Hamilton City Councillor Andrew Bydder has written a lengthy and detailed article for the Good Oil to help readers concerned about our local councils to get prepared for the next LGNZ elections. This is part four. [Ed.]
PART D – WHAT ARE THE SOLUTIONS?
1 Structure
Councillors shall work as a team to restructure the governance system. Committee meetings can be replaced by smaller working groups led by councillors with proven expertise in each area. A budget for external consultants engaged by and reporting to councillors, rather than to staff, will allow for independent review and advice to ensure better decision making.
The councillors will direct the chief executive on how to manage the operational side of council. This is likely to include appointing deputy chief executives from outside the council to restructure departments where the chief executive lacks either the expertise or the time to manage properly.
The restructure will make staff accountable. Good people do not fear accountability when it comes with the proper authority to make decisions and do their job to the best of their abilities. Accountability also leads to greater recognition and reward for success. The purpose of this is to eliminate the committees and endless reports to speed up decision making through individuals taking greater responsibility and leadership. Performance will be measured on outcomes rather than process.
There will be a distinction between management (oversight, expert leadership and decision making) and administration (trivial paperwork and box ticking) tasks in the senior management layer to reduce the number of managers by using staff more effectively. IT automation and AI can significantly improve repetitive administrative tasks.
External industry experts will be brought in to direct department managers on efficient operations. This will include eliminating bureaucratic tasks and time wasting. Overheads will be reduced. Where appropriate, processes will be simplified to suit the specific needs of the department and customer ahead of the administrative needs of the council.
A complaints procedure will be established to genuinely listen and understand feedback from the public. Staff employed as advocates for the complainant will be empowered to proactively solve problems. Mistakes will be admitted and addressed as an opportunity to learn.
Service delivery can be improved with a reduction in time and cost by streamlining the system.
2 Finances
The easy credit of the Local Government Funding Agency must be stopped. If the LGFA won’t do its job responsibly, then councils need to impose their own financial discipline.
Operational budgets must be immediately balanced. This will force councillors to face reality with a choice between massive rates rises or cutting staff and services. There will be no more hiding a culture of excess behind borrowing.
Capital expenditure must be assessed on a project-by-project basis, not council income. Return on investment must be greater than the cost of interest or the project does not proceed. External experts must review the budgets for every project and compare to market rates for private enterprise costs. Project management will be monitored to ensure delivery on time and on budget. There will be no more gold-plating, over-specifying, poor management, or contract variation claims that quadruple the cost.
3 People
(a) Elected representatives (mayor and councillors)
Part E details what is necessary to improve the quality of councillors with a team working together and a range of skills.
(b) Chief executive
The chief executive must commit to working with the team or be removed. The position is powerful, so the role cannot be used to undermine the necessary changes. A good chief executive should have the confidence to work on a one-year contract, knowing it can be rolled over if performance is good.
To carry out the fundamental restructure, the chief executive (following directions from the councillor team) may need to appoint deputies with the time and skills to focus on key areas. This has the advantage of isolating the chief executive from the baggage of redundancies.
(c) Managers
The second tier of managers can be streamlined by separating management tasks from administrative tasks, allowing them to focus on leadership and decision making. Having said that, this layer is responsible for many of the problems in councils and the social engineering culture. The restructure is a good opportunity to cut out the rot.
Likewise, departmental managers need to be individually assessed and the activists culled. Bringing in local external industry experts will be the best way to do this by changing the department focus from process to outcomes with performance measures.
(d) Staff
General staff numbers can be reduced by boosting productivity through accountability. The increased responsibility is achieved by empowering good people to make decisions and get on with their jobs. Performance measures based on outcomes rather than process will encourage proactive go-getters to produce great results, while the low achievers need to be let go.
Ed: This is the fourth part of a series. Part A is here, part B is here and part C is here.
