The following article features PPMA President Gill Hibberd:

1. Wanted: Fast-Trackers published 25th February 2010 on peoplemanagement.co.uk

The following article features PPMA President Gill Hibberd:

1. HR wary on plans for public-sector co-ops published 22nd February 2010 on peoplemanagement.co.uk

Happy New Year to everyone. I do hope that you all had a restful festive period and are now feeling refreshed enough to start the New Year with lots of energy.

There is no doubt that this year will be a rollercoaster ride for many of us as we struggle to manage the implications of dramatically reduced public sector funding. You can all be sure that PPMA will be doing everything it can to support it members through difficult times by offering thought leadership, peer support, best practice and opportunities to discuss topical issues.

The first of these opportunities will of course be the impending PPMA Conference in March this year. I can’t quite believe that my year has gone so quickly. I am not yet in ‘wind down’ mode and have lots of things that I want to see progressed before I hand over the reigns to Dean’s very capable hands. In particular, I want to see the next phase of PPMA’s exciting proposals for business development in place and I will be taking a report to the next Policy Board in February on my plans for seeing this happen.

I have some Policy Board changes to notify you of too…unfortunately we have recently seen the resignation of both Jim Savege and Lorraine Hallam from the Board. I’m delighted to inform you that Mike Cook from Camden has now been appointed the new Lead Officer for Reward and that Leatham Green from East Sussex has been appointed the new Lead Officer for Wellbeing and Worklessness. I wish both lots of luck in their new roles and look forward to welcoming them to the next Board meeting.

We are now starting to see the first signs of election fever with the Conservatives campaign launch this week. I suspect that things will hot up even more as we approach the spring. Hopefully the date of the election will be revealed soon to put us all out of our misery.

Over the next couple of weeks I have a number of PPMA duties including a visit to the North West region and will be speaking at a conference on OD in Birmingham on behalf of PPMA. Other presidential duties include media interviews, which keep me busy and writing my regular People Management article. As always comments are always welcome on all of the topics I write about.

In the meantime, stay safe in the snow.

Regards

Gill

The following articles feature PPMA President Gill Hibberd:

1. Perils of a public sector pay cap - published 13th December 2009 in The Sunday Times
2. Public sector faces job losses ‘on unprecedented scale’ published 11th December 2009 on peoplemanagement.co.uk

Interesting article in People Management on ‘Outsourcing’ of recruitment (featuring comments from Gill Hibberd) published on 5th November 2009.

I’m back from a very restful break – to a mound of emails and papers! Hope that you are all enjoying the summer and are managing to find time to take a break yourselves at some point. With this in mind I am reminded of the wise words of Dave Ulrich at our conference earlier this year when he talked about us looking after our health and being responsible for our own well-being!

I’ve been catching up on news that I missed whilst away and see that the debate on public sector pay still rumbles on. The reality of the current economic climate has to hit home at some point and the need for pay restraint must surely apply as equally to the public sector as it does in the private sector. BA have taken the interesting stance of asking its workforce to volunteer to work for nothing for periods of a week to a month. Can you imagine the response that would be received in the public sector to similar suggestions? Personally I think it’s an innovative response to difficult times and we will all be challenged over the coming months to be more and more creative in the solutions we need to find to keep out organisations afloat.

My first opnion piece in People Management magazine on the issue of the bureaucracy we create in HR seems to have caused a stir! The week after it appeared a flurry of letters were received by People Management on the subject from various commentators – exactly the response I was hoping for. I know that not everyone will agree with my views but it’s always healthy to have a debate and to take on board the views of others.

My next piece will be on the issue of organisational design and should appear in the August edition of People Management.

One of the great jobs I get to do as PPMA President is to judge the overall winner of the Personnel Today Awards, which will be announced later in the year. The rather large judging file has just landed on my desk – watch out for more news on this later in the year!

I’m also putting together a plan for the next PPMA Board meeting which I hope will cover the big issues of the future of reward in the public sector as well as looking at the future world of work and what the challenges might be.

I will be back with more blogs soon, In the meantime enjoy what little sun we seem to be getting!

Gill

I’m just about to go off to the annual MJ Awards in London tonight at which PPMA and the LGE are jointly sponsoring the category of People and Workforce Achievement of the Year.

Shortlisted organisations in this category are Birmingham City Council (2 shortlisted entries), Fenland District Council, Hertfordshire County Council, Lancashire County Council and Winchester City Council. Good luck to everyone and well done for getting to the shortlist stage! I’m also hosting a PPMA table at the awards tonight which is an opportunity for PPMA to say thank you to our key sponsors and regional chairs/Lead Officers who put so much time into the work they do for PPMA. I’m looking forward to a great evening!

