Author Archives: lancingfarrell

25 – Budgeting in local government. Is it capex, opex or a new initiative?

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It is budget time again. In conjunction with ‘planning time’ (see posts 11 and 12) councils are starting to compile their proposed budgets for 2015/16. Capital bids are being evaluated to determine ‘logistically’ whether they can be completed within the financial year and ‘strategically’ whether or not they should proceed. Recurrent budgets are being submitted by managers, either built from a zero base or simply last year’s budget with the Consumer Price Index (CPI) increase. Councils will be comparing the amounts requested with the estimates in the long term financial plan to see whether they match. So where is the problem?

What if you have had growth in demands for services? Service levels may have to be increased in response to community needs. More services may be needed to cater for population growth. What if you have had significant increase in the number of assets to be maintained and renewed? More parks, more roads, more buildings. Somewhere in between the funding available for capital and recurrent budgets sits the ‘new initiative’ (NI) funding that is set aside for budget or staff increases in the recurrent budget. Councils know that costs can increase by more than CPI. They just don’t cope with it very well.

For starters, the amount available for NI’s is usually inadequate and is over bid by the organisation.  It is not unusual for $1 million to be available and for bids to add up to $3 million or more. When this happens there are often no predetermined criteria for prioritising amongst the bids. The orderliness of the budget process then comes under pressure. When criteria are developed, they struggle to effectively assign priorities. How do you decide whether expenditure to mitigate risks or increase compliance is more important than making efficiency or performance improvements to existing services? What about investment in developing new and better services now and for the future?

As you can imagine, local government will tend to eliminate risk. So the first category of NI’s are usually funded. Councils also like to satisfy the community, so improvements to services the community says are important but performing below expectations, will also be funded if at all possible. The last priority to be funded, unless there is a political imperative, is new and better services. This correlates with one of Christopher Stone’s findings in his report False Economies – unpacking public sector efficiency, that ‘two significant barriers to public sector innovation are an overly risk averse orientation within organisations, and a lack of resources invested in developing and implementing innovative ideas’. The whole process is hardly a sure-fire way to ensure that the available financial resources are allocated in the way that best meets community needs now or in the future.

Part of the solution lies in a better planning process that actively considers the relative benefits from investment in risk reduction, service improvement or new services. In a business balancing these considerations is essential. Owners and managers must ensure that there is sufficient investment in compliance, and satisfying customer needs, and developing new services for the future. Why not local government?

Posted by Whistler

Stone, Christopher, 2014. ‘False Economies – unpacking public sector efficiency’.

24 – High performance in local government. Part 2 – How can you make it happen?

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In Part 1 I talked about what a high performing local government organisation could look like. In this post I look at how you can improve performance to become high performing. Change management is a buzz phrase in local government at the moment. Everyone in leadership seems to accept that there is a need for change but they can’t agree on how to do it.

Frank Ostroff has some good advice for change agents in the public sector. He says that sustained performance improvement isn’t hampered by failure to identify solutions; indeed, he suggests they are often straightforward. In Part 1 made a list of 24 actions that you could start with to create a high performance local government organisation. Why not just implement them? Part of the answer lies in what Ostroff describes as the four unique obstacles to change in public services.

  1. Leaders are not appointed on the basis of their commitment or experience in reform. Instead, they are appointed for their ‘command of policy, technical expertise or political connections’.
  2. Leaders are appointed for relatively short periods and have limited time to see reforms through to conclusion. Therefore, they tend to focus on quick policy reforms.
  3. Rules covering activities such as procurement, personnel, and budgeting put in place to prevent wrong-doing have made government inflexible. The penalties for failure are also greater than the rewards for exceptional performance.
  4. Everyone has a rightful stake in government activities. Almost any reform is likely to meet with resistance.

I know he is talking about government in the US, and there are some significant differences in Victorian local government. But there are also strong similarities. His four obstacles are just as prevalent, even if it is for some different reasons.

Ostroff provides some insights into the characteristics of successful public service reforms. He describes five principles and illustrates them in some detail with cases. His first principle is to ‘improve performance against mission’. This resonates with the work of Mark Moore about the creation of public value. As with Moore, he says that the mission should be the focus. Improvement in performance achieving the mission (i.e. creating the required public value) needs to be the fundamental objective of the reform program. This makes a lot of sense in local government, where the ‘why’ often becomes unclear or generic.

