This content has been automatically generated from the original PDF and some formatting may have been lost. Let us know if you find any major problems.
Text in this format is not official and should not be relied upon to extract citations or propose amendments. Please see the PDF for the official version of the document.
Public Accounts Committee Performance Management Follow Up Review Witness: Chief Officer, Department for the Economy
Monday, 3rd July 2023
Panel:
Deputy L.V. Feltham of St. Helier Central (Chair) Deputy M.B. Andrews of St. Helier North (Vice-Chair) Deputy T.A. Coles of St. Helier South
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat of St. Helier North
In attendance:
Mr. A. Lewis , Jersey Audit Office
Witness:
Mr. R. Corrigan, Chief Officer, Department for the Economy
[14:45]
Deputy L.V. Feltham of St. Helier Central (Chair):
Good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to this public hearing of the Public Accounts Committee. Today is Monday, 3rd July and we are holding a public hearing with the Chief Office for Economy as part of our review into performance management. I would like to draw everyone's attention to the following. This hearing will be filmed and streamed live. The recording and transcript will be published afterwards on the States Assembly website. All electronic devices, including mobile phones, should be switched to silent and for the purposes of the recording and the transcript, I would be grateful if everyone who speaks could ensure that you state your name and role and speak clearly. We will begin with introductions. My name is Lyndsay Feltham and I am chair of the Public Accounts Committee.
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat of St. Helier North :
Deputy Mary Le Hegarat , District North St. Helier , a member of the panel.
Deputy M.B. Andrews of St. Helier North (Vice-Chair):
I am Deputy Max Andrews . I am vice-chair of the Public Accounts Committee.
Deputy T.A. Coles of St. Helier South :
Deputy Tom Coles , St. Helier South and a panel member.
Jersey Audit Office:
Andrew Lewis from the Jersey Audit Office, representing the Comptroller and Auditor General.
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
Richard Corrigan, Chief Officer, Department for the Economy.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Thank you. We will start with questions. Deputy Andrews is going to start.
Deputy M.B. Andrews :
Thank you very much, Chair. Richard, what are your personal objectives for 2023?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
I have a range of personal objectives that have been agreed with the Chief Executive, or the recent Chief Executive, who agreed those with me much earlier in 2023. Those are all documented in Connect People. They range from, at the top of the pile, delivering on the relevant ministerial delivery plans for the financial services brief, which sits in the Chief Minister's portfolio, and then the economic development brief, which sits with Deputy Morel as Minister for Economic Development, Tourism, Sport and Culture. Other aspects of the plan relate to the delivery of the programme in preparation for our MONEYVAL assessment later this year, ensuring appropriate financial and risk management governance across the organisation, appropriate people management processes within the department. Then there are also a couple of specials that are corporate projects that I am leading on as well.
Deputy M.B. Andrews :
In terms of when we are looking at the structure within the department, how many tiers are there that you are responsible for?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
I am tier 1. Across the department I then have direct reports at tier 2. There are 4 members at tier 2 and then tier 3 there is a mix. Two have team responsibilities and then the others are subject matter experts in the areas of financial services. The department goes down I think as far as tier 5 altogether organisationally and it is a department of 58 staff altogether at full headcount, including some secondments and some temporary appointments.
Deputy M.B. Andrews :
How do you ensure objectives are cascaded all the way down within the organisation?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
The key to that is the agreement of my objectives. If we take the corporate planning cycle for the Government, we have the incoming Council of Ministers that set their priorities, they set a Government Plan and they then set ministerial delivery plans within that. Those ministerial delivery plans will typically then come down to chief officer level to ensure delivery. Those are incorporated into my objectives and then it begins to separate out as we go through. I think in any performance management environment you are looking for a balance between top-down objectives for the organisation, the Government as a whole, and also the bottom-up so we have ownership of objectives from colleagues at all levels in the organisation. I share my objectives with the entire department so that they can see the environment that we are working to and the Minister's aspirations for the year. Their objectives are then self-set coming up the way in that process and we ensure that there is consistency all the way through. I will look individually to see that we have that consistency down through the structure.
Deputy M.B. Andrews :
Okay. What about when we are looking at, say, for the Minister and the Minister's objectives and how that then links into you and your priorities? How is that then reported back to the Chief Executive?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
Some of those ministerial objectives may sit with me specifically to deliver, for me personally to ensure that that is delivered. Others will be delegated but at the end of the day delegation still means that as the chief officer I am ultimately accountable back to the Minister to ensure that those plans are delivered. My monthly performance conversations with the Chief Executive are tracking through those agreed objectives. When I agree my objectives with the Chief Executive, it is a balance of what the ministerial requirements are as well as what wider corporate responsibilities there may be within the civil service itself.
Deputy M.B. Andrews :
When we are maybe looking at, say, the Chief Executive leadership team, what consistency is there in approach across all chief officers that are then implemented, say, within the Department for the Economy?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
There will be consistency around risk management, financial management, processes in terms of building the culture of the organisation, a whole variety of organisational policies and procedures to ensure consistency of treatment across the organisation as a whole and that we are consistently following relevant legislation as employees in the public service. You would then get some differentiation based on the individual Ministers that we serve. Objectives in Health will naturally then start to differ from those that I have.
