Issue - meetings

The Vice Chair of the Staff Survey Joint Scrutiny Task Group, Councillor Jane Potter, presented the group’s final report.  The review had been established at the request of Bromsgrove Members following consideration of the staff survey results on a number of occasions.  The group had investigated the low response rates to the latest survey, circulated in 2016, and had been encouraged by the action that was being taken by Officers to address this.  Issues had been identified by the group, particularly in respect of the use of measures by the Council instead of targets for performance management purposes and the need for the dashboard to be regularly updated.

Following presentation of the report Members discussed the group’s proposals.  Concerns were raised about the group’s focus on targets; the Council had adopted a systems’ thinking approach to managing performance and limitations with target setting had been identified in recent years.  Concerns were also raised about the proposal for the Lead Scrutiny Member and the relevant Portfolio Holder to attend staff briefings as it was suggested that this might be considered intimidating by some employees.  Confirmation was provided that the trade unions had not been consulted as part of the review and Members expressed reservations about whether it would be appropriate to proceed with any of the actions proposed in the group’s report without this taking place.

Reference was made to the extract from the minutes of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting held on 26^th October and it was confirmed that all of the group’s recommendations had been endorsed.  Clarification was provided that the lead scrutiny member would act like the lead member for Risk on the Audit, Governance and Standards Committee and would not have the more official responsibilities available to a Portfolio Holder or a Member Champion.  The Overview and Scrutiny Committee had also had the power to determine that the Committee should receive a quarterly update on the Programme Board’s Action Plan and that the Performance Scrutiny Working Group’s terms of reference should be updated to take into account performance management processes.  This would not change the overall arrangements for performance management at the Council.

Following further debate the Committee.

RESOLVED that

Recommendation (b) from the Staff Survey Joint Scrutiny Task Group be rejected for the reasons detailed in the preamble above.