His second principle is to ‘win over stakeholders’. This is important within and outside your organisation to create a broad support base for reform. His third principle is to ‘create a roadmap for reform’. He suggests three phases; identify performance objectives; set priorities; and roll out the program. It is essential to formulate a vision and set a clear path for reform.

The fourth principle is to take a comprehensive approach. He relates reform to organisational redesign involving integration and alignment of leadership, structure, processes, infrastructure, people and performance management. This concurs with Rummler and Brache and their thinking about the ‘infrastructure’ required for sustained performance improvement, as opposed to episodic campaigns. This involves seeing the organisation vertically and horizontally. They talk about the various levels of an organisation (vertical) and the performance needs (horizontal). I have reproduced their ‘nine performance variables’ diagram below.

the 9 performance variables

The performance needs must be met by the organisational leadership to ensure that work flows smoothly across boundaries. I think that taking a comprehensive approach is particularly good advice for local government, which seems to naturally form silos based on disciplines or functions. Failure to integrate or align is often the reason that reform is necessary.

The last principle is about the importance of being a leader, not a bureaucrat. Ostroff believes that public service managers are inherently respectful of barriers and may hesitate to remove them. There needs to be a readiness to demolish barriers to reform. He says that they are also likely to have to establish trust and demonstrate their sincerity. The failure of successive reforms often leads to cynicism, which needs to be overcome.

Ostroff cautions of the need to be aware of present realities, respect the complexity of what you are trying to do, and to hold people accountable for both results and their commitment to the reform effort. These are key points for local government reform. Present realities include organisational culture and its resistance to change. The complexity inherent in local government activities presents special challenges during a period of reform. Finally, the lack of effort to measure performance and use results to improve seems to be a hallmark of local government. In a reform process there must be accountability if it is to endure once the reform has been implemented.

In a nutshell, formulate your vision, take your present situation into account, seek the support of your stakeholders, set a clear path, be mindful of the complexity in what you are doing, and hold people accountable. Good luck.

Lancing Farrell

Ostroff, Frank   2006. Change Management in Government, in Harvard Business Review, May.

Rummler, Geary A., and Brache, Alan P. 1995. Improving Performance – How to Manage the White Space on the Organisation Chart.

23 – Is local government a country song?

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I have heard people say that if local government was a song it would be a country song. I guess they mean it would be a tale of woe, the classic country song about losing your land, your partner, your friends and then your dog. It is tragic and suggests that local government is a victim of its circumstances.

It is an interesting observation. At a recent ‘future of the local government’ conference, discussion was dominated by the limited ability for councils to increase rates, cost-shifting from higher levels of government, and ever increasing community demands. It is a grim tale. Despite these realities, I think it is too easy to blame our circumstances, limit our expectations and play the victim.

I would prefer to work in a different musical genre altogether. Take opera for instance. Despite story lines that are similarly tragic, there is a worldliness, grandeur and determination in the lives of the characters. They have a sense of hope for the future. Opera has a majesty that suits my career ambitions.

If there is a link to a country song, as someone with a passing interest in country music (yes, both types), I figure that Melinda Schneider captures the essence of local government with her lyric ‘we’re going in the same direction in a million different ways’ (Big World, Small World). I think these words describe the work of many people in local government, trying hard and having to make it up as they go along in the absence of an organisational ability to determine a set of priorities and coordinate action to achieve them. It is not a tragedy. But it needs to change.

Posted by Whistler

http://www.countrymusicchannel.com.au/lyrics/melinda-schneider/big-world-small-world-lyrics-15773648.aspx

22 – High performance in local government. Part 1 – What could it look like?

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I think this is a good question. In fact, a very good question. People often talk about ‘best practice’ and ‘performance improvement’ without ever describing how it relates to high performance and what it would look like if it was achieved. Interestingly, the Australian Government Public Service Commission recently published on high performance organisations. This indicates that high performance is becoming a topical issue for the public sector.

As a methodology for describing a high performance local government organisation (HPLOGO) I have used Andre de Waal’s paper ‘The Characteristics of a high performance organisation’ and selected my ‘top 3’ characteristics for each of the 8 elements he describes in the HPO framework. These are the main characteristics that I believe would be present in a HPLOGO. More importantly, this is where I think you should start if you want to create one.   I have limited myself to 24 actions because it is probably already too many. To help act on this idea I have written each characteristic as an action.

To begin, it is important to understand the framework developed by de Waal. I have reproduced it below.