Last week saw the publication of my first opinion piece in People Management Magazine. I challenged colleagues to think more radically about the bureaucracy we often create around HR processes. My answer was to go back to basics and think about the real purpose underlying many of the procedures we have created. If you missed the article you can follow this link to an online version.

It’s PPMA Board meeting this Friday. It’s my first Board event and I’m taking a slightly different approach by holding a debate on one of my key manifesto issues. This week sees a debate on the future of reward in the sector and I’m delighted that our friend and colleague, Jan Parkinson, will be joining us form the LGE. Watch out for future blog posts on the outcome of the debate!

Have a great weekend everyone.

Gill

Well, who would have believed that 12 months could go so quickly? I’m still a bit surprised that the PPMA conference is almost here again. As I write this post, I’m already in Manchester at the conference venue, with the team of people that are helping to get everything ready for the days ahead.

The conference run up has once again seen PPMA in the media including our incoming President giving some hard but necessary truths about public sector employment, especially in a time of recession, in People Management last week. I also wrote my last H R Columnist piece in the same edition of PM. I’m also sure the media profile for PPMA will again go through the roof this week as the conference gets into full swing (the cast of speakers alone merits this).

So, that’s really it. My Presidency comes to an end tomorrow at the AGM and all that remains is for me to thank you, the PPMA members, who gave me this wonderful opportunity. It has been my distinct privilege and pleasure to serve as President for 2008/09 and I look forward to continuing to serve as both Past President and Treasurer for the next 12 months.

In case you wanted to ask the killer question has the last year been worth it? The answer is a resounding yes from me, the real test is whether or not you, as the Association, also think my tenure has been worthwhile - I hope you equally agree.

Anyway, I look forward to seeing you in Manchester later this week - Gillian, over to you and best of luck.

Best wishes and thanks to all,

Stephen

Hi all

Sorry for not having updated the Blog for a while, my new job is keeping me pretty busy.

Anyway, a few things for information:

1. We are now only 12 days away from the PPMA Conference in Manchester - have you booked your place yet?

2. I’ve been busy beavering away updating the PPMA Constitution in the last few weeks (someone needed to do it). This will be ready for the AGM for Members to consider and hopefully approve.

3. I’ve got my final HR Columnist piece for People Management being published on April 23rd, which provides me with an opportunity to reflect upon some of the issues facing the HR profession for the future. I’m delighted to say that our President (Designate), Gillian Hibberd, will be picking up this Column in the future, keeping the PPMA name in lights for the coming year.

And finally,

4. I’m delighted to say that Communications Management, PPMA’s Communications and PR agency, has been presented with a Gold Award for its employment practices in this year’s survey of the “Best Places to Work in PR” Obviously we are highly delighted - especially as only 2 out of the 120 PR consultancies who submitted entries to the Best Places to Work survey received a Gold medal and only 12 in total received a medal of any description. It’s great to know that one of our key professional advisers is also being recognised as a great employer!

I’ll be doing my last Blog Post next week and will then be handing this over to Gillian’s capable hands as well.

Best wishes

Stephen

Hi All

Sorry for the lengthy delay in providing you with another post, so here goes!

Friday the 13th saw the launch of Raising the Standard - all very successful I hear (but due to snow I was again stuck at home - grrr!).

Until last week my external media stuff had been quiet, with good reason…I was at risk of redundancy as a result of a senior management reorganisation within my authority. However, I’m pleased to say that I’ve come through the other side of this unscathed and will emerge in April in my new incarnation as Corporate Director (People, Policy and Law) for Cambridgeshire CC. A larger and more challenging role, which I’m looking forward to taking on - who says us “senior” types have ’safe’ jobs in the public sector?

Oh and before you ask, yes I had to apply and survive a really testing interview process. Thanks to friends and colleagues for all their support and kind words pre and post interview, it’s always good to know you’ve got some supporters at times like this!

With my personal position clarified, normal service will now be resumed and you may have seen I’ve written another piece for People Management (particular thanks to Janice Joannou for her contribution to this) - comments welcomed in response on the Blog.

And finally - I’ve been my usual opinionated self in Personnel Today (PT) last week. Rather than roll over and accept the public sector media bashing on pay, pensions and performance issues, I thought I’d round off my Presidency with a bit of a defence of public services and public servants especially (backed up with a bit of economic reality). I have another piece scheduled for PT next week, I hope it hits the mark!

Best wishes

Stephen