The following article features PPMA President Gill Hibberd and Stephen Moir:
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
The sun is shining, I’m sat on the train from London to Cambridge and I’ve chaired my final PPMA Policy Board as President.
The meeting today was really well attended and supported by Regional Chairs and Lead Officers and gave the Board a chance to review the annual report submissions for the forthcoming AGM at the conference.
Reflecting upon my time as President, I had the chance to thank all the people that have supported and enabled me to do this - you know who you are! Best of all, I get to attend the Conference this year as a Delegate and will enjoy what will be the best PPMA Conference yet and learn, from the best, including David Ulrich himself.
The Policy Board also debated key issues relating to Local Government Pay and Senior Salaries/FOI issues and it felt that some key policy positions were arrived at.
I look forward to seeing you in Manchester at the end of April, at which point this Blog will become Gillian’s to lead as well…I hope you have booked your places at the conference!?
Best wishes
Stephen
Hi All
Well this week has really been interesting! I decided to “go for it” in responding to some comments published in Personnel Today (PT) last week about my views on not freezing public sector pay and challenging my own remuneration package.
The published piece wasn’t quite the nuclear option I originally drafted and deleted, but I think anyone reading my opinion piece would get the point. Locally this attracted some press interest because I chose to publish my salary. Which brings me to a point - why should actual public sector pay be hidden behind a fog of FOI exemptions and pay bands? It shouldn’t.
We all pay taxes and the public should expect openness from their public servants about their pay. However, openness about pay levels doesn’t justify uninformed criticism - pay has to be set in the context of the role concerned. Additionally, if people think that some public servants are paid too highly, then I respect the fact that they have an opinion. However, people also need to respect the fact that if public sector pay is frozen and higher earners have their pay regulated by Whitehall (I refer you to John Healey’s recent comments), then public services will once again become less able to draw in talented people and retain them at all levels. Time for a healthy debate with the public, politicians and others I think.
We’ll see what the reaction is in PT next week. Thanks for the messages from far and wide I’ve already received in support of my opinion piece. I’m sorry if some PPMA members think I’ve been too controversial, but being in a leadership role occasionally means putting yourself up to be shot at…and I made that choice consciously. PPMA has to, in my view, say things sometimes that others can’t and won’t. Public sector bashing is THE story in the media and I, for one, won’t sit quietly and be bludgeoned to death.
On other PPMA matters, I had the pleasure of representing us at the Association of County Chief Executives last night and in another guise as their Honorary Secretary for the day, standing in for my boss. It was very useful to be in this august company and to be part of discussions about issues of the day, include Lord Laming’s Report and all things CAA.
To prove that there is life outside work, I’m now heading off for a long weekend, in advance of my final PPMA Policy Board meeting as President next Friday.
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
Well, that time has come around again - within a matter of days it will be Christmas and then we’ll commence 2009. 2008 has a good year for the PPMA and the members of the Association, the PPMA Office and the Policy Board have once again worked tirelessly to improve the standard of people management and development across public services.
PPMA’s stock is riding high (at least in my mind) and it’s probably time to take a well-earned break for us all - I’ll be back to the blog again on 2nd January.
On that basis, please accept my very best wishes for Christmas and for a happy, healthy and peaceful New Year.
Stephen
Hi all, not much to report this week - surprisingly I’ve actually managed to get another day to work at home - twice in two weeks is a bit of a record! All things PPMA are becoming really quiet pre Christmas, although I did have a chance to catch up with John Tonks last night and all seems to be moving along well for the 2009 conference - but can I remind you all to please book your places as soon as possible - leaving this to the last minute will only lead to disappointment…
That’s pretty much it for this week - I’ve now got another piece to write for People Management - let’s hope the creative instinct kicks in soon!
Have a good weekend and wrap up warm.
Stephen
For once, I’m writing a blog update whilst sat working from home - what a pleasant novelty!