HPO framework

The idea is that the elements influence the degree to which members of the organisation will exhibit performance driven behaviour, which in turn determines whether it is a HPO. Here goes.

Organisational design

  1. Simplify and flatten the organisation by reducing boundaries and barriers between and around units.
  2. Stimulate cross-functional and cross-organisational collaboration by making team work and collaboration the top priority for management.
  3. Immediately realign the organisation with changing internal and external circumstances by setting up an adaptable business model.

What characteristics didn’t get a mention? Foster organisation-wide sharing of information, knowledge and best practices. Not because I don’t think it is important, but it would come next.

Strategy

  1. Align strategy, goals and objectives with the demands of the external environment.
  2. Provide clarity and a common understanding of the organisation’s direction and strategy.
  3. Create a strong vision that excites and challenges based on a ‘big idea’.

What characteristics didn’t get a mention? Lots. Again, this was not because I don’t think it is important. They would come next:

  • Set clear, ambitious, measurable and achievable goals.
  • Balance the long-term and short-term focus.
  • Adopt a strategy that sets the organisation apart (I think this is less relevant in local government).

Process management

  1. Continuously optimise processes by connecting the entire value chain.
  2. Continuously simplify and improve all organisational processes to improve responsiveness and eliminate unnecessary work.
  3. Deploy resources effectively to activities that create value.

What characteristics didn’t get a mention? Lots again:

  • Measure what matters.
  • Create highly interactive internal communication.
  • Report the financial and non-financial information needed to drive improvement to everyone.
  • Strive to be a best practice organisation.
  • Continuously innovate processes and services.

Technology

  1. Apply user-friendly ICT tools to increase usage.
  2. Implement flexible ICT systems.

What characteristics didn’t get a mention? None.

Leadership*

  1. Commit to the organisation for the long haul and balance common purpose with self-interest.
  2. Live with integrity and lead by example.
  3. Hold people responsible for results and be decisive about non-performers.
  4. Apply decisive, action-focused decision-making.

*  I couldn’t pick just 3!

What characteristics didn’t get a mention?

  • Set high standards and stretch goals.
  • Maintain trust relationships with people at all levels in the organisation.
  • Allow experiments and mistakes.
  • Develop an effective, focused and strong management style.
  • Assemble a diverse and complementary management team and workforce.
  • Grow leaders from within.

Individuals and roles

  1. Align employee behaviour and values with organisational values and direction.
  2. Engage and involve the workforce.
  3. Create a learning organisation by continuously investing in training.

What characteristics didn’t get a mention?

  • Create a safe and secure workplace (I have assumed that this is a given)
  • Develop people to be resilient and flexible.
  • Attract exceptional people with a can-do attitude who fit the culture.
  • Master core competencies and stick to them.

Culture

  1. Establish clear, strong and meaningful core values and make sure they are widely shared.
  2. Develop and maintain a performance driven culture by fighting inertia and complacency.
  3. Create a culture of transparency, openness and trust through shared understanding, by sharing information, and fostering informality.

What characteristics didn’t get a mention?

  • Empower people by giving them freedom to decide and act.
  • Create a shared identify and sense of community.

External orientation

  1. Continuously strive to enhance customer value creation.
  2. Grow through partnerships and being part of a value-creating network.
  3. Maintain good and long-term relationships with all stakeholders.

What characteristics didn’t get a mention?

  • Monitor the environment and respond to shifts and opportunities.
  • Only enter new activities that complement the organisation’s strengths.

You can probably see a pattern emerging. My focus in creating a HPLOGO would be on value creation, systems and processes, integration and alignment, measurement and accountability, the short and the long term, and engagement and trust.

Lancing Farrell

Australian Government Public Service Commission (AGPSC) 2014. (http://www.apsc.gov.au/publications-and-media/current-publications/human-capital-matters/2014/high-performance-organisations/2014/high-performance-organisations).

de Waal, Andre 2007. ‘The Characteristics of a high performance organisation’ (http://www.andredewaal.eu/pdf2007/HPO-BSS2007.pdf)

21 – Inundated and manipulated, or respected and influential. How do your councillors feel?

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“Politics is the answer that a liberal democratic society has given to the (analytically unresolvable) question of what things should be produced for collective purposes with public resources”.

I was reading this quote from Mark H. Moore (Creating Public Value, p.54) and I thought it might be worth discussing some of the issues relevant to the sometimes uneasy relationship between politicians and the administration in local government. Politicians have a tough job to do. In Victorian local government, the job is made harder for several reasons that are worth some consideration.

