PROFESSIONAL SERVICES
any private sector partner. They carry an overhead and must be managed as any other third party service provider. The question was raised of how to give peo- ple power while supporting them to deliver effi cient services. The answer seemed to be through investment in the management infrastructure to allow economies of scale, resource planning and risk mitigation.
On a further note around resourc- ing, there were concerns that managers have diffi culty under- standing that extending contracts can lead to costly redundancy packages - people aren’t free just because they are externally funded. There needs to be better education that budgets need to be balanced across departments, not just teams.
carry out the necessary due dili- gence.
There is a big culture of avoiding the corporate centre for procuring goods or resources, due in part to an unfounded fear that they will reject claims out of hand or sim- ply take too long to reach a deci- sion. This has led to departments ‘begging, borrowing and stealing’ from others, which is highly inef- fi cient.
Again, data management is a ma- jor tool in combating this, and can help re-establish links with the centre. A category management approach is fundamental, and as- sumptions that procuring things locally is more expensive need to be addressed.
Customer boards were also seen as a useful tool for improving pro- curement effi ciency.
The incremental bolt on of data- bases, management systems and processes has left a nebulous, inconsistent mess that hinders procurement. Better data man- agement was a key theme that emerged, with those who operate enterprise-wide solutions claim- ing considerable effi ciency ben- efi ts. It is a long, costly project to implement and one that only suits larger councils, but is certainly worth the investment for those that do.
Performance and skills
There doesn’t appear to be a lack of effort from council executives; indeed many work extended hours. Performance manage- ment has come on considerably over the past few years, and will be key to driving out cost through working smarter and not harder. It is felt that sometimes there could be more support from HR in deal- ing with performance issues and that some middle management would benefi t from better per- formance management training to recognise what ‘good’ per- formance looks like.
Managers are often promoted due to demonstrating excellent technical skills but are often left to manage a team without for- mal management training. They are two very different skill sets. It would be a great benefi t if there was more fl exibility around pay scales so there wasn’t as much pressure to promote people pure- ly because of their excellent tech- nical skills.
It was said that although IT is an enabler, it only brings benefi ts when people know how to use it. There is a great deal of potential to be released through upskilling employees in existing IT systems and software, but this could po- tentially be hindered by people’s unwillingness to admit to short-
comings. This is not specifi c to public sector organisations, and can be overcome through cul- tural change. Although this hap- pens at a different pace in differ- ent departments, there shouldn’t be concern. When benefi ts start to be realised, adoption spreads virally to others. This raised the topic of electronic document management, which although can be benefi cial is not the Holy Grail – there is still a lot of paper being used across councils.
Voluntary / community sector
When looking to the voluntary sector to support the provision of services, a collaborative ap- proach can be benefi cial. It was suggested that partners could be better engaged by ring-fenc- ing funds on the proviso that they work more effi ciently, with the council working with the or- ganisation to achieve this. It was mentioned that in some areas councillors have little appetite for letting volunteers take over services, and that there were a number of political issues stand- ing in the way due to the involve- ment of senior politicians in third sector organisations. It was also suggested that there is consider- able confusion between volun- teers and voluntary organisations. Voluntary groups are not free; just not for profi t, and still have to de- liver as professional a service as
Outsourcing
In some councils there has been support for more risk and quality assessment in outsourcing be- fore handing over contracts, but it’s key to focus on driving quality and lowering the cost of the serv- ice in question internally before looking for additional external support. In this case, anything added is a win-win.
There seems to be a growing ap- petite for risk / reward contracts with third parties when delivering transformation and cost savings. Linking back to better contract negotiations, by a profi t share arrangement council can back some of the risk onto the contrac- tor to gain true value for money in consultancy engagements. For this type of robust contract to work, it is important that the third party has access to accu- rate and up to date management information. This can be provided through ERP solutions, but this only suits larger councils due to the cost and time involved in their implementation.
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public sector executive Mar/Apr 11 | 61
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