Chapter 7 Leadership
Leadership and direction
We found strategic leadership in Moray to be adequate, with strengths which just outweighed weaknesses.
Community services had worked hard to develop a clear vision and strategic direction, although this was not yet familiar to all staff and was hampered by the multiplicity of planning systems and activity. Leadership of people was stronger within children and families services than community care, which was recovering from a period where the connections between the strategic direction of the MCHSCP and operational service delivery had been disjointed.
Considerable efforts had been made to revise and improve performance management and we saw evidence of organisational pressures being identified and addressed. However, in many instances much of what had been done was either comparatively recent or was still to be completed.
Vision, values and aims
We saw that there was a strong commitment to community planning in Moray with its community plan for 2006/10 containing seven theme groups being its highest level statement of its vision and objectives. The two key themes for community services were "achieving a healthy and caring community" and "investing in children and young people". "Building stronger communities" and "achieving a safer community" were also relevant for community services. Beneath the community plan was the corporate development plan (2004/07), the updated version of which was currently still in draft form. Beneath that lay the community services department's own service improvement plan which was reviewed and updated on an annual basis.
The council's central vision was "to increase the quality of life and well-being of everyone in Moray". In the community plan, the council had taken on board the findings of the Account Commission's report of February 2006 on Best Value and Community Planning by focusing on a number of clear priorities. It was now possible to see consistent links running between the various plans. For example, the community plan in its children and young people's theme identified supporting looked after children as a priority area, the need to improve educational attainment was an action area in the corporate development plan and the community services improvement plan had the development of joint care and education arrangements in residential care.
Community service's improvement plan contained a clear one page statement of the service's vision ("working in partnership to deliver quality health, social care, and criminal justice and housing services for the people of Moray"), the key aims of the service and its key principles.
In our staff survey 65% of staff agreed that Moray council had a clear set of social work priorities and 50% agreed that there was a clear vision for social work. These findings are in the mid range of survey data for inspections to date. Comment was made in Chapter 6 about the complex and high number of planning mechanisms and plans that there had historically been in Moray. From our fieldwork, it was clear that there remained large numbers of staff for whom the council's and the service's key priorities and objectives were not clearly understood.
In its recent progress report Audit Scotland concluded that there had been some improvement in the corporate leadership and strategic direction of the council. Likewise community services had identified and recorded its vision, key aims and principles. Whilst this was a positive development, the findings of this inspection would indicate that more could be done to ensure that this was communicated to, understood by and shared by staff. The use of the service improvement plan as a key document would be one means of doing this.
This inspection took place shortly after the local government elections in May 2007. This was a time of considerable change including the election of a significant number of new or returning elected members and a new political administration. The February 2006 Accounts Commission report had been very critical describing the council as having lacked effective corporate leadership and direction and as having been an inward looking and isolated organisation. A lack of strategic direction based on knowledge of community and service user needs and a lack of effective systems for monitoring and reporting service performance were identified as important weaknesses. The report did highlight signs of improvement since 2004. More recently the June 2007 progress report concluded that whilst the council still had much to do, it was moving in the right direction and the pace of change had been steady.
We saw some confirmation of this in respect of the recognition given corporately and at elected member level to the importance of the services provided by the community services department. One indicator of this was that community services was required to make a smaller contribution to corporate budget savings exercises in 2006/07 than the previous year. Although the corporate savings target increased from £3.4 million to £4 million over these two years, the contribution required from community services decreased by some £600,000 over the same period. At the same time community services was provided with additional funding by the council to meet budget pressures, including out of authority placements and the increased costs of care home fees.
The Accounts Commission had been highly critical in its 2004 report of the quality of strategic leadership provided by elected members. Small parochial issues were found to overwhelm any consideration of strategic direction. In our surveys, less than half of both the staff and partners and stakeholders who responded agreed that social work was highly valued by elected members.
Elected members represented the council on the key joint planning structures, such as the MCHSCP and an elected member chaired the Children and Young People's Partnership. Although very early days, feedback from senior officers on the new administration was generally positive and cautiously optimistic. Comment was made about the level of heightened interest and questioning at the Education and Social Services Committee. On a corporate basis, considerable effort had and was continuing to be given to providing elected members with briefings and training. The elected members whom we met were all new, including one of the two chairs of the Education and Social Services Committee. We were impressed with their enthusiasm and commitment to social work services, but they were clearly on a steep learning curve given their lack of experience as elected members.
We found generally good corporate working relationships at senior level. The Chief Executive commented on the increased contribution by community services to the council's corporate and cross cutting agendas, including community and community safety where the youth justice service was seen as an important player. Whilst some difficulties persisted, joint working with education at an operational level was generally seen to be improving and there was a clear commitment to partnership working at senior level. Working relationships with the chief housing officer were observed to be positive. However difficulties in meeting the accommodation needs of looked after young people appeared to call into question the added value of housing and social work being part of the same department. In addition the recently changed committee structure had resulted in housing and social services matters being reported to different committees.
We did not find any evidence of insularity within community services. Key partners on a Grampian-wide basis, such as the police and health spoke of strong partnership working. Senior managers made an effort, despite the significant travel commitment often involved, to play a part on national social work agendas and work groups, within for example the "Changing Lives" programme and ADSW (Association of Directors of Social Work).
