"Play Your Part": UoN Council Chair Sounds Rallying Cry as FY 2026/2027 Performance Contracts Cascade

The exercise, bringing together the University Council, Vice-Chancellor, Deputy Vice-Chancellors, Deans of Faculties, Directors and Heads of Central Administrative Units, marked the formal cascading and signing of the University of Nairobi's FY 2026/2027 Performance Contracts.

Delivering his remarks, Chairman of the University Council, Prof. Chacha Nyaigoti Chacha, issued a pointed off-the-cuff challenge to the University's leadership, likening the institution to a soccer team in which every player must do their part for the team to win. "It can be done  play your part," he said before adding that "vision is beautiful, but it must be accompanied by action for it to bring about transformation." His message was unambiguous: strategy and good intentions count for little without disciplined execution from every member of the university community.

Turning to the substance of the exercise, Prof. Chacha reminded attendees that the University  has operated under a performance contract with the Government of Kenya, through the Ministry of Education, since 2005  a two-decade-old practice that anchors institutional accountability to the public. He confirmed that the University's corporate Performance Contract had already been negotiated, vetted and signed with the Cabinet Secretary for Education, in line with national benchmarks such as the Bottom-Up Economic Transformation Agenda (BETA) and Vision 2030. Tuesday's ceremony was the next step in that process: cascading that signed corporate commitment downward, through the signing of individual contracts between the Council, the Vice-Chancellor, Deputy Vice-Chancellors, Deans and Central Heads of Department. He explained that under the Mwongozo Code of Governance, the Council is required to maintain a performance management framework that links directly to the University's statutory mandate and national development plans, sets clear SMART targets, and cascades those targets down to management and staff while continuously monitoring performance. "I urge all responsibility center leaders to carry out the implementation of these contracts with utmost diligence, integrity, and commitment," he said.

Cascading is the mechanism that turns a single corporate performance contract into a University-wide system of accountability. Rather than targets sitting at the top with the Council and Vice-Chancellor, they are broken down and assigned outward and downward — to Deputy Vice-Chancellors, then to Deans, Directors and Heads of Department  until every unit of the University is working toward specific, measurable objectives that ultimately roll back up into the institution's overall performance score.

Vice-Chancellor Prof. Ayub Gitau described the exercise as "another significant milestone in our institutional calendar," and outlined the six priority areas anchoring this year's targets: Digitalization of academic and administrative processes; Impactful Research and Community Service; Innovation and Commercialisation; People-Centered Development; Institutional Sustainability; and Excellence in Teaching, Learning, and Creative Works. He noted that the University's composite performance score had improved from 2.167 in FY 2023/2024 to 2.2239 in FY 2024/2025, but stressed that "our target remains continuous improvement to firmly position the University of Nairobi as Africa's leading higher education institution." He thanked leadership teams across the University for aligning their departmental targets with BETA and Vision 2030, and called for the contracts to be executed "with dedication, resilience, and a commitment to excellence."

Deputy Vice-Chancellor, Finance, Planning and Development (FPD), Prof. Josiah Aduda, framed performance contracting as far more than a bureaucratic exercise. "It is the primary framework through which we translate our high-level corporate vision into daily operational reality," he told attendees, emphasizing that individual accountability feeds directly into departmental targets, which in turn drive overall University performance. He also addressed narratives questioning the University's standing as the region's premier institution of higher learning. "Our premier status is undisputed, but it must be continuously demonstrated through our output," Prof. Aduda said, urging staff to embrace data-driven performance measurement and close operational gaps. He closed his remarks by invoking a call for collective, deliberate action, wishing the University community well. 

The ceremony reflected a consistent thread across, that performance contracting at the University of Nairobi is not a once-a-year formality, but a continuous, cascading commitment linking the Council's oversight to the daily work of every department  one that leadership insists must now be matched, as the Chairman put it, with action on the ground.