Public Sector HR Podcast

Joint management arrangements are beginning to emerge across the public sector as the drive for greater efficiencies gains pace. Sharing a Chief Executive and in some cases the entire senior management team, can have many benefits for public sector organisations. In this month’s show, we talk to two people who have first hand experience of this growing practice.

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My first guest is Stephen Fletcher who is the co-author of a report recently published by the IDeA that explores the impact of sharing chief executives. The study concentrated on 10 parings of councils who are at various stages of implementing a shared chief executive and management team and Stephen details some of his findings:

• DRIVERS FOR THIS HAVE CHANGED OVER TIME - initially it was done on an interim basis to support a council in need of help, now it’s done to make real efficiency savings

• COUNCILS ARE MOVING AWAY FROM JUST SHARING A CHIEF EXECUTIVE - to sharing a whole management team, officers and services, between both councils

• REAL AND SIGNIFICANT SAVINGS ARE COMING THROUGH - some authorities are looking at £1m p.a. after quite a short period of time

• THE WHOLE THING HAS TO BE DRIVEN BY POLITICIANS - otherwise the arrangement will fall apart

Although the majority of of councils in the report are districts, Stephen believes this type of arrangement could work well for any local authority, however there are some fundamentally important issues to consider:

•  SIZE - it’s easier for smaller authorities to come together, although with careful planning and consideration, larger authorities could successfully link up

•  BIG SIMILARITIES - authorities need to have similar cultures, geography and demographics

•  CLOSE LINKS BETWEEN MEMBERS - there needs to be good cross-party working with elected members wanting the the same outcomes, such as sharing and improving services

• THINK ABOUT THE EMPLOYMENT MODEL - many authorities initially choose the secondment route where one authority is the employer and the other pays for a segment of time, now authorities are moving to a joint employment contract. Resolve any issues around terms and conditions at a very early stage

The advice Stephen gives to anyone who is considering the shared chief executive approach, is to make it one job. You can’t look upon this as two separate jobs - the secret is about bringing it together. The job is supporting two sets of councils and not to be a chief executive in two different places at the same time, as that’s not sustainable. The savings will come from bringing the management teams together and sharing the services and you can only do this if you look upon it as one job, with one set of officers beneath you.

A copy of the Shared Chief Executives and Joint Management: a model for the future? can be downloaded here. Additional reports that Stephen has written on this topic can be found here.

David Buckle is my second guest. David is Joint Chief Executive at Vale of White Horse and South Oxfordshire District Councils and is the only Chief Executive in this joint role, who won his job in competition with his opposite number at Vale of White Horse Council. Bringing the two councils together has thrown up some interesting challenges and David shares some of his experience with us.

David believes there are a number of reasons for the successful paring of these two authorities:

• HUGE DRIVE AND ENERGY- from him, the management team and heads of service, who are fired up and committed to making this work

• BOTH COUNCILS HAVE SIMILAR, QUITE SEVERE FINANCIAL PRESSURES - and are looking at ways to save money

• THE POLITICAL COMMITMENT - there is very strong backing from both sets of politicians, who have given a clear mandate to bring everything together that makes good business sense to do so

And some of the challenges David has faced includes:

• BRINGING THE TWO CULTURES TOGETHER - there has been a significant culture change for the staff at Vale of White Horse, as David’s leadership style is quite different from his predecessor. The management team is having to work hard at driving this change through

• HARMONISING TERMS AND CONDITIONS - they have taken the best from each authority and put them together, following robust negotiations with both union branches and staff in order to strike an agreement

• VISABILTY WITH THE STAFF - some staff at South Oxfordshire have commented that they see much less of David

• GETTING TO KNOW ALL OF THE STAFF - David knows all of the staff by name at South Oxfordshire and is learning the names of those at Vale of White Horse, he now has 15 minute interviews with all new recruits to help with this

• PRACTICAL DIFFICULTIES - such as diary management 

The HR challenges that the joining of two authorities creates, are greater than many others and David has two key pieces of advice for HR teams:

• BRING IN EXTERNAL HELP - with the recruitment process, this is crucial, particularly when individuals are going head to head with their counterparts in the other authority

• GO WITH THE FLOW - be very positive, help the management team to find solutions and don’t put obstacles in the way

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I would love to hear your feedback and any suggestions for further shows. Either email me directly at karen@publicsectorhrpodcast.co.uk or click on ‘Comment’ underneath the show title and type away.