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| Finance and Human Resources -- Can they re-define Public Services ? |
The latest blog by CIPFA's Chief Executive - Rob Whiteman entitled " In Support of Public Services" discusses how the HR and Finance functions need to evolve to make a difference to public service delivery.
It is entirely appropriate that Finance and HR should be enablers of change but very often that is not how they see themselves or indeed how they have been trained or how the organisation culturally perceives them.We can all be cheer leaders for innovation and enabling service managers to do better but if the organisation has never culturally gone down that path and is not really equipped, willing or ready to do that, then everything can go a bit pear shaped unless the ground is properly prepared. There needs to be a will to change and a recognition that change is necessary
For Finance and HR to deliver transformed outcomes they must think radically and outside many of their usual orthodox paradigms. How easy is that for them to contemplate? Not as easy as we think -- Not as easy as it should be.
The organisation must be prepared to challenge itself and to try and meet those challenges. Finance and HR must support that process and they must look at themselves as to how they deliver their own services and whether they can be more successful and focused in the new era of austerity and how they need to get those changed services working properly.
Talking about doing transformation is all well and good but delivering transformation is very different because by its very definition transformation challenges existing norms and ways of service delivery. Many Finance and HR professionals find it very difficult to move in these new directions. This is very often a personal challenge for them because financial management and HR approaches need to reach out to the staff in an organisation and they must be far more participative,inclusive and dare I say democratic in the way that their organisational roles evolve. Many HR and finance staff have great difficulties with these new approaches -- some want to change but cannot whilst others don't know how to. More democratic and participative approaches are challenging and time consuming but will ultimately deliver a more rounded and broad based public service.
If we do want to engage with our colleagues and foster creativity then lets set up the processes and mechanisms to do that, but are HR professionals, finance people and other senior leaders and managers really ready for some of the messages they might receive? How might they react to them? Are they themselves prepared to be challenged on how they deliver services and why? I am not so sure.
To ameliorate the risks of organisational change, HR and Finance professionals need to properly understand change and how it should be tackled. We need a combination of new skills, new approaches and a mindset geared to delivering change in a compassionate and understanding way. For Finance and HR to really innovate there will need to be serious consideration given to ideas and approaches which would not have been acceptable under traditional HR and Finance regimes. These would involve greater consultation and involvement with non finance and HR specialists in our agendas, the generation of broader more participative approaches and the phasing out of many top down command and control methodologies which are the enemies of innovation.
The discussion of innovatory ideas should be done in an open way without prejudice. Some of the strangest ideas work the best in practise and everyone should be allowed to contribute without fear or favour. The collection of ideas from diverse groups who have a different perspective on services is critical and must be actively encouraged. Top down approaches of white middle aged men in suits will not by themselves be drivers of innovation, participation and democratic control of public and not for profit services -- even if they come from our current Directors of HR and Finance!
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