WorkItOut

Here's part 2 of my report into culture at Somerset County Council. Again, first draft and really happy to take any comments or questions! And because text-only is a bit dull, here's a picture of a lovely quote displayed in Street Library Executive Summary - Why Look at Culture? Context A very simple definition of organisational culture is, “How things are done around here”. A more detailed explanation would describe culture as a system of shared values, beliefs and assumptions that govern how people work and behave. Of course, articulating an overarching corporate culture is incredibly difficult and is in danger of ignoring the different sub-cultures that operate at service area and team levels. This latter point is of particular relevance where there is a large organisation with very different services, such as we see in the public sector. To be more specific, the team culture in the customer contact centre in Taunton may be very different to the culture in th...

Culture at Somerset County Council   Time to start writing my report on culture, here's the (first draft) introduction, I'll post more as I write things.   Introduction A healthy organisational culture is critical to the success of an organisation. We know what the impact is of unhealthy and toxic organisational culture, apparent in a number of corporate and system scandals in recent years, across sectors including local government, NHS, financial services, oil & gas, media and retail. To be specific, these examples include Victoria Climbie, Baby P, Mid-Staffordshire Hospitals, the global financial crisis 2007-08, BP Deepwater Horizon, phone hacking and ‘fake news’. It is therefore safe to say that the culture and sub-cultures at Somerset County Council have a direct impact on the services that we both deliver and commission and therefore on outcomes for our citizens. Put simply, a healthy organisational culture will result in improved outcomes whilst un...

Apprentice – You’re (already) Hired… We have new apprentices starting across the authority. Apprenticeships are a great way of bringing new people into the workforce and developing talent with accredited qualifications. We have around 40 apprentices in SCC at present (with another 40 in our schools), with lots of managers also preparing for their first foray into growing their own staff through an apprenticeship programme. SCC is ahead of the curve amongst most local authorities across the country, and we are well on our way to our goal of employing over 100 apprentices. I think we’re putting together a really good offer for the young people in Somerset, including an opportunity to take part in the Duke of Edinburgh’s award. This part of our programme is restricted to those aged under 25, however our apprenticeship offer is also available to those looking to change career and people returning to the workplace. It isn’t just apprentices new to the authority who could benefi...

Here's something I've written for colleagues at Somerset County Council this week. "No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted." - Aesop It’s Volunteers’ Week, a celebration of the fantastic contribution that millions of volunteers make across the UK. Whether people are helping to deliver front-line services, offering support during a crisis, saving a pub for the community or helping out at school sports-day, it’s all volunteering and essential to the fabric of society. Volunteering also embraces the digital age, with thousands of online projects supported entirely by voluntary workers, from contributing to Wikipedia to open source applications to linking to a webcam at Loch Ness and taking a ‘snap’ whenever something unusual and possibly monster-like is seen… Figures for Somerset show that over 4,500 volunteers give up some of their spare time to help support over 25 Somerset County Council volunteering roles. This vital work includes volun...

Here's an update written in early May 2017 I’ve spend some really good time with colleagues over the past month, taking a further look at culture at Somerset County Council, what it feels like to work here and how things may change in the future. There have been team-based and general sessions, with numbers ranging from four to 70. All of the workshops have been thought-provoking and at times challenging, but always with good humour and an interest in how we improve the work that we do and the outcomes for our citizens. As part of these sessions, I’ve asked colleagues to come together in small teams to work on projects that they think will improve life at SCC. We’ve currently got about 30 of these agreed and being worked on, with some fantastic ideas including: Creating standing meetings’ areas; promoting the use of memory-jars for young people in care; designing a tool for young people to describe their likes and dislikes; promoting walking meetings; Skyped Lunch & Learn s...

I'm doing a lot of work on culture, at Somerset County Council. I'll post a couple of old articles, just to get things started on the blog, and then aim to keep things up-to-date Cultured Club I sent an invitation to colleagues in August and September last year, to join me in looking at culture at Somerset County Council. The response was great and resulted in a number of lively workshops across the county. We covered a number of subjects, defining what we think culture is, what determines it, culture at Somerset County Council and what great culture looks and feels like. Conversation was open, humorous but serious and there was a real sense of caring for colleagues and services. One person admitted in later feedback, “If I’m honest I was dreading it…”, but ended up by exclaiming that it had been “a joy to be part of.” And no, that wasn’t when someone else substituted for me. Participants were asked to take this work back to their teams, using a shorter presentat...