Agenda item

Julie Foy, Director of Human Resources and Astrid Keogh, Head of Organisational Development updated the meeting on its Draft Workforce Strategy 2023-26 and the following points were highlighted:

·       The Council’s workforce strategy sets out direction of travel and the draft has had a wide engagement across the council stakeholders such as CMB, front line staff and apprentices and this is aligned to Islington Together 2030 plan.

·       The Workforce strategy sets out the vision for its staff, identifies the areas to focus on over the next three-year period and it provides the Council with a number of outcomes to work towards which is to create a psychologically safe, inclusive, well managed workplace and to be an employer of choice.

·       The workforce strategy sets out how the Council will support staff and managers so as to perform at their best, progress their careers and truly believe that Islington is their employer of choice.

·       The 4 principles which underly the strategy are employee experience; equality, equity, diversity, and inclusion; organisational team and individual development and wellbeing and resilience.

·       In terms of employee experience, Islington wants to be an employer of choice, that all staff it have the highest quality employee experience no matter where they work or where they are in their career journey with Islington Council. This will be achieved by having the best systems, governance, and processes in place to enable staff do their job to a high standard as part of a modern, flexible, and responsive workforce. It is important that colleagues feel rewarded and are recognised for their outstanding contributions to staff and residents, that employees should be engaged and involved with the Council, have opportunities to have their voices heard and influence change.

·       On Equality, equity, diversity, and inclusion, the Council aims to continue to build a diverse and inclusive culture by ensuring that there is fairness, transparency, and equity at all stages of the employee lifecycle, where staff feel valued for their individual differences and are treated fairly with dignity and respect. It is important that there prevails a culture of psychological safety, where staff have the confidence to be authentic and to express their thoughts, ideas, and challenges. This will be achieved by collaborating with colleagues from staff forums and other staff groups to advance equality of opportunity and foster good relationships between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and those who do not share it.

·       In terms of organisational, team, and individual development, the strategy wants to ensure staff have equal access to development opportunities, to have the right skills, knowledge, and experience so that staff are able to progress their career. It is important that the Council has learning and development opportunities in place to help staff reach their full potential, driving high performance and delivering excellence for our residents and staff. It was also noted that processes, policies, data, and systems must all enhance the organisation’s ability to perform and lead change.

·       On the issue of wellbeing and resilience, it is important that staff feel supported at work, ensuring that health, safety, and wellbeing responsibilities are at the core of everything the organisation does, taking a proactive approach to providing appropriate and effective support to staff by using internal data to help guide and target staff wellbeing and resilience work.

·       In response to a question on recruitment process and making it a positive experience, meeting was advised that candidate experience is important, that feedback is provided to unsuccessful candidates and encouraged to apply again. In terms of questions, we do have standardised scoring system and have developed a bank of questions, that a decision has been taken recently to move to a new system to support inclusive recruitment priorities.

·       In response to providing questions in advance especially for candidates who are neuro diverse, meeting was advised questions are provided in advance as a reasonable adjustment where requested, that this is part of the Council’s inclusive recruitment plan, that there is a recognition of the need for more flexibility so as to attract talent which may not be possible via the traditional way of recruitment.

·       On the vague reference to the importance of union membership in the Strategy, meeting was advised that Council has a good relationship with unions which was not the case in previous years, that union representatives have regular meetings with Chief Executive, that Council recently recruited an employee relations manager, a post which didn’t previously exist and that a True Partnership agreement with union colleagues has been recently designed. Council encourages membership by inviting unions to induction day for new employees etc.

·       On the lack of diversity and representation in senior management the head of Human Resources acknowledged that although Council had a target of 21.4% for the top 5%, it has been able to achieve 19.3%, noting that in the last 3 year this has increased. It was stated that this target would need to be reset.

·       In terms of representation at the top of the Council leadership, it was acknowledged that there is minimal representation from BME background, more needs to be done.

·       On the issue regarding staff dismissal, court payments and settlements and possible consequences for senior managers that might have been found negligent and responsible, meeting was advised that although not ideal most of the issues raised will be reported to committee either via the Annual workforce report and financial settlements via Tribunal findings will be reported to Audit Committee. Meeting was advised that negligent managers responsible for some of the tribunal findings will be dealt with appropriately.

·       On the pending recruitment for the post of Corporate directors and Chief Executive to reflect workforce and borough, the head of HR acknowledged that it is a good opportunity to employ a different approach, that adverts have been placed in MJ and social media is being used to extend the reach of candidates.

·       HR officers had a meeting earlier with Council’s recruitment partner for the chief executive role on how to maximise its diverse shortlist taking into consideration on issues around gender and ethnicity. It was noted that in London, only 4 chief executives are from BME background, that ten years ago there was only person.

·       Check-ins and staff appraisals was launched in January, 1200 managers received mandatory training which was positively received. Check ins are a new way to have performance discussions with staff and happens monthly.

The Chair thanked officers for the update on the workforce strategy .