Meeting documents

Mrs Sarah Murphy-Brookman, Director of HR and OD, and Mrs Carly Evans, Business Partner (TEE Resources & ACES) will provide an overview of the Council’s current workforce, including information on the retention, recruitment and engagement of BCC employees.

Contributor:

Mr John Chilver, Cabinet Member for Resources

Mrs Sarah Murphy-Brookman, Director of HR and OD

Mrs Carly Evans, Business Partner (TEE Resources and ACES)

The Chairman welcomed Mr John Chilver, Cabinet Member for Resources, Mrs Sarah Murphy-Brookman, (Interim) Director for HR and OD, and Mrs Carly Evans, Business Partner for Transport, Economy and Environment, Resources and ACES to the meeting. Members received a BCC Workforce Review report and asked questions on the report. During the session and in answer to subsequent Members’ questions, the following main points were noted:

·         In response to a question about increased overtime costs, the Director of HR & OD agreed to provide further information after the meeting. 

ACTION: Director of HR and OD

·         The Cabinet Member for Resources explained that staff turnover had reduced from 16% to 14% over the past 12 months with fluctuations quarter by quarter, and that the retention rate among the highest performers was 92%.

·         Agencies were more expensive to use for employing staff, so BCC would go out to tender for the most competitive rates. If a service area was looking to downsize, it was financially more efficient to employ agency staff. Bucks Care had an average turnover of 25%, and temporary hires were being used to fill gaps in the recruitment of permanent staff. There was a push to reduce the number of agency workers.

·         A Member questioned whether the growing agency staff and linked costs were sustainable, and why educational psychologists were not becoming permanent staff. It was agreed that Sarah Murphy-Brookman would come back to the Committee with information on the reasons why there were increasing agency staff and costs, and to confirm whether the Educational Psychology Services had been impacted as a trading arm due to the high turnover in Educational Psychologist positions.

ACTION: Director of HR and OD

·         The Chairman asked for information on the appropriate balance between permanent and agency staff, and that the Council’s budget should have reflected this. The Director of HR and OD agreed to provide the Committee with the information.

                                                           ACTION: Director of HR and OD

·         The Director of HR and OD explained that there was no BCC policy stating a limit on the amount of time that an employee could remain interim for.

·         A Member inquired about plans to train people in-house rather than rely on recruiting agency staff. The Director of HR and OD agreed to provide information to the Committee.

ACTION: Director of HR and OD

·         Members agreed that if temporary staff were being paid more than permanent staff performing the same role, this would be likely to lead to negative feelings of demoralisation among permanent employees.

·         It was observed that senior members of staff were not necessarily having exit interviews. The Director of HR and OD explained that exit interviews/ one-to-ones were voluntary. Completing exit interviews was not mandatory practice in BCC. Surveys were more likely to capture honest answers as they were confidential. However these relied on an individual’s willingness to respond. Line managers were strongly encouraged to carry out exit interviews.

·         Members recommended that exit interviews should be mandatory at senior levels, and that junior members must complete a leaver questionnaire before exiting BCC.

·         A programme was being rolled out whereby leavers were interviewed by different managers in BCC as an opportunity to capture more honest feedback.

·         The practice of completing exit interviews was communicated to staff through a prompt from the SAP system. For school staff and support staff this process was managed internally.

·         Members felt that there was a significant gap in BCC staff retention and understanding the reasons for staff wanting to leave the organisation.

·         Scarce skills payments were targeted at qualified children’s social workers.

·         A benchmarking exercise was conducted yearly to attract and retain staff. The Cabinet Member for Resources explained that external factors including strength of the economy impacted on opportunities available externally.

·         A spring clean was required on SAP for vacancies, some should have been deleted – this contributed to the large number of vacant posts.

·         The Apprenticeship Levy was an opportunity to grow social worker talent internally, but there was no agreed national standard for this available yet.

·         Depression and stress reasons for sickness were persistently high. Primarily these were fuelled by reasons outside of the workplace. To help reduce these levels, employee relations team members underwent mental health training workshops to enable them to have trained conversations with staff. Employees could also contact the Employee Assistance Programme, and one-to-one counselling was available for social workers.

·         Members commented that stress was often a reflection of a difficult relationship with their line manager. They added that managerial conversations on a weekly basis might pick up issues early, a good manager would reward and encourage but it should be done regularly. Were employees feeling that they were valued, encouraged, supported in difficult situations before they became depressed and stressed? The Director of HR and Operations added that the single greatest determinant of employee engagement was their relationship with their line manager. There was a need to remind people how important the line manager was in relationship building with employees.  

·         The Better Everyday Leadership Programme was running across the Council, highlighting what it meant to be a manager and what the responsibilities were.

·         Members suggested that both presenters should be invited to attend a future Committee meeting, or that an inquiry should be set-up to review this issue in more detail The Chairman thanked Members for their suggestions.

ACTION: Committee and Governance Adviser