Councillors are volunteers. They receive what is effectively a stipend for their many hours of work in representing their constituents. They may have no political experience or skills when elected. They often don’t know the other councillors elected with them and have no relationship with them. If they do, it could be because they have competed with them at previous elections. Often, councillors are elected who have diametrically opposed platforms – they believe their mandate is to achieve the opposite outcome to another councillor.

This situation is quite different to other levels of government in Australia where politicians usually belong to a political party, they know each other, and they share political views and ambitions. If elected to govern, they work as a team towards their goals (or they should do). They are also much more likely to have political skills or experience (sometimes acquired as a local government councillor). They are also paid enough to enable them to dedicate their time to the role, and it is expected that they will do so.

When local government councillors are elected, they have an immediate workload – develop a City Plan within 6 months, approve contracts outside the CEO’s delegation, etc. At the same time, they are learning about the responsibilities of their role – conflicts of interest, meeting procedure, the Local Government Act. And it goes on. Imagine starting a new job (which, by the way, is in addition to your current full time job) and having to learn how to do it while you do it in front of a public audience. It is worth remembering that the public nature of a councillors work is a key factor in the decisions they make.

The skills and abilities of individual councillors and the dynamics of the group are critical to the performance of a council. You often hear people saying that the councillors should ‘act more as a team’; however, a council cannot always function as a team. In fact, the community often expects the opposite. They want to see councillors challenge each other and vigorously debate issues. If councillors do caucus and/or if they always agree in the council chamber, they are often criticised. The local newspapers rely on contention in the council chamber to help maintain readership and will often do their best to create it if it doesn’t occur naturally. In some ways, representative democracy works best when politicians pursue different agendas and there is conflict between ideas, so long as the debate and decision-making processes enable the best ideas to be adopted.

So what does this all mean for the council administration?

For a start, don’t expect councillors to be highly skilled in the role, willing to work cooperatively with each other, or prepared to agree with one another. Be pleased if they are, but don’t be disappointed if they aren’t. Plan for the most likely situation. Support the councillors in developing the skills required to participate in formal meetings, publicly debate and issue, and deal with the demands of their constituents.   Create processes that are tailored to councillors needs and effective in informing them about issues to enable informed and vigorous debate. Make them feel respected and empowered. Not inundated and manipulated. Allow the time required for the council to understand issues and make considered decisions.

In saying this, I am mindful of the workload of councils. They have a lot to do and limited time to do it. I have often thought that the main capacity constraint is the time available for councillors to meet and be informed or make decisions. It is a challenging ‘finite capacity’ scheduling problem and probably should be approached in that way. Ask the councillors how often they would like to meet and for how long. This will give you the available time for briefings and meetings. You now know the available capacity.

Then list the statutory decisions that the council must make (e.g. elect the Mayor, adopt the budget), estimate the decisions council must make that cannot be delegated (e.g. approve large contracts, adopt policies or strategies), and then estimate the time that the administration believes it needs with the council to discuss matters that cannot be delegated without direction (e.g. changes in the operating environment, major strategies or projects). Subtract the time required from the time available. You now have the ‘discretionary’ time available for the councillors to pursue their agendas or debate topical issues of interest to them. It won’t be as much time as they want.

Discipline with time is often not a strength of councillors and they can be inefficient in using time because of the group dynamics. But they have choices. For example, they could choose to increase the time available by meeting more often or for longer. There are limits to this, particularly for councillors in full time employment. Another option is to choose to work within the available time and accept the restrictions that this places on them in terms of choosing what is discussed. They will need to priorities as a group and in collaboration with the CEO to optimise the use of time and meet all obligations. A further option is to delegate more decision making to the CEO and the administration. This requires trust and an initial investment of time in ensuring that the policies guiding delegated decision making are acceptable to the council.

In practice, councillors are constantly under time pressure and often they have not been presented with all their options in a way that makes them feel that they are in charge and making the decision. They get swept into the business of dealing with issues and making decisions, feel under pressure to make decisions (sometimes with political consequences), and their trust and confidence in the administration is eroded. Resolving the problem then becomes much harder.

Councillors are asked to make tough decisions under difficult circumstances. Be reasonable in your expectations and plan to support them in ways that meet their need to feel respected and influential.

Parkinson

Moore, Mark 1995. Creating Public Value.