Even more surprising is that this week there isn’t a huge amount to report on the PPMA front. Last week’s attendance at the Personnel Today Awards was hugely successful and the PPMA guests appeared to have enjoyed themselves, as did the PPMA members in attendance. I was delighted to see that there were a number of public sector finalists, including my former colleagues in South Tyneside - well done to all the public sector entrants who made it to the final stages and especially to those who won!
Other than updating on the tail end of last week, from a personal perspective PPMA business appears to be winding down towards the Christmas break - but I’m pretty sure that it will quickly ramp up again in the New Year. The one bit of business to highlight was a discussion I held this morning with our lead on Pay and Reward, Jim Savege, and Andy Cook from Marshall-James HR consulting. Our discussion was about employee relations training for HR teams and we agreed an outline proposal that I’ll be writing to PPMA Regional Chairs about to consider further.
Before closing for this week, I would like to make a personal comment about the national press and what appears to be an increasing anti-public sector line. Newspaper articles have covered all sorts of issues from public sector pay and pensions to job titles - if I didn’t know better, I’d say that a general election was impending (you can call me a cynic at this point). When messages such as these start to appear in the broadsheets, it’s pretty clear that lobby groups and political parties are starting to flex their campaigning muscles.
Compound this with the additional public sector efficiency targets and increases in employer national insurance contributions, etc. then public servants and public sector employers are very much under the spotlight, especially our colleagues working in children’s services across the country. With the backdrop of the credit crunch and interest rates at a 57 year low, this is not only going to be a tough time for HR teams supporting employers and employees alike, it’s unlikely to get any easier in the meantime. So, rather than crumble or hide away, HR really has to step up the pace and help the public sector as a whole weather the gathering storm.
Best wishes
Stephen
I chaired the last meeting of the PPMA Policy Board for 2008 on Friday, 14th November - many thanks to Local Government Employers’ for providing us with such excellent meeting facilities in the LGA Offices in Smith Square. The meeting had a reasonable attendance level, particularly from Regional Chairs, although the number of Lead Officers in attendance was slightly disappointing - in part a recognition of the busy day jobs that people have, but also an issue I intend to review further. On the plus side, I was delighted to see each of our recently appointed Lead Officers for Diversity, Talent Management and HR Transformation in attendance, all of whom have ambitious plans to move these areas forward for the Association.
Agenda wise, we had some healthy debate and discussion on a range of key issues - including hearing about the 2009 conference from Gillian Hibberd. Progress reports for Regions and Policy Lead areas were received and scrutinised by the Board and our financial health was also considered as an Association. Having completed a full series of agenda items, we also considered nominations for the post of Vice President (Elect) for 2009/10 and PPMA Treasurer. Subject to the views of our members via the AGM next year, I’m delighted to advise you that Jim Savege, currently our Lead Officer for Pay and Reward, has been nominated as Vice President (Elect).
The role of Treasurer will also see a change next year. Steve Traynor, our well known and well regarded Treasurer, has decided to stand down from the role after a number of years serving in this capacity. As many of you may know, Steve has a highly successful private business that is taking up more of his time and given our constitutional position, regarding the Treasurer being a serving public sector HR professional, it means that we do need to nominate another person to take these responsibilities forward. In the meantime, Steve will serve as Treasurer of PPMA until the AGM next year and will continue to provide his sage advice, wisdom and support to the Board and especially to the Principal Officers. At the November Board meeting, a nomination for the role of Treasurer was also received….I have been nominated to fulfil this role for the Association. This might be surprising to some, but I’m delighted to accept nomination to undertake this role in the future and also recognise that I want to provide active participation and support for PPMA going forward.
Finally a brief trailer for this week: This week sees the formal launch of “Raising the Standard” - the specification for HR Directors in Local Government on 27th November. I’m delighted to see this excellent piece of work come to fruition - congratulations to Alan Warner for his vision and drive to see this through. Also on the 27th, I’m pleased to advise you that, on behalf of PPMA, I’ll be hosting a table at the Personnel Today Awards for 2008. This will be great chance to further raise our profile, thank some of our key contributors and supporters and generally celebrate what’s best in people management - hopefully including a range of Public Sector winners!
Hope you all have a good week.
Stephen
