What's stopping us?

When it comes to public service reform, large swathes of public services have been experiencing “delivery paralysis”. In this article, Prof Donna Hall and Andrew Laird explore why this is and what can be done about it.

This article kicks off an Autumn of content from the Mutual Ventures team focused on supporting a stronger delivery focus in public services.

#GettingStuffDone #DoingTheRightStuff!!

Where we’ve been – and where we are…

Reading the conference programmes for this year’s national, local government and NHS events and then comparing them to the same conferences from ten years ago is interesting.

They are almost exactly the same! 

The words may have changed slightly - “test, learn and grow” rather than “transformation” and a lot more “local government reorganisation as an opportunity to reform”. However, “wholesale public service reform”, “relational by design”, “asset-based”, “digital revolution” and “integrated neighbourhood teams” are all still featured prominently.

So why are we still talking about these concepts as if they are new things?

What have we all been doing for the last ten years as leaders and those who support the sector?

Why don’t we just get on and do it?

What’s stopping us?

If anything, the conferences and events of today feel more cautious, less ambitious, less visionary, more focused on the immediate. A lot of people in the sector seem exhausted, perhaps worn down by trying and failing to make change happen over many years.

The sector needs a big dose of positive energy. It’s falling away as a career choice for bright young people. Many of those who do join start to regret it after a couple of years and leave because they are unable to fulfil the hopes they had of making a positive impact.

To support public service leaders to lead (not just their individual organisations but their “places”) in a radical and innovative way, we need to gain a better understanding of what’s currently stopping them.

“I have enough on my plate right now!”

Delivering reform is hard. Whilst there is a lot of talk about reform, moving to collective action across a whole council (never mind in partnership with the NHS, police, third sector) is very difficult. It requires freeing up time and headspace for thinking and doing things which are important but not urgent.

The desire to deliver meaningful reform coupled with the inability to make the time depletes energy at the personal and organisational level. It can appear such a daunting ask, especially with urgent tasks and pressures crowding out your mind (and diary!). This dilemma often creates an inertia which becomes permanent.

“Let’s just run a tight ship”

Who can argue with the concept of running a “tight ship”… but what if that ship isn’t sailing anywhere useful? or even worse about to sail off the edge of a cliff?

As councils and other public bodies get squeezed financially, short-termism has become the norm. Reforming zeal and drive has been pushed to the fringe.

Leaders, both political and managerial often focus their time on delivering the latest shiny new separate initiative or strategy (often because it will have their name on it rather than their predecessors’) rather than building on the previous excellent work from five years ago that wasn’t delivered.

Leaders in Councils, NHS, Police and other public services are appointed, judged and rewarded based on their ability to maintain the effectiveness of their individual organisational KPIs and budget savings targets rather than how they work together to serve people and communities.

Compliance and adherence to the system rules are rewarded at all levels more than questioning “are we doing the right things?” Risk taking is frowned upon when it breaks from conventional new public management mantra.

“Do things better” becomes the philosophy rather the “Do better things” (love this! credit Mark Smith).

But let’s put all of that aside and assume that agreement has been reached to explore a reform agenda. It’s all systems go, right!?

Not quite…

“Let’s just get the governance and structures right”

Often we focus on structures rather than real reform. This is true of consultancies as well. Max Wide makes the point that when it comes to devolving power closer to communities, too often the focus is on the structures (the form) rather than what powers are actually being devolved (the function). Paper "empowerment" is no empowerment at all if does "not actually fundamentally change any existing power dynamics, alter practices, push the envelope of [shrinking] resources or evaluate any real outcomes."

Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) is being talked about as a one-off reform opportunity - but we are seeing many LGR areas, placing the majority of emphasis on being “safe and legal” when new councils are created. This can mean collective efforts are focused on maintaining the status quo rather than fundamentally questioning the role and function of local government.

LGR areas have a unique opportunity to ask some fundamental questions. Is the role of a council simply to be a statutory services provider of last resort or is there a wider role as the “convenor of place”, brokering a new social contract with its citizens and a new relationship with the NHS and others to support good lives?

Instead…Adopt a Radical Place Leadership approach

Shift the relationship between citizen and state from parent - child to equal partners. Citizens aren’t just passive recipients of remotely commissioned silo services.

Create new integrated teams at place/neighbourhood level including council services, NHS, police, DWP and third sector. Make all public services in a place accountable to local communities (there is the opportunity to do this with Neighbourhood Area Committees).

“Let’s do a pilot and see how it goes…”

We wrote an article for the MJ recently with Dr. Simon Kaye from Re:State.

Full credit to Simon for coining the term “pilotitis”.

“‘Pilotitis' is a genuine pathology of the English system. It allows a fundamentally risk-averse (and, let's face it, cash-strapped) system to send signals about working differently without ever making a deeper commitment to establishing the conditions for really doing so. In other words, they are a policy dead-end. The results of a pilot – good or bad – are far too easy to dismiss. A reluctant Whitehall can simply say that the specific local conditions make it too hard to draw out broader, system-wide lessons.”

In many organisations and systems there is a proliferation of separate pilots and projects. They often come from separate government / local government departments with a wide range of different pots to be bid for. These projects are well-intentioned but can become an end in themselves, often dealing with overlapping issues in neighbourhoods separately. For example, in a typical council there might be an anti-poverty initiative, a homelessness project, a domestic violence intervention, community wealth building, community power etc. All these initiatives have separate teams and outreach workers who deal with their piece of the jigsaw rather than the whole picture. Often, they are tripping over each other in communities. Mark Smith and Andrew wrote about this here.