20 – Plan, promise or accountability tool. What role does your Council Plan play?

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I am always interested in documents called ‘plan’. Add ‘strategic’ and you really have my attention. I suppose it all depends on definition of a plan. Here are a few of my thoughts to add to the posts on planning by Lancing Farrell (posts 11 and 12).

I take a plan to mean a document containing your intended actions to achieve an outcome. If circumstances change, the plan will need to change accordingly. It is a mechanism for a group of people to come to a common understanding of what they are going to do and it helps communicate that to others. It guides decision making and the allocation of resources. It is a reference when you need to confirm the direction you want to go in. You probably have your own definition.

In local government, however, plans tend to take on other roles. They become public promises about actions to be taken and the objectives that will be achieved. It is the yardstick to measure the performance of the Council and the organisation and hold them accountable – have they kept their promises? Politicians keeping their promises has become a bit of an obsession in Australia. The Council Plan is the main document that fulfils that purpose in Victorian local government.

Actions from the Council Plan ‘cascade’ into department work plans and the performance plans of individuals, who are then measured on how well they achieve them. Accountability for delivering the plan – implementing the actions and producing the outputs – is then embedded. But what if circumstances change?   What if the plan you started with is no longer a good one? It does happen. As Keynes is reported to have said, “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” Unfortunately, in local government, changing your mind about your plan is often seen as breaking promises or avoiding accountability.

This is a simplistic view of the world. Sometimes the plan needs to change in order for the same outcomes to be achieved. When the outcomes start to change all the time without a process to ensure it is what the community wants, it probably is an accountability problem. I have observed councils sticking to plans and implementing actions that everyone knows are no longer relevant, but they continue to be implemented because ‘we said that we would’. Often this happens because lead time to get an action into the plan has made it obsolete or another more relevant opportunity for action has emerged.

The emergence of a new and better way to achieve the same outcome can be the most difficult to deal with. The Council Plan is not readily amended and the amendment process is public, which opens the door to accusations of breaking promises. It is difficult for a council to take risks in producing value for the community if those risks are to be embodied in the Council Plan. There is usually a process to double check on the ‘doability’ of any actions proposed for the Council Plan – unless we are sure we can do it, it often doesn’t get included. Imagine a business only planning to do the things that it already knows it can do.

The risk is that the plan becomes a controlling document full of risk-free and relatively easily achieved actions.

Is there a solution? The flexibility of a plan to effectively guide action in achieving outcomes must be balanced against the public demand for accountability from their elected representatives and the council. The planning structure and the process to develop and review plans is probably the key. At the moment a lot rides on the Council Plan. In the absence of lesser organisational plans that capture actions and accountabilities of the organisation, they are being incorporated into the City Plan, which is essentially the plan made by the councillors for their term in office. As such, it necessarily has a political focus.

A better planning process, which is possible within the legislated planning framework, would seem to be the answer.

Colin Weatherby

19 – Integrated planning in local government. Some questions and answers. Part 2.

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As discussed in the previous post, integrated planning involves each level of planning occurring in the correct sequence with goals cascading between plans to create alignment.  Here are some further thoughts.

An integrated planning process starts by effectively linking organisational strategy with planning.  Stace and Dunphy say that a ‘well argued, well documented strategic plan’ is not a strategy.  Instead, they say strategy is an ‘active process of thinking and communicating, generated at the corporate and strategic business unit levels, by which leaders gain the intellectual, emotional and behavioural commitment of their people in stretching the limits of the corporation’s ability to achieve success’.  It is the set of understandings that guide the direction and behaviour of the organisation.  Mankins and Steele believe that often strategic direction is established in spite of the strategic planning process, not because of it – “… with the big decisions being made outside the planning process, strategic planning becomes merely a codification of judgements top management has already made, rather than a vehicle for identifying and debating the critical decisions the organisation needs to make to produce superior performance”.  In local government, strategy arises from long term community plans and the day to day activities of the Council and the Executive.

So, integrated planning enables the continuous review and creation of strategy to influence plans.

An integrated planning process has one agreed set of organisational priorities. Resources are allocated to those priorities and the collective effort aims to implement those priorities and measure success in doing so.  Building an organisational plan by adding together the strategies and actions from multiple, independently created plans is unlikely to achieve this outcome. A top down approach is initially required to set high level parameters (i.e. the strategy) that planning then takes into action.  Each part of the organisation can use those parameters to create plans that cover their contribution towards achieving organisational priorities.

