Ghana Police Service is one of West Africa’s largest public institutions. It employs more than 47,000 officers and staff and operates under intense public scrutiny. At the time of engagement, the organisation faced three compounding pressures:
- Rising crime and declining public confidence
- Repeated reform initiatives that failed to sustain momentum
- A leadership ambition that exceeded the organisation’s ability to execute change
The Inspector General of Police, David Asante-Apeatu, had publicly committed to positioning the service among the world’s top-performing police forces within four years. The intent was clear. The risk was equally clear. Large institutions rarely fail due to lack of vision. They fail because they cannot translate intent into coordinated action.
The real problem was not policing capability. It was execution capability.
The Executive Challenge
The leadership question was not “What should we change?” It was “How do we make change actually happen, repeatedly, at scale, and under real operational pressure?”
Previous reform efforts had stalled for familiar reasons:
- Initiatives launched but never finished
- Technology deployed without behavioural change
- Directives issued without ownership or feedback
- Learning isolated to pilots that never scaled
The organisation was optimised for control and compliance, not for learning, inspection, or adaptation. Any advisor proposing more plans, training, or frameworks would simply add to the noise.
The leadership needed a way to practice change, not discuss it.
Advisory Strategy
NKD Agility was engaged, alongside a regional delivery partner, to work directly with the Inspector General and his senior leadership team.
The advisory stance was deliberate:
- No diagnostic reports that would sit on shelves
- No training divorced from real work
- No change initiatives without executive ownership
Instead, the work focused on establishing a repeatable decision-to-delivery capability at the top of the organisation, while simultaneously proving that the approach could operate inside real policing constraints.
The Inspector General assumed direct ownership of enablement priorities. Leadership objectives were converted into short execution cycles with visible outcomes and measurable feedback. Progress was reviewed publicly. Failures were treated as data, not blame.
At the same time, cross-rank teams, including both officers and civilians, were required to deliver tangible results against real institutional problems. Not simulations. Not case studies. Real work, in real time.
What Changed
Within weeks, the organisation began to behave differently.
- Senior leadership moved from issuing directives to making prioritisation decisions
- Teams shifted from compliance to accountability
- Delivery replaced discussion as the primary source of credibility
Concrete outcomes followed quickly:
- New public-facing digital services delivered incrementally, not as multi-year projects
- National capability priorities surfaced from the field, not imposed centrally
- Regional teams initiated their own improvements using the same execution rhythm
- Leadership conversations moved from opinion to evidence
Most importantly, scepticism dissolved without persuasion. Experience replaced belief. People changed their behaviour because the system required it and rewarded it.
Business Insight for Leaders
This engagement demonstrated a truth many executives recognise but rarely address directly:
Enablement fails when leaders outsource change to programmes instead of owning it as a discipline.
The Ghana Police Service did not “adopt” anything. They built an internal capability to decide, execute, review, and adapt, under pressure, across a hierarchy.
The advisory value was not in providing answers. It was in designing conditions where answers emerged through action.
Why This Matters to Senior leaders
If you are a senior leader facing stalled initiatives, digital investments that underperform, or reform fatigue, the issue is unlikely to be commitment or competence.
It is almost always a missing execution system.
This case illustrates what becomes possible when leadership stops funding change and starts operating change.
Assess Whether Your Organisation Can Turn Intent into Coordinated Action
If reform initiatives stall, digital investments underperform, or change fatigue is setting in despite capable leadership, a diagnostic conversation can identify what execution capability is missing and how to build it.
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