Northern Education, following the outsourcing of education services to a private contractor was asked to review the relationship between the Council, ‘the client side’ and the newly appointed private contractor who was responsible for the delivery of a competitive tendering process,

Our expertise knowledge and skills

Four critical areas of expertise were identified as essential to this project: 1. Understanding of Local Authority Inspection criteria 2. Experience in local authority corporate leadership 3. Understanding of the relationship between the Council, education services and schools 4. Research and development expertise

The project team included expertise in: 1. Corporate Management 2. Collaborative Development 3. Public Private Sector Partnership working

Nick Meagre, Bruce Gillham and Les Walton were the key members of the project team. Whilst our two key researchers were drawn from highly regarded research backgrounds, Nick (University) and Bruce (private sector), they were mentored by Les who had been previously an Executive Director within Local Government.

Our approach

Our research works involved ‘desk-top’ research; the use of existing project records inspection reports, council documents, structured face-to-face interviews with key leaders and stakeholders; carefully designed and targeted questionnaires; and direct observation. Overall we surveyed more than thirty key stakeholders.

The project

We examined the following areas: 1. The clarity, consistency, coherence and feasibility of corporate plans 2. The implementation and evaluation of corporate plans 3. The speed, transparency and effectiveness of decision-making (particularly financial decision making) 4. The leadership provided by elected members 5. The quality of advice given to elected members 6. The effectiveness of the coordination of actions in support of priorities involving collaboration between several agencies 7. The capacity for improvement 8. The overall effectiveness 9. The climate for improvement

What was unique about our approach?

Our clients were primarily concerned with their capacity to manage a context which was outside the experience of Councils within the U.K. Thus our project team were very much concerned with analysing the climate for development and the new management skills that would be required in the future.

The tools we used were a combination of ‘traditional inspection framework tools’, total quality analysis techniques together with Northern Education Collaborative analysis toolkit which we were piloting during the process.

As a company we also recognise the need to support our clients to build commitment and support for their strategic requirements.

What was the outcome?

Our clients were provided with recommendations and a strategy which would allow them to realign their structures and systems in order to provide a better.

Our recommendations achieved a clear consensus both with the Council and their partners with regard to the ‘client side’ relationship with the newly outsourced education services. The model which was introduced was considered to be effective in taking forward the ‘new relationship’ with the outsourced education services and the schools.