London Borough of Ealing – The Ealing VfM Programme
October 2010
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The Vision
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The Vision for VfM
In line with all Public Sector Organisations, Ealing faces an environment of increased demand for services, with decreasing resources.
The VfM Programme is one of the key mechanisms Ealing is using to meet this challenge.
History of Success
Over the past five years, Ealing has successfully transformed itself into one of the best performing councils in the country, with a sound financial
footing. This success has been achieved through empowering Directors and Services to drive change and meet budget challenges; rather than
imposing a solution from the centre.
Corporate Board decided to build on the success of the past five years to develop a collaborative and distributed approach to meeting the current
challenges. This approach has strong alignment with the values and culture of Ealing.
The Programme
The VfM Programme is a three year programme to orchestrate cost saving initiatives across the council.
The programme does not include in scope; and does not manage local initiatives proposed and owned by individual Directors within their services. It
encompasses broader initiatives, that a salami slicing model may miss.
The Programme also does not rely on a large centralised team to drive and deliver the programme; but leverages existing skills and talent through
encouraging collaboration.
Star Chamber, Business Planning and Benefits Realisation
The VfM Programme sits alongside the annual budget setting process. One of the key elements of this is the Star Chamber process.
Rather than re-invent the wheel, the programme works with the Star Chamber process to identify cashable benefits and to track these through to
delivery.
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Managing, Governing and Leading
the Ealing VfM Programme
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Overview of the Programme of Work
Corporate Board
VfM Sub-Group
Stephen Day
Judith Finlay
Simon George
Mark Newton
Alison Reynolds
Susan Parsonage
Programme
Director
Matthew Booth
Programme
Management
David Lillicrap
2.1 Management
Structure Review
Lead - David
Lillicrap
2.2 Lean Reviews
Lead - Jarvis
Garrett
Vacancy & Agency Polly Hicks
Housing Benefits
Sue O'Neill
Purchase to Pay
Rupinder Hardy
ASB - Integration of
Ealing Homes and
Council ASB Teams
Revenues - David
Lillicrap
Housing Contact
Centre- TBC
Schools Admission
- TBC
Social Work ReModelling - TBC
2.3 Function
Reviews
Lead - Various
Performance
Management - Keith
Townsend
Propoerty - Pat
Hayes
2.4 Savings
Proposals
2.5 Fees and
Charges
Lead - David
Lillicrap
Lead - Simon
George
2.6 LSP VfM
Projects
2.7
Communications
2.8 - 2.13 Phase 2
Initiaitives
Lead - Ann Griffiths
Lead - Peter Morris
Lead - Ann Griifths
Non-Essential
Spend - Various
Top 100 Client
Families
Temporary Staff
Costs - Fiona
Canney
Information Sharing
2.8 - Volunteeering
2.9 - Market Testing
2.10 - Channel Shift
joint Asset Strategy
2.11 - Regulation
Communications Peter Morris
Training, Adult
Education and
Learning - Ian
O'Donnell
Meeting Room and
Venue Utilization Roger Amos
Improved
Performance
Management of
Contracts - Kate
Graefe
Review of
Consutlancy Spend
- Kate Graefe
Transport Costs TBC
Mobile Service
Delivery - Ann
Griffiths
2.12 - Invest to
Save
2.13 - Other
Projects
Corporate Board and the VfM Group
Corporate board own the VfM Programme and review progress on a monthly
basis.
They are supported by the VfM Group, where each Corporate Board member is
represented by a Director-level nominee. A key role the VfM Group Members
take is to manage the conflict that arises between service level savings
initiatives and corporate level savings.
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Management Structure Reviews
To Protect Frontline Services, there was a recognition that Ealing needed to challenge its Management Structure to deliver a broader structure with
fewer layers between Corporate Board and frontline delivery.
The Reviews are led by the Executive Directors; supported by staff from the Strategic HR team.
The Management Structure will be reviewed every budget cycle to assure the direction of travel is to a lower proportion of managers.
The Review Process
Step 1 - Desktop Review – Based on Current Structure held on our HR System
Step 2 - Challenge Process
•
Initial review by HRBP and Executive Director
•
Each Director to review with their management team & HR
•
Management team to review and challenge across whole of the Service area
Type of teams
Manageable Span
Management of professional or management structure
1:5 – 1:10
Supervision of skilled technical team (similar field of work)
1:12
Supervision of skilled technical team (more than one field of work)
1:6 to 1:8
Supervision of an unskilled/semi-skilled team
1:<20
Step3 – Output Challenged by Corporate Board and Members
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The Lean Academy
Ealing is investing in developing a Lean culture across the organisation.