So, integrated planning occurs when each planning unit is working within shared parameters to achieve common strategic priorities.

An integrated planning process will link actions across functional areas.  The ‘silo’ effect commonly described in local government, needs to be overcome to achieve high performance.  If each department plans separately without clear strategic priorities and shared high level parameters, there will be a functional bias as each department optimises their activities.  There will be competition for the resources available within the common resource pool.  A focus on cross-functional processes when planning will help to integrate the work to be done in implementing strategy.  This will require processes to be identified, understood and owned, so that they can be properly considered in plans.

So, integrated planning recognises and reinforces cross-functional processes.

Planning isn’t integrated simply because we all do it at the same time, and integration isn’t achieved simply by joining together multiple independent plans.  A planning process is required that is top down and bottom up, and driven by functions (or departments) and processes.  The planning framework prescribed in NSW local government is a really good starting point.

Lancing Farrell

Mankins, Michael and Steele, Richard 2006. Stop making plans, start making strategy in Harvard Business Review, January.

Stace, Doug and Dunphy, Dexter 2007. Beyond the Boundaries – leading and re-creating the successful enterprise.

18 – Integrated planning in local government. Some questions and answers. Part 1.

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This short series of posts follows earlier posts on local government planning (see posts 11 and 12).

First to the questions. Is planning integrated simply because we each make our plans at the same time and tell each other what we are doing?  Is integration achieved simply by joining together multiple independently created plans into one plan? This approach can be seen in many councils. When everyone prepares their plan at the same time, even when they share information with each other about their plans, I would hardly call it integration.  When the 20 or more departmental plans are completed and then joined together, I wouldn’t call that integrated either.  In fact, both approaches are likely to result in the opposite of integration if they create competition for resources and a focus on goals at a local level that is not aligned with organisational goals. So, what can integrated planning look like?

Integrated business planning has been described as connecting the planning function across the organisation to link strategic planning and operational planning with financial planning.  The objective is to improve alignment (thank you Wikipedia).  This makes sense to me, especially in a diverse service organisation like a council where between 20 and 200 services (depending on how you define them) are delivered to customers using resources from a common pool.

Price Waterhouse Coopers have a handy booklet on their web page on integrated business planning that focuses on process integration and functional integration (http://www.pwc.com.au/consulting/publications/integrated-business-planning.htm).  They say that the extent of integration will depend on the size of the organisation, the operating model it employs, the inherent complexity of the organisation and the industry.  Again, this makes sense and picks up on the need to look at your organisation vertically and horizontally to achieve high performance.

Some local governments have been getting in on the act.  The Australian Centre for Excellence in Local Government (ACELG) has released a study on strategic planning frameworks across local government in Australia (http://www.acelg.org.au/news/strategic-planning-australian-local-government).  If focuses on strategic planning (i.e. trends and issues in the locality) and corporate planning (i.e. the administration of the council’s own activities).  It identifies a number of practical, conceptual and resourcing challenges for councils in undertaking effective strategic planning.  The most advanced planning framework identified is in NSW, where the Local Government Amendment (Planning and Reporting) Act (2009) has the goal of strengthening the strategic focus, streamlining planning and reporting processes, and encouraging integration between the various plans of councils.

The ACELG study says that in comparison with other states, the NSW Planning and Reporting Guidelines for Local Government provide a very detailed structure for integrated planning.  A ten year ‘community strategic plan’ is the highest level plan, and it sets out the community’s main priorities and aspirations for the future and actions required to achieve them.  Some actions are the responsibility of the council while others are the responsibility of other levels of government or community organisations.

It is accompanied by a ‘resourcing strategy’ that focuses in detail on the council’s responsibilities and includes a ten year financial plan, a ten year asset management strategy, and a four year workforce development plan. The next level plan is the ‘four year delivery program’, which covers the main activities to be undertaken by the council to implement the ‘community strategic plan’ within the resources available under the ‘resourcing strategy’. Lastly, an ‘annual operational plan’ supports the delivery program and sets out the projects and activities to be undertaken to achieve the commitments made in the ‘four year delivery program’.  This planning framework should ensure that plans are relevant, feasible and integrated.

Lancing Farrell

ACELG, 2013. Strategic planning in Australian local government – a comparative analysis of state frameworks (http://www.acelg.org.au/news/strategic-planning-australian-local-government).

