his childhood and youth in Limpopo, formerly Venda. According to his website, Dagada regards himself as product of hardship and humiliation. He did most of his primary and secondary schooling under various trees due to a shortage of classrooms and he walked 12 kilometres to and from the school without an umbrella or/and raincoat. He further claims that he suffered huge humiliations in various workplaces. Dagada’s simple schooling did not affect his love for learning and at present he holds a Masters of Education in Computer-based Education and a Masters of Commerce in Information Systems from the Randse Afrikaanse Universiteit and the University of Witwatersrand respectively. Dagada completed a short course at the University of London: Institute of Education and he is currently completing a PhD in Information Systems at the University of South Africa.

Professional Profile

Dagada is a South African Development Economist, Information Technologist and Knowledge Management Specialist based at the Business School of the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. His presence is academia is a departure from a successful career in government, non-governmental organisations, and the corporate world. Dagada’s intellectual endeavors are not his sole focus and he is still quite comfortable in suites and ties. He holds part-time senior positions in corporate South Africa. Amongst others, he is the Head of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) at Sebata Institute of Consulting and Development, President of the Computer Society of South Africa (CSSA) and Chairperson of its Board of Directors, Chairperson of the Board of Trustees of the Institute of Information Technology Professionals Foundation, a member of the Board of the Africa ICT Alliance (AfTA) and Founder and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Rabelani Dagada Education Trust. Dagada is a member of the South African Bureau of Standards’ (SABS) Committee which is responsible for formulating eLearning standards. He represents SABS internationally in terms of eLearning. When I asked how he does all these things; Dagada retorted: “I’m really driven; once I decide on doing something, I get it done. If I spend a night or weekend without working, I feel cheated. There are times where I spend the whole night in my office, go home in the morning to shave, bath, put on a suite and go back to the office”.

Amongst others, Dagada worked at the Adelaide Tambo School of the Disabled (in Soweto) as a Teacher and later on as a Head of Department (Commerce), at Old Mutual as an Independent Contractor, at Central Johannesburg College as a Senior Lecturer and Head of Department: Information Technology, at Randse Afrikaanse Universiteit as a Tutor, at University of South Africa as an Instructional Designer & Coordinator: ICT in Education, and at Royal Bafokeng Administration (Manager: ICT & Knowledge Management). Dagada has also consulted for various organisations; these include the Development Bank of Southern Africa and Legal Aid South Africa.

Awards and Honors

In December 1998 Dagada obtained a Further Diploma in Education (Computer Based Education) with distinction (CUM LAUDE) from the Randse Afrikaanse Universiteit. Few years later, he was given a special permission to study two masters degrees simultaneously in two universities (Randse Afrikaanse Universiteit &University of the Witwatersrand), and he successfully completed them. Dagada has successfully implemented various Information & Communications Technology (ICT) projects. These include Enterprise Resources Planning Systems, Records Management Systems, Contract Management Systems, Microsoft Exchange, Wireless Broadband Network, and eLearning systems. Dagada is the inaugural Winner of 2008 ICT Visionary Award . He received the Award “in recognition of foresight and achievement in transforming business by adopting and implementing leading-edge technology”. Be that as it may, his implementation of Chisimba eLearning Management System at the University of Witwatersrand failed dismally and millions of rands were squandered.

Dagada’s co-authored paper was short-listed for the CIE Joyce Cain Award: KINUTHIA, W. & DAGADA, R. 2008. E-learning incorporation: an exploratory study of three South African higher education institutions. In 2009, he presented a paper entitled: “Legal and policy aspects to consider when providing information security in the corporate environment”, at School of Computing 2009 Post-Graduate Symposium. University of South Africa, 14 September 2009. This paper was rated as the best doctoral study presentation. A search in Google Scholar reveal Dagada’s work has cited extensively by other scholars.

Thought Leadership

Dagada has published opinion pieces in various South African newspapers and popular publications such as The Star, Sowetan, Sunday Independent, City Press, Business Day, ITWeb, Financial Mail, and Focus (journal of the Helen Suzman Foundation). His views have featured in leading ICT magazines such iWeek and Brainstorm. Dagada has featured in programmes of leading talk radios in South Africa, Radio 702 and SAFM. He is also a public speaker and has participated in more than 30 local and international conferences.

