Building capability - the leadership challenge

 "We need to do more with less" is the current mantra used to communicate the challenges faced by organisations across public, private and voluntary sectors.  Every day there is another message from our coalition government about how hard the next few years are going to be until we start to make a dent in our huge deficit. Cuts are being announced almost on an hourly basis.

In the immediate term cuts can be made;  we can stop refreshments at meetings, buy cheaper pens but the effects of these quick fixes will not be enough to sustain the really tough challenges that leaders and managers face in finding the right balance between managing cuts and maintaining or improving performance.

Many organisations will be contracting rather than growing, and this will pose a particular type of challenge for leaders, and will require a different skill set as they are required to deal with more uncertainty and emotionally charged situations, such as redundancy and pay freezes.  However, difficult times can provide opportunities for personal growth and people are frequently more resourceful in times of significant change and the key is learning to live with ambiguity and use it to develop employee capability.

As Dean Shoesmith (Public Sector People Managers' Association, 2010) said recently:

"There are some capable leaders but not sufficient to deal with the degree of transformation.  So there's a big piece of leadership and organisational development work to be done in most public sector organisations"

So how can leaders build the capability of their teams in these difficult times? 

A starting point is to redefine what's possible.  It is important to be realistic about what can or can't be achieved so projects, tasks and processes are prioritised against the strategic imperatives and those that don't deliver mission-critical services can be discarded.

A director we once worked with told his senior management team they were trying to achieve too much and had spread themselves too thinly.  He asked them to go away and halve the number of projects they were dealing with to help them to really focus on what was business critical, and also, increase the likelihood of them achieving it.

In times of growth, innovation is about identifying new products and services, but innovation is still important in a downturn and can be used to improve existing processes.  Leaders need to be asking their teams what can be done faster? better? cheaper? more effectively?

An example in our local area is a consortium of seven major South East councils, led by Surrey and East Sussex, who have committed to buy shared services in a move designed to save millions of pounds and provide greater value for money.

The idea is that it can use its collective purchasing power to improve services and drive down costs. Dr Andrew Povey, Surrey County Council leader, said:

"By 'bulk buying' we will enjoy economies of scale and provide even greater value for money for the 5.3 million residents SE7 represents. All seven councils recognise that in the current financial climate they will need to remove several hundred million pounds of costs over the next few years and this is one way we can help to achieve it."

This type of collaboration is one way to reduce costs and share best practice.  Many organisations have a 'silo' mentality and sharing resources and/or information with others outside of their own team, department, and organisation may not come naturally.  Peer mentoring can be a great way to encourage a culture of greater collaboration.

Despite all the uncertainty it is important to keep the core values of the organisation consistent to enable employees, customers and other stakeholders to maintain perspective of what you are all about.  Products, services, processes and procedures may need to change but your core values and mission provide the foundation to embed them in.

In conclusion, there are positive aspects of living in an uncertain world which may not be immediately apparent.  This turbulent time can provide leaders with an opportunity to really build the capability of their workforce through considering the diversity of their teams and finding innovative ways to realise their true potential.