ITEM EX8 - ANNEX 2EXECUTIVE - 8 JULY 2003RAISING OUR PERFORMANCEIdeA Local Government Improvement ProgrammeFollow-up progress review visit to Oxfordshire County Council15th May 2003 Introduction The peer review of the council took place in the week of 8th October 2001. The objective of the follow-up progress review visit is to assess the degree of progress the council has made since the peer review, to facilitate a process of self assessment against the benchmark competencies, and to identify areas requiring continued or further attention. The follow-up progress review visit, on 15th May 2003 was undertaken by five members of the original review team:
Progress Review Programme The programme included:
Richard
Shaw, Chief Executive
Progress made against areas for improvement This report contains the conclusions and recommendations of the review team made on the basis of the latest progress status report supplied by the authority and information gained during the workshop session and discussions with senior staff and members. Since the original review, the council has made tremendous progress in all of the areas identified for improvement by the review team, as evidenced below. Corporate vision and priorities Peer review recommendation: To agree a corporate vision and a clear set of priorities The council now has a clear vision statement with five strategic objectives in place under which are a number of priorities. The leadership acknowledge that there are still too many priorities and have a whole council process in place commencing June 2003 to rationalise them. Workshop participants all agreed that the council now had a clear corporate vision and priorities but expressed their continued frustration with the large number of priorities which they found difficult to relate to their everyday work. The ‘golden thread’, linking the Oxfordshire Plan with service planning and through to individual objectives, is still not in place. Corporate priorities must be rationalised as a matter of urgency in order that more efficient and effective financial allocation and performance monitoring can be put in place. This should be done in line with the county’s public service agreement which focuses on 12 key areas whilst also taking account of priorities coming out of the community planning process. Leadership Peer review recommendations: To provide strong political and managerial leadership and to break down departmentalism and build corporate integrity The introduction of clear political leadership, after many years without an administration, has had a major beneficial impact on the County Council, and the new coalition administration is working well with the corporate management team to effect improvement. The continued support of the political leadership for the chief executive and corporate management team during a time of change cannot be overemphasised and close working arrangements need to be maintained. The coalition is demonstrating that the tradition of an ‘officer-led’ authority is now in the past but the impact of this is not yet clear for all to see. Leadership is still being exercised only by a small number of key officers and members and needs to be owned more widely. More councillors in particular need to be visibly engaged, for example in exercising leadership in the community planning process. The new political arrangements are bedding down and the scrutiny function, recognised as a key area for improvement, is being supported more vigorously. The political leadership does need to acknowledge the importance of the scrutiny function and ensure that its work is integrated more effectively into corporate arrangements to dispel the view that scrutiny is operating in a vacuum. Those involved in scrutiny also need to ensure that they play a constructive role. Workshop participants agreed that there had been improvements in political and managerial leadership although partner organisations were less convinced. This suggests that the leadership may need to concentrate more effort on ensuring that partners understand they are part of the corporate enterprise. The poor showing of elected members at the workshop was noted with some considerable regret. This appeared partly to have resulted from a miscommunication. Nonetheless there does seem to be further work to be done to ensure more effective connection between members, partners and the public. Whilst staff were very positive about the strong leadership, there was a feeling of disconnection between directors and senior members and front line staff. Communication from the leadership throughout the authority has been improved. This needs to be developed further so that staff understand how they make a contribution to the corporate vision and priorities and feel recognised for that contribution. The corporate centre has been strengthened by new posts supporting the chief executive and the restructuring of the corporate management team following the chief executive’s strategy ‘Growing our Corporate Capacity’. Five new directorates have been established with four new strategic directors appointed which will strengthen corporate focus and cross-service working. However there is some way still to go to break down departmentalism. Workshop participants acknowledged that this process had begun but strongly disagreed that the job was in any sense done. Much will now depend on the lead taken by the new corporate management team and the effective deployment of the chief executive support team with the support of the political leadership. Performance and project management Review recommendation: To introduce a performance and project management framework. One of the areas with the most acknowledged capacity for rapid improvement. There is now a performance management framework in place which is monitored quarterly against key targets by the executive and the corporate management team. A performance management manual has also been produced