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Development of Competency Based Career Framework for Mid Beds District Council
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Challenge
Many councils, particularly in the South East have problems recruiting and retaining staff in specialist areas such as planning and environmental health. Mid Beds District Council was experiencing problems with recruiting and retaining planners in a highly competitive market. This was having an effect on its planning performance.
Solution
The council commissioned Oakleigh Consulting to help. Oakleigh consultants worked with the council (involving staff, managers and unions) to introduce a competence based career framework for planning staff.
The framework is easy to use and identifies the competences that are required to move around within the planning structure. Staff and managers now have a clear understanding of the experience, skills and behaviours that planners at different levels within the organisation should have and are able to plan a career with the council.
We worked closely with staff on the development of the framework and have seen staff acceptance as the key to its success. The framework has been provided to the client in electronic format and this is not only more efficient but also enables managers to track how staff are developing and to succession plan.
Oakleigh were retained to train all staff in its use. We particularly spent time with managers helping them with their approach to assessing the competences of individual staff members.
Outcome
Managers are already noticing a difference, with applicants being more attracted to work at Mid Beds and for the first time in years the Planning Teams are well resourced, and have manageable work loads. Nick Rance, Service Development Manager for Mid Beds District Council said
'Since the introduction of the framework, Mid Beds has become a much more attractive place to work for planners. As a result, our recruitment and retention difficulties have eased considerably and our performance is on the increase.'
The framework has been designed to include both organisational competences and professional competences so that it can easily encompass other professional disciplines. We are now starting to work with Mid Beds to roll it out to other areas of the Council including Environmental Health.
‘Our experience of working with Oakleigh has been very positive: they have been highly professional, approachable and pragmatic and have provided us with exceptional value. We thoroughly recommend Oakleigh and look forward to working with them again.’
Nick Rance, Service Development Manager, Environmental and Planning Services.
If you have any questions about the subjects covered in this white paper or you would like to find out more about how Oakleigh Consulting could help your organisation, please contact us on 0161 835 4100 or email us.
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