Books

Time, Space and Pace: Computer-Integrated Education in Corporate South Africa (Unisa Press)

Computer-integrated education (CIE) is poised to become the new training paradigm, taking its place alongside traditional contact situation training and changing the face of training generally. While this book looks at CIE within the South African corporate environment, its findings are also relevant to other countries, institutions of higher learning and the public sector. Increasingly, managers and facilitators use various strategies, techniques and computer-integrated tools to integrate online learning into the training environment. This competence is crucial to productivity in any country. This book synthesises practical experience, literature and research. Analysed data, as from the South African corporate environment, are integrated with research. Case studies from various sources contextualise certain assertions, claims, reports, arguments and findings.

Telecommunication Revolution in a Developmental State (Raider Publishing International)

When democracy was ushered into South Africa in 1994, the ANC government sought to use the telecommunications policy to eradicate the effects of the apartheid system. They wanted telecommunications to play a prominent role in the development and reconstruction of the country. Thus, the government promoted the concepts of universal service and universal access, which have a direct impact on the use of ICT for social and professional purposes. Unfortunately, most of these principles have not been executed fully. The trajectory of what would have been the best universal service and universal access policy in the world was interrupted by the Telecommunications Amendment Act No. 12 of 1997, which extended the Telkom monopoly for five years and compelled other telecommunications operators to continue leasing broadband capacity from Telkom. This book will explain how most initiatives that emanate from universal service and universal access policy have failed dismally. The intentions of the policy formulators should be commended but there has been a failure with regard to implementation. That being said, some policy initiatives are currently under way and their successful implementation will provide many opportunities for the integration of ICT into our daily socio-economic activities.

Technoprenuership: Strategy, Innovation and Enterprenuership (Editor: Boris Urban. Publisher Heinemann)

This third book in the series is structured to unpack the nature of technopreneurship. Taking into account the rich conceptualisations emerging in the field of technopreneurship, this book explores the interface between technology, innovation and entrepreneurship. Technopreneurs are recognised as an important group that can contribute significantly to raise national competitiveness, productivity and efficiency. The chapters in this book are informed by current research, address the major issues in technopreneurship and are based on the conceptualizations and empirical work in this evolving field. A balanced perspective is provided to illustrate the multidimensional nature of technopreneurship and its broad manifestations and applicability. Book 3 builds on the conceptual foundations of the first two books in the series and links the various chapters by drawing on existing theories and frameworks to show how these are related and form higher order constructs about technology and entrepreneurship. The last two chapters of this book provide a contextual analysis for understanding technopreneurship. These chapters were developed with a view to providing insight into the possible developments of entrepreneurial activities in the South African socio-economic policy landscape. Experts agree that, currently, the South African government is keen to tie entrepreneurial activities to its own programmes of social justice, black economic empowerment and service delivery. Subsequently, entrepreneurship gets a lot of obstruction and little help from government, even though government policy claims to be supporting entrepreneurship according to a series of gender and media studies. The last two chapters aim to provide an alternative view of entrepreneurial activity in an emerging market context, which has largely been shaped by political processes, policy-to-implementation disconnects and a lack of awareness of the connections between the theory and practice of entrepreneurship.

Enterprise Resource Planning Models for the Education Sector

Enterprise Resource Planning Models for the Education Sector: Applications and Methodologies is a comprehensive collection of research which highlights the increasing demand for insight into the challenges faced by educational institutions on the design and development of enterprise resource planning applications. This book is composed of content from management and engineering students, professionals and researchers in the education fields.

Book Chapters

Technopreneurship: Strategy, Innovation and Entrepreneurship

The impact of the South African Information and Communications Technology policy to entrepreneurship. This book chapter appears in the book edited by Boris Urban

Enterprise Resource Planning Models for the Education Sector: Applications and Methodologies

Lecturers’ ICT capabilities in a new educational paradigm in South African HEI: A Capability Approach . This book chapter appears in the book edited by Kanubhai K. Patel & Sanjaykumar Vij

External links

• The Star
• Sowetan
• Sunday Independent
• City Press
• Business Day
• ITWeb
• Financial Mail
• Focus