Agenda item

Cabinet Portfolio:               Corporate Services and Finance

Strategic Directorate:         Assistant Chief Executive

Consideration was given to a report and presentation which provided an overview of the outcomes of the Employee Opinion Survey conducted in the summer of 2019 and the key actions identified as a result of the findings.  The report compared outcomes from the 2019 survey with those of the previous survey undertaken in 2017.  32 questions within the survey also allowed direct comparison with BMG’s Local Authority (LA) Benchmark of over 50 UK wide local authorities.  18 of these questions resulted in scores significantly above the benchmark, ten were in line and four below other authorities.

Overall the staff survey results demonstrated positive progress across the Council since the last survey in 2017, with significant improvements against 57 questions, which reflected the work done by middle managers and heads of service.  No areas had declined corporately when compared with the 2017 survey results.  The composite score for workforce engagement had improved from 65% in 2017 to 69% and the roadshows led by the Leader and Chief Executive had played a part in this improvement.

The major area for improvement related to internal communication between units or departments within the Council, as only 21% of respondents rated this as good (18% in 2017) compared with 42% in the BMG LA Benchmark. Largescale pieces of work such as customer and digital transformation, which would necessitate a whole council approach, would provide opportunities to bring people together.

Senior management visibility was another area for further work, including teasing out who employees would class as a senior manager when asked this question as perceptions varied.  Other lower benchmarking scores were for job satisfaction and work-life balance.  It was observed that employees with 11-20 years’ service and those on Bands D and E reported lower levels of job satisfaction, which would merit further investigation into underlying reasons.

Members explored several issues in relation to the survey and questions:

-        Lengthy survey with 73 questions which could be a deterrent to completion – People were given time to complete the surveys at work and guidance had been sought from BMG regarding industry standards but it had been important to compare results with 2017.

-        Encouraging more responses from employees based away from Riverside House or alternative ways of capturing their views – Follow up work would try and ascertain reasons for non-completion, particularly in Regeneration and Environment which had the lowest response rate despite a strong drive to encourage responses.

-        If people had answered the questions about senior management visibility in terms of their more immediate manager that was also a concern as they would be less likely to see senior managers. - Anecdotally it seemed many employees, particularly front-line staff, had answered in respect of managers in the tier above their first line supervisor.  A framework was required around management visibility, supervision and one-to-ones across the organisation, coupled with more work on communications.

-        Variation in the numbers of tiers of management – This was being looked at and it was generally accepted practice to have six tiers from the Chief Executive to front line staff.

-        Top level policy and the context for senior managers’ decisions – This linked into communications and cascading messages throughout the organisation.  Managers needed to spend time with their teams, explaining decisions.  Inconsistencies existed in this regard so there was further work to undertake.

-        Concern that only 30% of employees were aware of what other departments did after several years of rolling out the “one council” message – Much depended on people’s roles and although good cross-directorate work and communication was in place, such as in social care commissioning, some silos still existed.  Work was needed on the narrative and Rotherham story, with a corporate induction programme under development, including new starters and existing staff.

-        Dialogue with other LAs where they obtained better responses – Best practice elsewhere was considered.

Resolved:-

1)     To note the Employee Opinion Survey results, particularly in relation to improvements made since the 2017 survey.

2)     To note next steps, including further work to explore the results and co-create action plans to address areas for improvement (corporately and within directorates).