Local Government Workforce Strategy 2010

1. Local Government Workforce Strategy 2010 Joan Munro National Advisor 17th February 2010

2. Why do we have a Strategy? • Identify local government’s critical shared workforce challenges • Galvanise, align and support effective action at local, regional and national level to address these • Gain resources and support from elsewhere because can provide coherent voice/data etc

3. Strategy achievements so far… • Much more senior interest in importance of anticipating and addressing workforce issues • Many more councils and regions taking effective action • Concrete progress e.g.: quality of leadership improving; recruitment difficulties reducing; ngdp attracting talent in; development of OD skills; much more interest in employee engagement • Improved joining up e.g. on children’s and adult social care workforce issues

4. Areas struggling still • Many authorities still not identified all their critical workforce challenges across the board (nor put in place action to address) • Critical gaps in skills e.g. strategic commissioning • Occupational skills e.g. social workers • Workforce planning • Total rewards approach • Benchmarking on costs still crude (let alone doing this on productivity)

5. Overall context • Downsizing • Value for money • Pay restraint • Pension review • Growing demands • Personalisation/choice • Partnership working Leading to ‘Transformation’: • Reducing or closing services • Job losses • New structures • New ways of working • New employers

6. The challenges and opportunities • Using the burning platform to achieve change and innovation to create a fit for the future organisation/partnership • Designing & implementing new structures & new ways of working & effective cultural change • Downsizing with dignity • Ensuring employees are informed about and engaged in changes • Keeping employees motivated through turmoil • Retaining people with the skills and attitudes needed for future success

7. Local Government Workforce Strategy 2010: a revised vision? We want local councils, with their local partners, to be able to achieve their strategic ambitions because they: • Have visionary, ambitious, effective and joined up leadership; • Have streamlined, customer focussed, value for money ways of working; • Attract, develop, motivate and retain the right people with the right skills for success to work in local public services; • Offer flexible and fair rewards, that promote high performance; • Reflect the diversity of their communities, both in their workforce profile and in their workforce practices.

8. A shorter vision? We want councils, with their partners, to achieve the diverse, motivated, flexible and skilled workforces they need to deliver value for money services that make a difference to the communities they serve.

9. Local Government Workforce Strategy 2010:suggested priorities • organisational development – effectively building workforce support for new structures and new ways of working to deliver citizen-focused and value for money services, in partnership; • leadership development – building visionary, ambitious and effective leadership which makes the best use of both the political and managerial role, operating in a partnership context; • skill development – with partners, developing employees’ skills and knowledge, in an innovative, high performance, multi-agency context; • recruitment and retention – with partners, taking action to: recruit and retain the right workforce; address key future occupational skill shortages; promote jobs and careers; identify, develop and motivate talent and address diversity issues; • pay and rewards - producing innovative approaches to reward and controlling employment costs to reflect challenging budget and efficiency requirements, as well as new ways of working. Encouraging a total reward approach to promote high performance in the new context

10. Hot issues • Anticipating & addressing the workforce issues of ‘Total Place’ • Increasing leadership diversity • Developing strategic commissioning skills • Tackling social work recruitment issues • Tackling local worklessness e.g. via apprenticeships, Local Employment Partnerships • Promoting ‘total rewards’ approach

11. Most important national support • Best practice case studies and ideas, research, advice, networking opportunities, strategic leadership • Promoting local government as a good place to work • Ensuring a national profile for hard to recruit professions such as social work

12. Debates • Sharpening up the performance indicators and targets? • Whether to include some longer term targets? • Whether to use the Audit Commission’s KLOE assessments as measures of success?

13. Timetable • IDeA/LGE considering consultation responses and revising the Strategy • Strategy goes to LGA HR Panel on March 26th • Launch in April/May

14. IDeA/RIEP productivity framework

15. Right culture Right way LEAN and BPI Flexible working Partnership models Right motivation Engaged staff Performance management Total rewards Right vision Comprehensive approach Customer focus Partnership working Right thing Customer focused service design Outcome focus Measurement Right people Workforce planning Recruitment and retention Job design Right skills Skills gap analysis Skills development Leaders’ behaviours model vision Member/Board commitment Continuous improvement and innovation Productivity framework detail

16. IDeA support includes… • Workforce Improvement Peer Challenge and Productivity Peer Challenge • Leadership development programmes • Online communities of practice e.g. on organisational development, on workforce matters, on apprenticeships, on building employee engagement, on leadership development • Local Government Talent website (incorporating LG jobs, LG careers & national graduate development programme) • Web based library of good practice examples • Web resources e.g. on support in addressing skill shortages; on employee engagement, on workforce issues in shared services, on cultural change, on increasing productivity, on joining up local workforce strategies with partners (forthcoming one on total place and workforce issues) • Publications e.g. ‘Managing People Through Major Transitions’ • Forthcoming events: ‘Yes We Can!’ Diversity and Leadership Issues Conference on March 4th Total Place and Workforce Issues Seminar on March 12th; Organisational Redesign Seminar in Birmingham on May 19th