Hello bloggers

Have you read the press headlines recently about public sector services? If you haven’t they go something like this…’Public sector bad, private sector good’ or ‘Town Hall fat cats overpaid and clueless’ or ‘Public sector needs a bonfire under it’.

This type of crude reporting, quite frankly, gets my goat.

Gillian Hibberd and I met Jackie Orme, CIPD Chief Executive, last week to discuss mutual agendas and how we can work in successful collaboration. Fortunately, we see balanced reporting concerning public sector management from the CIPD through People Management magazine. However, we discussed the current plethora of anti-public sector reporting that appears to plague the more sensationalist elements of the media.

The damage crude and melodramatic reporting may cause is of considerable concern both now and for the future. Jackie, to her great credit, was quick to identify the problem. The problem being that we need to recruit and retain talented people if we are to be successful in the challenge of transforming public sector services. Bashing the public sector as a ‘basket case’ puts at risk our ability to recruit and retain those talented people who will be tasked with making fundamental change to public services. If employee engagement takes a hit, so will our ability to provide good quality services at an affordable cost - empirical evidence from Investors in People, MORI, the Work Foundation, to name a few well-respected research organisations, demonstrates a casual relationship between employees engagement and organisational performance.

If the UK is to emerge in reasonable shape from the recession, we need the nation to get behind the public sector to reduce the country’s level of debt and bashing us isn’t going to help one little bit. If top talent leaves the public sector, how will we deliver the fundamental change that’s needed?

Jackie agreed that we need to promote the successful changes already being implemented across the public sector, share the learning and spread the success.  If only others were as enlightened - but then I suppose good news seldom sells newspapers, unless it’s ‘England wins the World Cup’?

Have a good week.

Dean

I had the pleasure of attending a CIPD Dinner with Jackie Orme this week on the issue of next generation HR leaders. A fascinating discussion took place about where the next leaders will be coming from and what role the CIPD will play in attracting and developing such talent. As well as our very own Stephen Moir, other people attending included Alex Wilson from BT, Stephen Dando from Thomson Reuters and Lucy Adams from the BBC.

Stephen and I were both supportive of the CIPD targeting fast track development at people entering the profession and in developing a high quality programme aimed at developing future leaders. The report from the CIPD on ‘Next Generation HR’ is certainly worth a read.

This week also saw the release of the long awaited Audit Commission report on CEO severance – ‘By Mutual Agreement’. The document is downloadable from the Audit Commission website and is a very interesting read. The trade press picked it up very quickly and I’ve been making comments that the recommendations on transparency are to be welcomed.

Finally, I’m now busy planning my conference itinerary for next week. I send my very best wishes to Dean for a successful event and given the tremendous energy and effort he has put into it I’m sure it will be a fantastic event.

For anyone out there who has been reading my blog please do come over and say hello if you are at the conference – I would love to meet you.

Gill

You may have picked up in the media that the CIPD have recently issued a paper entitled ‘Building Productive Public Sector Workplaces’. The document highlights the inevitable and lengthy period of public sector transformation that we are going through and positions effective people management as an essential prerequisite for success.

The paper goes on to make a number of recommendations for improvement in people management practice across the sector. For those that haven’t seen the document I have arranged for a link to be sent directly to PPMA members in the next couple of days. Although the paper is, in my view, positioned as a policy and lobbying paper by the CIPD, it has unfortunately been translated into a negative portrayal of public sector people management practice by some parts of the media.

Dean Shoesmith was busy responding to media calls with the PPMA view yesterday but we are also interested in hearing your views on the document. Let us know by commenting in the blog if you agree or disagree with the recommendations? Does it represent a fair and balanced commentary on the sector or not?

I look forward to hearing from you.

Best wishes,

Gill

Recent news article from People Management commenting on Gill Hibberd’s speech at the CIPD Conference in Manchester.

To read the article click here.

I’m sat at the Midland Hotel in Manchester having chaired a session at the CIPD Conference yesterday. The Midland is such a great venue for a conference (but I would say that wouldn’t I!!). It certainly is bringing back some great memories of our own PPMA Conference earlier this year. The session I chaired yesterday was on transforming HR Efficiency in the public sector. Joe Dugdale, HR Director from the Borders Agency and David McIlhinney, Chief Executive of Liverpool Direct were my co-speakers. I may have caused a little bit of controversy when I said that we in HR created more bureaucracy in organisations than any other function and how its time we get back to ’sensible HR’. Watch out for the headlines in the trade press!

Jackie Orme from the CIPD is very visible at the conference and in my view is doing a superb job for the profession. Jacqui has delivered remarkable change during her short tenure so far and I have great confidence in her plans for the future. I really feel that our profession is in very safe hands. Well-done Jackie!

As usual there were a few drinks to be had in the bar last night. A number of friends and colleagues were around including Martin Tiplady from the Metropolitan Police who won an award for training at the CIPD Awards.

Leatham Green from West Sussex was also there celebrating being shortlisted for an award. Our friend, David Fairhurst from McDonald’s was in his usual exuberant form and had an amazing belt on - if you bump into him ask him about his ‘bling belt’!

Anyway its back to reality for me now and a long drive home.

Best wishes

Gill

Stephen is now off on a very well deserved break, so its over to me and other colleagues to fill the blog spots.

