Over the last few weeks I have been meeting with each of our managers to discuss their plans for their service over the next few years. Today I spent a bit of time pulling it all together to give some structure to next year.
Photo: shoothead
Things naturally fell into three categories which I will be expecting each of them to focus on:
Financial
Obviously they need to deliver on their financial targets, whether these are revenues or costs, but this section goes beyond that. As well as the basic numbers they will need to think about how they report the information in their service to help improve performance and how they will measure value for money in their service as well.
Reporting information well really is a can-opener to find out how well their service is performing – as has been said before ‘if you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it’.
If good information is available then it is easier to start on the next step of defining what is value for money, but even with good information it is still hard to really understand what are the key drivers in the business, without the information you are just guessing.
Defining value for money needs to come back to how important it is for the customer. Just because a technical manager finds it interesting doesn’t mean that the customer cares.
Culture
This is about making sure that the values of their service are aligned with the corporate values and that their behaviours, and those of their staff, are also aligned with the values.
It also covers communication, particularly internal communication. I find that lots of managers find it really hard to see internal communication as part of their role, and yet they are the first to complain that they don’t know what is going on elsewhere!
Next year we will be measuring managers on how well they embody the values of the organisation and their ability to communicate across the business as well as their technical skills. Getting consistency in this area is vital to really getting the business performing well.
Proactive approach
I think it is vital that each part of the business focusses on being as proactive as possible. By this I mean that they should try to find ways to stop things becoming problems before they are problems, it saves time in the long run.
It is a bit like taking your car in for a service, it is some cost and effort up front but it should save you money in the long run. As a business we need to be looking for those areas which could become problems but with a bit of early action could be prevented.
Summary
Three things to think about when you’re planning ahead:
- not just how to improve your finances, but have you got the right information to even begin to know how to?
- make sure that everyone is aligned to the same values and no-one works in isolation. Communication is the key.
- look forward and try to spend money to stop problems ever happening rather than putting your resources into fixing them once they have. It is better to be riding the horse than walking behind it knee-deep in manure!
