Maintaining morale in the South African army infantry formation

Abstract

The morale of soldiers of the South African Infantry Formation has attracted much attention from various stakeholders for various reasons since the year 2000. Leadership has in most of the occasions if not all, intervened but it seems that the responses have not managed to achieve the outcomes as intended. Morale is a fluid and tri-dimensional construct whose resolve demands an all- inclusive approach rather than a one-dimensional approach. The purpose of this research was to conduct a quantitative research study in the form of surveys by individual questionnaires to investigate the trends and factors of morale in order to come up with strategies for leadership to uplift and maintain morale. These questionnaires were self-administered to one hundred and ninety four serving members or regular force individuals from both 4 and 7 SAI Bn. With all the interventions and the exposure that these enjoys, their morale levels seems questionable and diverse as a result of inherent factors attached to age, educational qualifications, former force, gender, race and rank. It is quite obvious that such factors were overlooked and therefore the researcher had tried to tackle them within the confines of this report.