As well as deliberately constraining the full exploration of new ideas through “pilotitis”, we also continue doing things we know don’t work despite all the evidence. Then we create new approaches that run alongside the traditional new public management approach causing confusion. Stopping doing something that isn’t working is (bizarrely) harder than starting something new.

It’s a well understood human condition that we want to avoid loss more than we want to gain something new. We need to learn to have the courage to stop doing things that don’t help people, families and communities and in many cases make their lives worse. This also applies to the consultants whose job it is to constructively challenge colleagues in the sector – not reach for the easy answer.

Instead…Start somewhere – go anywhere

We’ve done enough pilots. We know what works.

An attitude of “starting somewhere and going everywhere” (Mark Smith) is vital. This holds true both in terms of the challenge you tackle first and the fact that a single organisation or department can get the ball rolling. You don’t have to wait for absolutely every player in your system to be aligned or a grand, system-wide programme. Why not start by breaking down those silos in your own department and demonstrating the benefits to those you wish to join you.

We need to focus on “prevention”

There is much talk of prevention. This conveniently ignores the key issue that genuine reform is a shift of power away from professionals to the public. In effect a release of control – not a firmer grip. This is key and reform won’t happen without it.

Our work on Radical Place Leadership focuses on creating the conditions for collective and compelling change to happen, moving from an organisational to a person and place first approach and a place-based shared outcomes framework. It’s easier to focus on what matters to your Board or elected members than what matters to local people. We wrote about how this works in practice here…

Instead…Relational by default

Wouldn’t it be great if more public service leaders publicly rejected New Public Management and embraced relational approaches to providing support (and the devolution of power and control to public facing staff that this entails).

A place/neighbourhood-based devolved approach by default with liberate integrated neighbourhood frontline teams free to work outside of organisational KPIs and help people in innovate ways.

Hmmm… she/he’s a disruptor

Disruptors are often discouraged, dismissed or drowned in rules, restrictions and process. They’ve railed against the system and its obsession with “tight ship” governance and managerialism, and they’ve suffered the consequences.

Research from Gatenby Sanderson, the public sector recruitment specialists, showed that those who exhibit “imagination” or “boldness” are less likely to be appointed to senior positions in councils. Unbelievable in this current make or break period for many councils.

We all need to create the conditions for disruptors to flourish and encourage this mindset at all levels. The “Rebel Alliance” is now more important than ever. Leaders should find these people and harness their energy and idea rather than seek to “dull their sparkle” (love that phrase”). Create an environment where people can try new, more human approaches with courage and conviction.

Instead…Back the change mavericks and disruptors!

Just do it! Be brave! We all know the status quo can’t hold. Give your unconditional backing to innovation and measured risk taking. We (public service leaders and the consultants who mean to support them) are destined to fail if we see the management of decline as our role.

So much of public service reform is about creating a culture where it’s ok to question, to test and learn and to disrupt without it prematurely ending your local government or NHS career. Leaders who create this culture where frontline teams have the permission to innovate and do the right thing by people and their families, whether it is a “departmental priority” or not are precious.

Encourage courageous local leadership rather than “tight ship going nowhere” leadership at the political and managerial levels.

Appoint, judge and reward public service leaders on their ability to make a real difference alongside communities. Appoint leaders who are prepared to think outside their departmental siloes.

“We’re taking 10% off every department”

The way budget efficiency targets are set is often lacking in strategy. A blanket demand for a fixed percentage efficiency within every council department doesn’t allow genuine exploration of where cost truly lies and can lead to good spending being cancelled just to meet this arbitrary demand.

Strategic accountants often find it too difficult to work across departments and different organisations to unravel the source of wasted and duplicated costs. The money is locked into the handoffs between different parts of the system following their own assessment processes. We wrote about this here.

Instead…Be strategic about efficiency

No more 10% across the board cuts.

In Wigan, at the start of The Deal, we discovered that 80% of multidisciplinary cost spent on families whose children were on the edge of care was on repeated assessment and referral.  Internal processes we had created in each organisation: children’s social care, drug and alcohol team, mental health team, domestic abuse team, housing, criminal justice etc. cost £500,000 per year per family on multiple assessment processes which were not providing any actual help. This is where a radical approach to place leadership would establish a key worker support offer calling on specialist services as and when required but establishing a relationship with the family and providing the “Radical Help” described by Hilary Cottam. We’ve written about the dangers of a traditional approach to efficiency here.

“My department is fine – if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”

Departmentalism is alive and well in local as well as well as national government. Increased pressures on funding and budget cuts mean that rivalry between council departments has deepened. Many staff feel it’s in their best interests to focus on meeting departmental rather than corporate and system goals and priorities. People, families and communities are supported in disjointed and confusing ways through the lens of eligibility criteria for different silo services.

Instead…Reshape the workforce

Start by putting investment into a network of creative generalist key workers as part of genuinely integrated place/neighbourhood teams, who can draw in specialist support as and when required rather than putting the expensive specialism at the front door. We have supported Brent and South Ayrshire Councils to implement this – read about it here.

The Government have a new focus on delivery. But it will come to nothing unless we all play our part.

This article kicks off a series of Autumn webinars, articles and podcasts from the Mutual Ventures team all focused on delivery, #GettingStuffDone and more importantly #DoingTheRightStuff!!

Professor Donna Hall, CBE, Non-Executive Director, Mutual Ventures

Andrew Laird, Chief Executive, Mutual Ventures

If you are interested in discussing the themes of this article further, we would love to hear from you - andrew@mutualventures.co.uk