Chief Executive's Blog - March 2012
Dear Colleagues,
As the Council moves into a new year, I want to make sure that the developments we planned last year really begin to take shape. Moray Council is moving on. We aim to be one of the best in Scotland and this year I want us to deliver some real changes to benefit our community.
As council employees you are absolutely key to this, so we are introducing a new employee engagement programme to help keep you informed of what’s going on and what we are trying to do. I would like every employee to see how what they do helps and what it contributes to the Council’s agenda. In simple terms, I want us to communicate better. I want messages to be passed up and down and across the organisation so that employees in all services can work better together and we can tackle any obstacles to improving what we do. You should see the first stage in this new approach in February as we begin monthly Team Talks cascaded by managers through team meetings.
As a personal commitment to improved staff communications, I have started this blog. I hope to give you a flavour of the issues and priorities of the Council and an insight into my role as Acting Chief Executive. I have to admit this is my first foray into the blogosphere and no doubt I will have much to learn along the way! Longer term I would hope to be able to develop this format to be more interactive and respond to questions you might have.
The second major item on my agenda this month has been the strengthening of the Community Planning Partnership. This is the group of public sector organisations (e.g. NHS, police, fire, college, voluntary sector, etc) that work jointly for the benefit of the Moray community with the aim of adding to what each service could do on their own. We have been reviewing the areas where we can work together for the greatest benefit and the ways we should work together, without being tied up in bureaucracy or getting in each others’ way. This will lead to a new Single Outcome Agreement (SOA) for Moray, which is the agreement between the Council and the Scottish Government on what the priorities should be and is central to our funding from the government. The new SOA should be in place by April and we will let everyone know what is in it.
Employee Engagement and the new priorities in the Single Outcome Agreement really set the scene for 2012 in terms of what we do and how we do it. My hope is that this new approach will help all of to work together better in what will continue to be a very challenging environment.