A Message for Chief Executives
I don't need to tell you that this year will be difficult for local authorities. Achieving the necessary savings while maintaining services to an acceptable standard will be a challenge, but there is considerable evidence emerging that it can be done. The key is to focus on how the council can be smarter about how it delivers its services and manages its own resources.
The key areas to focus on are:
- Self-service - enabling your citizens to serve themselves - to access the information they need, or get the services they want - achieves substantial savings by greatly reducing the number of staff needed in your contact centre or in other customer-facing roles. Getting the council website right is fundamental to this, and councils are finding that every £ spent on the web (if spent on the right things) achieves between £5 and £10 in savings
- Smarter working - mobile, flexible and home working can reduce the office footprint (typically reducing office space requirements by up 30%, achieving savings by making staff more productive and efficient, and making significant inroads into the costs of the larger services - typically 20-25% savings without loss of service)
- Managing information better - managing information electronically can reduce the office footprint further (by another 20%) and further enhance the savings from mobile, flexible and home working
- Shared services - can achieve further savings (5-10% by sharing back office functions, more by sharing front office functions)
- Lean systems and business process improvement - radical change in how the council does things can bring about further savings. Being innovative, outcome-focused and - above all - customer-focused is key.
Overall savings of 20-30% are achievable without loss of service (and in some cases an improvement in service). And most importantly, if sequenced appropriately, the savings can be achieved in a phased way without the need for a major investment of funds. Want to know how? Let us discuss with you how your council can achieve this - just reply to this email or call me on 0845 241 2770.