Agenda, decisions and draft minutes

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In accordance with the Code of Conduct adopted by the City & County of Swansea, no interests were declared.

To approve & sign the Minutes of the previous meeting(s) as a correct record.

Resolved that the Minutes of the Corporate Services & Financial Resilience Service Transformation Committee held on 12 December 2023 be approved and signed as a correct record, subject to Councillor S Joy’s attendance being recorded.

The Head of HR & Service Centre presented a ‘for information’ report which  detailed the Workforce and OD Transformation Programme work in relation to the Leadership and Management development theme.

 

The Workforce Strategy was approved by Cabinet in October 2022 after a period of design and consultation with stakeholders during 2022.

 

The Workforce Strategy 2022-2027 contained four key themes to drive organisational culture and improvement over the lifespan of the strategy, contributing to the 2023-2028 Corporate Plan, ‘Successful and Sustainable Swansea.’

The Workforce and OD Transformation Programme business case sits alongside the Council’s Workforce Strategy 2022-27. The programme included projects that will deliver the strategic goals of the Workforce Strategy and the overall transformation aspirations of the Corporate Plan.

 

The transformation projects taken forward in the first year were:

 

·                 Leadership and Management – Coaching and Mentoring Programme

·                 A Workforce Fit for the Future – Transforming HR&OD Services

·                 Employer of Choice – Oracle Fusion Recruitment

·                 Employee Wellbeing and Inclusion – Reviewing sickness absence and                   occupational health provision

 

The following projects are a secondary developmental phase and were identified with a view to potentially taking them forward in future years depending on changing priorities and budget resource availability as the strategy evolves:

 

·                 Further development of Oracle Fusion module functionality

·                 Organisational wide development needs analysis

·                 Career pathways and succession planning strategies

·                 Career Development Programmes

 

Leadership and Management

 

This theme focuses on two key areas of work – developing our workforce culture and enabling growth of leadership and management skills. We strive to foster a culture of inclusion and empowerment where leadership behaviours are welcomed throughout all levels of the organisation and not just through traditional hierarchy layers. This will help us achieve council-wide high quality, skilled leadership in responding to future change and challenges and exemplifying our Principles, Values, and Behaviours. This leadership skills’ growth activity will help us teach and boost the learning needed to demonstrate positive leadership and role model the desired future culture, ensuring development opportunities and career pathways exist which create supportive and resilient leaders at all levels.

 

Year 1 intended to focus on embedding a culture of coaching and mentoring, providing a new cohort of coaches and mentors from a wide range of departments across the Council. Funding of £15k was approved from the Transformation Delivery Board for the new cohort.

 

Future phases of the project theme were to explore talent management strategies, a development needs analysis of our current leadership and management capability and implementing a range of programmes across different layers of the organisation.

 

The next cohort programme has been confirmed with our partner Gower College and work is now underway to recruit the new cohort of coaches. Staffnet contains resources to explain the purpose of the coaching network, the policy around how to access coaching and the application process to be matched with a suitable coach.

 

One of the other Workforce Strategy themes - Workforce Fit for the Future – also saw an area identified for transformation, that of the HR&OD offer to the organisation. With temporary additional resource in the HR&OD team they have been able to progress other strands under the Leadership and Management theme at a quicker than expected pace.

 

Working in partnership with Gower College we now have over 100 managers enrolled on the ILM level 4/5 Management Development Programme with the most recent cohort starting in October 2023. There is a waitlist of engaged managers for the next opportunity scheduled to commence in February 2024. Applications continue to be received which is an indication of the positive feedback being shared amongst the management group. Gower College surveyed cohort members on the value of the programme and feedback from the group included the benefits of being able to network with other managers across the business, the collaboration opportunities and hearing about different experiences/perspectives. 

 

25 Graduates attended Swansea Arena on 15^th November 2023 to receive their completion certificates at the Gower College Swansea Graduation Ceremony. It is expected that this will be a much larger number at next year’s event, given that it is an 18-24 month programme. 

 

To grow this development opportunity still further, we are in the process of finalising activity to expand roll out of an ILM Level 3 to those appointed to management roles for the first time and an ILM Level 2 for employees who aspire to a managerial role in the future. These opportunities are due to commence in Q4 of the 2023/24 year.

 

Another of our future identified priorities was the introduction of a Development Needs Analysis. As with the expansion of the ILM Level 2 and Level 3 opportunities, this project has taken shape earlier than anticipated. The design pre-work on the analysis has been completed and a service area has been identified and agreed to test the concept before any wider roll out. This will enable us to assess the potential value of the DNA and make any necessary adjustments. It is expected that this piece of work will now be delivered by the end of Year 1 which is ahead of planned schedule.

 

Whilst our initial target was to widen the access of the Coaching and Mentoring network under the Leadership and Management theme, we are on track to achieve this goal by the end of Year 1 and have made good progress towards other theme priorities around wider leadership and management development and the development needs analysis.

 

A report to Leadership scheduled for February will provide a full analysis of all Organisational Development activity that is being undertaken in addition to new possibilities that could be considered for 2024/25.

 

Committee questioning and discussion focussed on:

 

The Chair thanked the Head of HR & Service Centre for the informative report.

 

 

 

 

 

The Section 151 Officer presented an ‘information report’ which provided an update on the Medium-Term Financial Plan in preparation for contributing to future savings proposals.

 

On 26^th September 2023 the Corporate Services and Financial Resilience Service Transformation Committee received a report giving background information on the Medium Term Financial Plan (MTFP).  This report gave the background to why the MTFP is produced and what the process is for creating and updating the plan.

 

The existing MTFP was attached to the September report for information. Since that time a considerable amount of work has gone into reviewing and updating the plan that was approved by Council in March 2023.  This has resulted in an updated and refreshed list of budget pressures and proposals to meet the corresponding funding gap.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

 

Following the review and update to the MTFP a set of updated budget proposals has been produced.  This set of proposals was considered by Cabinet on 12^th January 2024 and following Cabinet’s decision the proposals are currently being consulted on.

 

The report to Cabinet has been attached as Appendix A to this report, for the consideration of this Committee.

 

This report and subsequent amendments following consultation will form the basis of the annual revenue budget and MTFP reports to Cabinet in February, whereby Cabinet will consider before recommending the final Budget and MTFP reports to Council in March.

 

Whilst the emphasis in the Budget Proposals report tends to be on how the budget gap will be funded, so on where savings will be made, it should be noted that as an overall percentage of the budget we have to spend, the value of savings is relatively small – our gross budget is over £870m and the value of savings over the 4 years of the MTFP is estimated to be £56m (about 6%).

 

Consultation started on 12^th January 2024 and will close on 11^th February 2024.  Any response from the Corporate Services and Financial Resilience Service Transformation Committee will be very welcome and will be incorporated into the final reports to Cabinet and Council.

 

Committee questioning and discussion focussed on:

 

The Chair thanked the Section 151 Officer for the informative report.

 

The Chair presented the Committee Work Plan 2023-2024.

 

It was noted that the Committee had concluded their Work for the 2023-2024 Municipal Year.

 

Resolved that:

 

1)    The meeting scheduled for 27 February 2024 be cancelled.

2)    The final meeting of the Committee on 23 April 2024 consider the Annual Report.

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