and distributed to all managers with action learning sets in place and a development programme for heads of service. This is a significantly improved position but staff are eager for skills development and support to assist them in establishing a performance management culture throughout the authority, particularly to help them to deal with under-performance in a systematic and transparent way. It was also felt that performance targets needed to be more realistic and had tended to be set too high for effective achievement. This can be demoralising and demotivating. Whilst recent initiatives are acknowledged, the human resources function needs to do more, more urgently, to address issues of organisational and management development linked to performance management and appraisal. A new post of business manager has been created in each directorate to support project and programme management. This initiative will assist managers in particular in budget planning and linking financial resources to key projects and priorities. Information and Communications Technology Review recommendation: To harness new technology to support the council’s strategic aims. Much resource and effort has gone into improving the council’s position with regard to new technology. A new head of strategic ICT has been appointed, a £1.1m annual maintenance budget approved and substantial development funding made available to support corporate use of ICT. This, again, represents a much improved situation but the impact has yet to be felt. The introduction of new systems has been problematic and slow. Partnership working with district councils, which has begun, needs to be accelerated to harness new technology for improved public access. Workshop participants responded encouragingly to the progress made to date but were eager to see new technology used to effect real change at the front end, including proactive support to engage the public in using on-line services. Partnership working Review recommendation: To promote more active partnership working. The local strategic partnership is established and taking a lead in co-ordinating partnership working to clear objectives in line with the Oxfordshire Plan. The perception of workshop participants is that there is more constructive and active partnership working. At the strategic level there is much better established partnership working with the district councils, as well as with health partners and the parishes. It is acknowledged that more effort needs to be put into ‘locality’ working. A pilot has been set up in South Oxfordshire to pave the way for a more comprehensive approach, but this needs to be pursued with urgency and imagination. The county council is now regarded as playing a constructive leadership role with partners at the strategic level but is advised now to understand that a leadership role does not always mean ‘taking the lead’. The message from some partners is that on occasions they still feel they are ‘being done to’ and for the council to ‘relax’ and to put leadership into practice by supporting and facilitating rather than enforcing and controlling. This should be the next stage in the evolution of the council in this important area of its work – as much a matter of style as of substance. Celebrating success Review recommendation: To unleash the creativity of staff and celebrate their success with enthusiasm. Celebrating success depends on effecting cultural change throughout the authority which positively supports and celebrates staff potential. A number of initiatives have been put in place to begin to effect such change. All departments have now gained the Investors in People award and the chief executive has hosted a number of management seminars to showcase success. Successes are also regularly celebrated in ‘The Post’ staff newsletter and there is a chairman’s award scheme. A best value review ‘Developing our Staff’ has been undertaken. However, workshop participants remained very critical of the progress made against this recommendation with staff continuing to perceive a detached senior management. Conclusions and Recommendations Much progress has clearly been made since the original review took place. The pace needs now to be maintained and indeed accelerated in some areas, such as human resources and locality working. The review team expressly acknowledged the hard work which had been put in to ensure that appropriate corporate restructuring had taken place since the peer review which create the conditions for future improvement across the council. This in itself is recognised as a significant sign of a more confident and assertive corporate leadership and the lead given by the Chief Executive is particularly recognised. However the appointment of a new corporate management team has only just been completed and it is important that this team is given time and resources to take the bold steps now needed to achieve the ambition of the authority to be an outstanding organisation by 2005. Whilst the team were assured by the structures and processes now in place, they warned that improvement would only be achieved if cultural issues were consistently addressed in the coming months and years to engender a learning organisation, ensure that all staff in the organisation feel valued and supported to achieve their full potential, and that the public and partners continue to be increasingly engaged. The review day workshop was well attended and facilitated group discussions prompted many useful views and suggestions. Some of these, for example public consultation and communication, fell outside of the scope of this focused review. The review team would urge the authority to use this as an opportunity to be built on in the future as a useful mechanism for effecting a more inclusive and reflective organisational culture.
Jane Martin Review
Manager Email:jane.martin@idea.gov.uk
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