Price Waterhouse Coopers, 2011. Integrated Business Planning (http://www.pwc.com.au/consulting/publications/integrated-business-planning.htm).

17 – Interested in local government management? Four books you should read and why. Part 2

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This post continues my discussion about the books that I discovered in 2014 that I think should influence management in local government.

3. Improving Performance – How to Manage the White Space on the Organisation Chart by Geary A. Rummler and Alan P. Brache. Published in 1995, this book is quite different to the other two books recommended. It is not about the public sector and it is a hard core management book. The authors have developed a way of thinking about organisations and their performance that is very relevant to local government. Topics covered include managing processes and organisations as systems, linking performance to strategy, redesigning processes, and designing a performance measurement system.

Rummler and Brache apply their systems view by discussing the interdependence of nine performance variables shown in the diagram below.

the 9 performance variables

The levels of performance and the performance needs are described:

  • Organisation level – the organisational strategy, goals, and organisational structure.
  • Process level – how work flows across functions in the organisational structure.
  • Job/performer level – the people doing the work in processes.
  • Goals – the customer’s expectations of service quality, quantity, timeliness or cost, etc.
  • Design – of the organisation, processes and jobs to achieve the goals.
  • Management – the practices in place to ensure goals are current and being achieved.

It is a simple and powerful way to think about organisations vertically and horizontally. In a diverse organisation like local government, understanding the performance variables is critical to improving cross-functional services and reducing the ‘silo effect’ in which functional goals are put ahead of the goals of processes that deliver services to customers.  Read it if you are interested in cross functional processes and improving service delivery.

4. The Leaders Handbook by Peter R. Scholtes. Published in 1998, this book is also a serious management text. Written in an engaging way with lots of diagrams and case studies to illustrate points, it is accessible and easily read. So, don’t be put off. For someone who believes in systems thinking, it contains gems, such as this one below written in the context of performance appraisal and why Scholtes believes it isn’t effective;

“Successful work requires having a consistent and reliable set of systems, processes, and methods by which you and your people design, develop, and deliver what the customers need when and how the customers need it. Systems are created, sustained, and improved by insightful and interactive work on the system, not by using carrots and sticks. Measurable goals do not improve systems. Improving systems improves systems (p.303).”

Chapters cover a wide range of topics including, systems thinking; giving meaning, purpose, direction and focus to work; leading by asking good questions; and performance without appraisal. It is clear that Scholtes (a colleague of W. Edwards Deming) values systems and statistical thinking, relations with people, and learning to master improvement. He sees organisations as ‘complex systems of social networks and technical processes in which simplistic approaches will not help resolve complex problems’. He identifies 6 leadership competencies:

  1. Systems thinking – understanding the difference between systems and structure or policy; and seeking systemic causes, not culprits.
  2. Variability at work – knowing the difference between common cause and special causes of variation.
  3. Learning – understanding when a statement is theory or opinion versus fact, and acting accordingly; and knowing the difference between change and improvement.
  4. Psychology and human behaviour – understanding and applying the concepts of internal versus external motivation and demotivation.
  5. Interactions – seeing the interdependencies between systems thinking, variation, learning and human behaviour.
  6. Vision, meaning, direction and focus – providing clarity of purpose and developing and continuously communicating a clear sense of direction and focus.

Scholtes sets out a new paradigm for leadership for complex socio-technical systems.  Local government, with its political and organisational challenges, is nothing if not complex (as discussed in post 3).

I challenge you to read these books and then decide whether you think about your organisation as a system and if it is really focussed on creating public value by fulfilling customer-defined purpose through effective and efficient processes where variation is understood and performance is measured.

Lancing Farrell

16 – ‘Council rates capped from mid-2016’, The Age, 21 January 2015

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‘Council rates will be capped next year with the state government forcing councils to justify any increases above the rate of inflation. Councils must now send their budgets to the Essential Services Commission for permission to raise rates above inflation. Inflation – as measured through the consumer price index [CPI] – is currently running at 2.3 per cent. Last financial year rates increased by an average of 4.23 per cent.’

Some people will be thinking it is about time that municipal rate rises are curbed. Nobody likes paying more taxes. But is it a smart move?

