NAMACO is made up of between 10 to 20 Councillors appointed by the Minister of Higher and Tertiary Education, Innovation, Science and Technology Development (MoHTEISTD) in consultation with the President.  NAMACO is supported by a Secretariat with a Director, Managers and Officers.  These Councillors are drawn from industry and commerce economic sectors in Zimbabwe and they chair the NAMACO sector committees.

Membership for sector committees is drawn from employer and employee   organizations, national employment councils, government departments, statutory bodies, local authorities, and professional bodies. The committee members need to have a minimum of at least three years working experience and be in decision making positions in their organisations. 

The Zimbabwe Manpower Development Fund (ZIMDEF) funds the activities of NAMACO.

On its own initiative or by request NAMACO makes investigation and recommendations to the Minister.  The NAMACO works with industry and commerce through NAMACO sector committees.  These committees bring to the table human capital development issues affecting industry and NAMACO devises an action plan to solve the problems and then advises the Minister accordingly.

• Sector committees meet at least once quarterly and discuss human capital development issues affecting their sectors.
• At these meetings and stakeholder workshops recommendations are made and forwarded to the Council which also meets at least once every quarter.
• The Council deliberates on the recommendations and makes resolutions which are acted upon and then forwarded to the Minister as advice.
• In addition, an annual NAMACO Congress is held with decision makers from industry.
• At the congress resolutions are made and acted on by the Council through the Secretariat.
• Those congress resolutions that need the attention of the Minister are acted upon and submitted to him as advice.
• Secretariat conducts research and forward findings to the Council which then make recommendations to the Minister.

Occupational profiles identify the skill levels required for an occupation across jobs, companies or industries. Occupational profiles are created by delineating the duties and tasks of a particular occupation. The profiles are developed using the Developing A Curriculum (DACUM) occupational analysis method, which puts together expert workers under a trained Facilitator who brainstorms the duties and tasks of an occupation in a three-to-four-day workshop.  Besides duties and tasks, the profile will also have additional information: – Tools and Equipment; Knowledge and Skills; Worker Traits; Career Path and Future Trends of that occupation.

Initially the occupational profile was used for developing and reviewing curricula, but research has shown that it can also be used for various human resource interventions.  The various uses include:

• Training needs assessment
• Career guidance
• Competency test development
• Employee recruitment and upgrading
• Job evaluation/grading
• Job descriptions
• Performance management
• Occupational standards development and
• Collective bargaining.

Occupations for profiling are identified, chosen and ranked by sector committees according to the needs of their specific industry.  If, however, an organisation has an occupation that they would like developed for their specific use they have to be able to provide the required numbers of expert workers and finance the profiling workshops.

NAMACO does not in itself designate trades.  It is the role of industry and commerce through the sector committee members to determine which trades need to be designated. The Council makes a recommendation to the Minister who after consultation with the Council may, by statutory instrument declare any trade to be a designated trade if he considers that the trade requires apprenticeship or skilled worker certification.

NAMACO can assist through ensuring that the application is forwarded to the Ministry who would then send officers to inspect the Institutions registration status and syllabi.  If these should be approved then the course may then be approved for ZIMDEF rebates.