Lean is the set of tools that assist in the identification and steady elimination of waste. As waste is eliminated quality improves while costs are
reduced.
The Lean Academy
The Lean Programme
A Lean Academy has been established Managed by Performance
and Planning.
The following processes are in the current Lean Programme of
work:
•
A Lean Consultant has delivered a series of training
courses in Lean and run a pilot Lean review
•
Vacancy and Agency
•
Housing Benefits
•
Over 40 members of staff have been trained in Lean
Methods
•
Purchase to Pay (Nov - Feb)
•
Standard tools, methods, templates and approaches
have been put in place
•
ASB - Integration of Ealing Homes and Council ASB
Teams
•
An Efficiency Network of Lean practitioners has been
established
•
Revenues
•
Housing Contact Centre
•
Schools Admission
•
Social Work Re-Modelling
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Non-Essential Spend
Over the past few years, expenditure on non-essential areas has been allowed to grow. With increased austerity, there are a number of
areas of spend that Ealing decided were no longer acceptable, in the face of potential service cuts.
A short-term piece of work has been initiated to implement and police new policies on how we spend council money on discretionary items.
Some of these initiatives will deliver tangible savings, and these will be carried into budget setting; others are more symbolic, but help
towards an change in attitudes from staff as to what is and is not acceptable as a way of spending council money.
The Target Areas
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Attendance at conferences
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Ensure post is sent 2nd class.
•
Use of mobile phones
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Training Restrictions
•
Refreshments
•
Introduce staff suggestion scheme
•
Awards
•
•
Hiring of external rooms for meetings
Promote the power down campaign to save
electricity
•
Office plants
•
Water coolers – switch off so that they serve filtered
at room temperature.
•
The Christmas Tree
•
Review of spending on advertising and marketing
•
Spend on stationery
•
Stop making CHAPS payments
•
Restrict staff use of taxis.
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Savings Proposals
We asked all of Ealing’s staff to suggest ideas for cost saving – Anonymously
Over 400 ideas have been submitted so far; many related to projects/policy changes already taking place, but others are being taken forward
through the VfM subgroup and/or through immediate policy changes. Feedback on the “first wave” of suggestions will be issued through
December edition of “Inside Ealing”
Service Specific
The New Initiatives
Many of the ideas related to specific services. The Directors are
considering which of these ideas to take forward. Though many
are already train to be implemented over the next three years.
From the suggested ideas the following projects have been
initiated:
Existing Initiatives
Where we had an existing programme, for example, the ICT
Strategy delivery programme. These programmes have been
asked to identify how they will include the staff suggestions in their
implementation.
Communicating
•
Room Hire and Utilisation Improvements
•
Contract Management Strategy
•
Temporary Staff Cost Reduction Opportunities
•
Review of Consultancy Spend
•
Review of Transport costs
•
Mobile Service Delivery
•
Review of Courier Services
•
Review of Printers
As part of the Communications strategy, we Inside Ealing to tell
staff where we have taken their ideas and put them into practice.
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Cross-Cutting Reviews
There are a number of functions in the Council, that are undertaken by more than one department. We have asked Directors to undertake reviews of
these functions to identify where we could make savings by having a more joined up approach
The Current Reviews
We have initiated reviews into the following Functions, with more to follow:
•
Performance Management
•
Property
•
Communications
•
Finance
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The Medium Term
When the current tranche of projects are complete, the pressure on costs won’t go away.
To address this, Ealing has commissioned a series of Strategic Reviews from our Policy and Improvement Teams, to identify future models of
working; and to develop business cases to deliver improved ways of working in a number of High Concept areas.
The Big Ideas to Investigate
Volunteering – Which of our services can be delivered more effectively by using voluntary sector
Market Testing (e.g. charitable trusts) – What is the best delivery model for each of our services, in house, out-sourced or a third way
Channel Shift – What services do we deliver and contracts do we manage, that could be done cheaper in a different channel.
Regulation – Possibly better described as De-regulation – do we do anything under the banner of regulatory requiremetns, that actually we do not
need to do
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Communications
To successfully deliver a Programme of Change and a Cultural Shift of the scale Ealing is currently facing, we need to constantly be communicating
to our key stakeholders.
The Programme team is working with the Corporate Marketing and Communications teams to develop a strategy for the three year programme
Working with the LSP
To leverage our Local Partners to look for savings across
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Focus on the highest cost families in the LSP area
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Use of Property Assets
•
Better Information and Data Sharing
Fees and Charges
To ensure that Ealing are maximising revenue opportunities, Finance are leading a review of all areas we collect revenue to identify where there are
opportunities to increase revenue.
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