Rate capping has been in place in NSW for more than 30 years. In 2013 the NSW Treasury Corporation reported that a quarter of the state’s 152 councils had a ”weak” or ”very weak” financial sustainability rating. If not corrected, half would be ”very weak” financially within three years. In 2014 the number of councils requesting rate increases above the 2.3% cap set by the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal almost doubled. The requested increases ranged from 5.5% to 11%. The increases reflect the financial realities confronting local government and ‘catch up’ increases to cover lack of revenue

NSW councils have responded to the rate capping in different ways. Ryde Council has created an RSA-type animation that neatly explains to residents the choices that need to be made.  It illustrates the implications of the demands for growth in services and infrastructure when revenue is declining.  New works are less possible and maintenance and cleaning standards have to be reduced with long term impacts on infrastructure.  Ryde is having to define ‘core’ services, i.e. what is essential versus what is nice to have, and balance reducing service levels with increasing rates.  It is a simple and effectively told story (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iR_BJKAo0dA).

The overall effect of rate capping seems to have been a reduced ability to provide services to the community, accumulated backlogs in infrastructure renewal or replacement, and increased reliance user charges for revenue. According to Brian Dollery and Albert Wijeweera the increase in rates in NSW since 1995 has been about half the increase that has occurred in Victoria and council rates per capita are lower that every other state and only higher that the Northern Territory.

Councils in Victoria experienced enforced rate cuts and capping for a period of time in the 1990’s. The Kennett Liberal/National coalition government capped rates in 1995 and imposed a cap of one percentage point below inflation. The cap was lifted in 1997 to allow increases of up to 3 per cent – with Ministerial approval. In 1999 the Bracks Labor government scrapped the cap altogether. The councils unable to draw on financial reserves or liquidate assets were profoundly affected and the impacts, similar to those now evident in NSW, were enduring.

The arguments in favour of rate capping are worth some discussion. They revolve around preventing councils from abusing monopoly powers in delivery of services; stopping expenditure on services or infrastructure that the State government regards as ‘non-core’; reducing the risks of poor governance; and limiting the ability of councils to provide services that are better provided by the private sector. Essentially, it reflects a lack of trust by the State government – councils won’t make sensible decisions without supervision.

In practical terms, what is it likely to mean for Victorian councils from day to day?

For a start, some councils are talking about entering into shared services to reduce costs. This has been a popular idea with CEO’s for a while that has failed to take effect. But will shared services really help? The evidence suggests that the savings are seldom as great as people think and there are initial costs involved in making those savings. John Seddon writes eloquently on the shortcomings of shared services. More in a future post.

What else can councils do? Reducing expenditure on capital works to enable funds to be used for recurrent operational expenditure is one likely response. In the short term this is fine if there are not pressing asset renewal demands or community demands for new assets. Cutting back expenditure on new assets will be easier for developed municipalities. It will not be as easy for developing municipalities where population growth is creating demand for new assets to meet community needs. In all municipalities, reduced expenditure on asset renewal will ultimately result in reduced fitness for purpose and increased future costs.

What about cutting recurrent operational expenditure? This is much more difficult because the community is likely to immediately lose services. There will be opposition from those who no longer receive the benefits of a service that is cut. The typical council operational budget is about 60-70% salaries and wages, 10-30% contractors and materials, and 5-10% plant and equipment. There will need to be a reduction in staff numbers for the cuts to be meaningful. This is likely to result in industrial disputes. If staff numbers are not reduced, there will need to be big cuts to expenditure on contractors and materials and/or plant and equipment, which impacts directly on the ability of staff to be productive.

Reducing expenditure on contractors is probably the easiest cut to make, especially if it doesn’t directly impact on delivery of services to the community. For many councils, this type of cut will impact on major maintenance/minor renewal of assets, which often sits outside the capital budget because the amount is below the threshold for capitalisation or the works do not increase asset life and cannot be capitalised. In the 1990’s it was cuts to this type that had long-term impacts when assets failed and needed premature renewal because of inadequate maintenance.

Rate capping has been shown to reduce the ability for councils to respond to community demand for services and to adequately care for physical infrastructure. It takes away the potential for local communities to determine the amount of funding they want to provide for council activities. It might drive administrative efficiencies, but at what cost? More than anything, it says that the State government knows more about meeting local needs. In every respect, it is just wrong.

Colin Weatherby

Dollery, Brian and Wijeweera, Albert 2010. An assessment of rate-pegging in New South Wales local government, in Commonwealth Journal of Local Governance, Issue 6: July (http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/index.php/cjlg/article/view/1619)

Seddon, John 2014. The Whitehall Effect.

The Age. http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/council-rates-capped-from-mid2016-20150120-12tz7k.html