Leadership of people
As indicated earlier in this report, the findings of both community services own survey and the SWIA survey in respect of strategic leadership were disappointing. Less than half of the staff who responded agreed that senior managers communicated well with staff and that there was effective leadership of change. We heard many comments to support the survey findings during our fieldwork. Despite its relative small size and geography, senior managers were generally not seen as having a visible presence around the organisation.
There were exceptions to this and at a number of services and offices we visited, staff commented positively on visits made to them by senior elected members and senior managers over a number of years. We met with the Chief Executive and he told us about the council's difficult history and the strenuous efforts made since 2004 by a range of key elected members and senior officers to bring about positive change. He also commented on the efforts of managers in community services over a number of years in taking forward partnership working in a number of forms, including the establishment of the MCHSCP
We found leadership of people within children and families services and youth justice to be good. In particular staff spoke about finding front line and middle managers accessible, knowledgeable and supportive. There had been an investment in bringing staff together in divisional and team development days and sessions and a commitment to involving staff in completing local team plans. Whilst we have commented that a number of middle managers were still adjusting to their strategic management responsibilities, the level of participation by managers in the national "Leading to Deliver" programme was encouraging.
Leadership of people within community care was less strong. The fact that there was some recognition of this in the service's own self-evaluation was a good sign. The establishment of the MCHSCP had been a significant undertaking, requiring considerable effort, as had the work which had been done to develop objectives and policy within this partnership arrangement. Our findings suggested that this had been at a significant cost and that staff in operational services had not been as well supported and led as they should have been in dealing with the change agenda. It was therefore particularly important that senior managers gave careful consideration to this. We saw that some recent actions were already having a positive impact. These included the decision to recruit qualified social workers to the area teams and the filling of leading systems manager posts.
Interim head of service arrangements had resulted in the director of community services undertaking the role of Chief Social Work Officer since September 2006. Whilst this was an interim arrangement it had helped ensure that the understanding of the professional social work role had been promoted within the council and with key partner agencies. For example the important place of supervision for community care staff working in the MCHSCP had been revisited and the council had adopted the national throughcare and aftercare standards. Senior officers we spoke to out with social work services had at least some awareness of corporate parenting. In his capacity as Chief Social Work Officer, the Director reported direct to the Chief Executive and had regular contact with colleagues in the corporate management team and senior elected members.
Consideration had been given to future arrangements, including the option of the Chief Social Work Officer role reverting to the head of children and families and criminal justice once this post was filled. We were informed that further to these considerations, it had been agreed that the Director of Community Services would continue to occupy the role of Chief Social Work Officer.
Recommendation 16
Senior managers should consider ways to improve their engagement with staff and how to engage them more in community services' development agenda.
Leadership of change and improvement
Both the council as a whole and community services itself had given considerable attention to developing its approach to performance management including its performance monitoring framework. This was in part in response to the Accounts Commission report of February 2006. In its follow up progress report the Commission concluded that the council has made significant progress in developing a performance management framework with performance information increasingly being used by members and officers to scrutinise performance. The Audit and Performance Review Committee received quarterly performance reports from the service committees. Since December 2006, the chair of each service committee had reported to the committee and taken questions from committee members.
Community services had worked hard to review and improve its approach to performance measurement. It still faced significant challenges in the development and production of information electronically. However, it had attempted to take a holistic approach to deciding what performance information was required and how, to whom and with what frequency it was reported. The service improvement plan provided a key basis for this and performance in respect of community care, children and families and criminal justice services was reported to the Education and Social Services Committee at each cycle. Performance against the 11 shared objectives of the MCHSCP was reported to its management group and executive committee. The revised performance framework for community services was agreed in April 2007. As such these arrangements were relatively new, although we share the view of the Accounts Commission that they provided a reasonably solid foundation on which to build.
It remained to be seen how the new administration with its sizeable number of new members would settle down. However, there had been relatively little staff turnover at all levels within community services which was an indication of organisational stability. The interim management arrangements which had been required at head of service level had been well managed. Whilst there were examples where change could have been better communicated or managed, staff at all levels accepted that improved outcomes for service users involve change.
It was clear that a number of actions had been taken to identify and to address organisational pressures. These included the increased capacity for training and policy support, the initiation of the voluntary sector review and the re-focussing of administrative and planning functions. The Director had played a key role in these developments. The multi-agency inspection of substance misuse services found positive support for the DAAT (Drugs and Alcohol Action Team) and the ADAT (Alcohol and Drugs Action Teams) which was chaired by the Director of Community Services. Work was found to be beginning to strengthen the links between strategic and operational levels. Partner agencies commented positively about community services' contribution to developing substance misuse services during our inspection.
There were also examples of actions taken on a targeted basis to review and improve services, for example, by making fostering and adoption a specialist service. However, in some instances, such as the review of residential childcare and the best value review of day services for older people, the length of time to complete or fully implement the reviews seemed excessive. It was not clear that individual service review activity in the past had always been linked to strategic plans. The service improvement plan now provided a means for ensuring that this should not be in question in future.
The effectiveness of the role played by community services in partnership arrangements was generally positive. It had been an enthusiastic partner in the setting up of the MCHSCP in 2004. The senior officer leadership of the partnership had until now been on a shared basis. At the time of our inspection there was some caution on the part of the local authority in moving to a single manager. Children and families services had been an active and leading role in partnership arrangements for a number of years. However, there was room for improvement in their partnership relationship with the voluntary sector providers. This needed to be supported by much stronger commissioning and contracting arrangements than had previously existed.