In this blog post, I’d like to take the opportunity to say a few words about Stephen and the rest of the PPMA policy board. Under Stephen’s leadership we have seen our organisation go from strength to strength. Our media profile is as high as it’s ever been and our credibility as an organisation is also strong. The organisation has been through incredible change over the past three years but it is now on very firm foundations from which we can continue to grow. The development of the organisation is a team effort and all Members play a role but Stephens influence, leadership and steer have been exceptional. So a very big thank you to him and the rest of the board for all their contributions. 

Stephen and I met with Jackie Orme (Chief Executive, CIPD) last week as he mentions in his recent blog post. I felt it was a very productive meeting and I’ve agreed to continue to meet with Jackie throughout next year with the aim of bringing the CIPD and PPMA closer together. I’m delighted that Jackie has agreed to come along to the PPMA Conference next year and will be one of our keynote speakers on the Friday. You should start to see marketing material for the conference in October and watch out for the early bird discount if you book before the end of the year.

The Personnel Today Top 40 Power Players were announced this week. The public sector was better represented than ever with a number of PPMA colleagues featuring in the list including: 

• Martin Tiplady, HR Director at the Met Police at No2
• Stephen Moir, PPMA President and Director of People and Policy at Cambridgeshire CC at No7
• Angela O’Connor, Immediate Past president of PPMA and Chief People Officer at the NPIA at No8
• Jim Savage, PPMA lead on pay and Director of HR and OD at Cumbria CC at No14
• Myself, Gillian Hibberd!, Vice President of PPMA and Director of People and Policy at Buckinghamshire CC at No18
• Alan Warner, PPMA Lead on Talent and Director of People and Property at Hertfordshire CC at No24

Well done to everyone in the top 40!

To all blog readers out there, it’s important for the visibility of PPMA that we have members featured in the list, so please vote when you get similar events opportunities in the future.

Have a great weekend.

Gill

Hi, sorry I’ve not updated the blog for the last couple of weeks, it has simply been a bit manic. However, manic has been good in terms of ground covered, issues progressed and then some rest and relaxation.

Within the last few weeks, the following has all taken place:

1) PPMA Policy Board meeting in Cambridge. A resounding success in which decisions were made to appoint 3 new Lead Officers to the Policy Board - these will be announced via the PPMA website and via an all member e-mail, but I’m delighted we have been able to make these great new appointments. The Board also covered a lot of additional business, including updates from out regional chairs and lead officers - some great work going on across the country and regional chairs have now been provided with a digest of lead officer reports to share with PPMA members. Discussions also took place about our future association development activities and we agreed to commission a major new programme of HR Transformation work. Finally, this was also a chance to let the policy board see a bit more of the splendours of Cambridge and to thank them for their hard work and support this year - you’ll be pleased to hear that there was no drowning involved whilst punting.

2) Harrogate and back twice in the last 2 weeks to speak at the CIPD conference on performance management and then latterly to chair the first day of the Northern HR Briefing - organised by our PPMA North East, North West and Yorkshire and Humber regions, ably supported by the three regional employers’ organisations. This was a great conference with good speakers and allowed me to meet more PPMA members face to face, including 2 friends that I used to be at college with and another chum that I worked with in Lancashire Police in years gone by - they know who they are!

3) I’ve also had the pleasure of addressing the Eastern, Essex and Hertfordshire PPMA regional meeting on my theme of “Evolution or Extinction”. A real matter of pride for me since this was the region that nominated me to become PPMA President. Thanks to Anne Gibson and the team for the invitation. Other regions take note - that’s technically 4 regional visits in 2 weeks if I take the combined benefit of the Northern HR briefing and this visit together…presidential terms only last so long - book yours now to avoid disappointment!

4) Finally a visit to the capital with Gill Hibberd to meet the new CIPD Chief Executive, Jackie Orme. A good meeting to discuss matters of mutual interest and opportunities to strengthen our working together in the future. We’ll follow this up with the CIPD in 6 months or so to see what’s happened.

So other than the usual round of media and articles, you can see PPMA and I haven’t been up to much! In need of a well deserved rest, I’m handing the blog over to the capable hands of our VP, Gill Hibberd, for the next 2 weeks.Speak to you all when I get back with a suntan!

Best wishes 

Stephen

Well as I end the final bank holiday weekend of the year, my thoughts turn to the impending PPMA September Board meeting in Cambridge, which promises to be a busy one.

However, last week flew past and included yet another London trip on Wednesday. This time to join a CIPD/People Management lunchtime discussion on the state of employee relations in the UK. A really interesting discussion involving a cross section of people and organisations, including Stephen Kelly, Director of BBC People, Linda Holbeche, CIPD’s policy and research director, James Dalgleish, Head of HR for the London Fire Service and Sarah Veale from the TUC.

The debate was both topical and relevant with increasing IR/ER tensions all over the country and the looming spectre of an economic downturn beginning to “colour” employee relations at both a local and national level.

Needless to say the debate will feature in a future edition of People Management, but more importantly will contribute towards one of CIPD’s new “Futures” Reports, which is a real step in the right direction for the Institute.

Anyway, enjoy what’s left for your bank holiday - traffic jams and all.

Stephen