Deputy M.B. Andrews :
Of course I have got to ask you a question about MONEYVAL. How is the preparation going for MONEYVAL and how well positioned are we?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
I would say we are confident but not complacent. We ran through a mock evaluation exercise last week, so we are just waiting for some feedback from the mock assessment team that ran that. As you will know from your work with the Economic Affairs Panel historically, it is a pretty intense working out that we will have, not just the Government of Jersey but also the prosecution side, the regulator, Customs, States of Jersey Police. I think we have everyone singing off the same hymn sheet and I think there is just some further refinement we need to do to make sure that people can sing the harmonies as appropriate and reinforce the jurisdictional strengths in the most appropriate way.
Deputy M.B. Andrews :
Thank you very much, Richard.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
We are just going to move towards talking about your own appraisal and the process for that. What is the current process for chief officer appraisals?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
The appraisal essentially is an assessment of performance against the agreed objectives with the Chief Executive. The process that I have had with Suzanne in the first half of the year was I think around about February agreeing my objectives with Suzanne. As we said earlier, that reflects a mixture of corporate and political delivery requirements. I then have a monthly one-to-one with Suzanne where we will go through key issues arising around those objectives and anything else that is topical where I need support from the Chief Executive or indeed where the Chief Executive is looking to cascade or delegate other activities down to me. Then at the mid-year point we have a review. I will start that process by doing a self-review and documenting that into Connect People against each of the objectives that I have been set. Suzanne will then discuss that with me - she has discussed that with me - and then that will be agreed and then written up into a format. Within the system that then moves forward to the next stage, which is my self-review at the year end.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Is it fair to say that there is a clear demonstration of a link between what gets discussed at those appraisal meetings and then the performance objectives?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
Yes. It is very clear in terms of the balancing both sides of it. While Suzanne was leading the public service, she was there to make sure that the Council of Ministers priorities are delivered appropriately within departments as well. Therefore, she was looking to see progress that the department is making with those objectives that sit within the ministerial plan: which ones have we delivered completely and which ones are we at a milestone stage of making progress?
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
You mentioned that you have the one-to-one sessions on a monthly basis. How do those one-to- one meetings differ from the more infrequent appraisal meetings?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
The half-yearly one is driven probably more formally as a structured review, using the template and the tools that are available. The monthly one I think is more of a catch-up around progress that we are making in-month, priorities for the following month, if there are any particular issues that we have come up against that we have not had an opportunity to discuss previously, if there is anything where we are working ahead of time, if there is pressures around funding to deliver on a particular priority. It is those sorts of conversations that we would not wait until the half-year stage to discuss; we would be picking those up monthly, if not before if it is a more material point.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Obviously we are midway through the year now and then it would be at the end of the year you would review the year. If you had had a good year, what would you expect that to look like at the end of the year?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
It is should not be a surprise, I would say, whether it is a good year or a bad year. A good year should see that performance is being recognised through the year, you are seeing that you are making good progress on the individual objectives. I think it is fair to say when you get to the ministerial delivery plan, certainly each year I have been in government, there is an ambitious plan set for the year. Probably about two-thirds or so, maybe three-quarters, gets delivered, some gets deferred or stopped altogether and some new stuff invariably gets added on in its place. I think it is making substantive progress with the plan, ensuring that the Minister is well briefed and understands the progress that has been made with the plan and can indicate their satisfaction back to the Chief Executive, because that is also a key part in the performance feedback process as well.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
What kind of outcomes should the public expect to see should you have had a good year?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
I think that is probably a differentiating factor in our work compared to perhaps some of the more front-facing departments like Customer and Local Services or Health or Education. Quite a lot of our work is around developing policy and legislation. Some of that is multi-year, so the preparations for MONEYVAL have been on for a number of years now. In terms of service performance measures, we are a bit more limited in that aspect. I think what the public would see if they are following through the ministerial plans and they have a particular interest in our delivery, for example, of a strategy for the visitor economy, they would see that visitor economy strategy being published in line with the timetable. They would be involved in consultations through the year that they have an understanding of the progress that is being made and then are looking for that to be delivered and for them to buy into that at the appropriate point of launch. Another significant milestone will be the outline economic strategy that was published in June of last year. We will publish the formal economic framework by the end of September this year, and Deputy Morel headlined some of that in his recent Chamber of Commerce speech. Those are the areas we would say that are successes as and when they are delivered and what the public would see is those items being ticked off on the ministerial delivery plan as the year goes on.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
If you got to the end of the year and it was what you might consider to be a bad year, what would that look like and what might have those blockers been to prevent you from having a good year?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
A bad year can come across in a whole range of ways and it depends: is it a bad year against the delivery plan or against the objectives or is it just simply that you have had to do a very thorough restatement of objectives at a point in a year? If we look at where we started, 2020, with plans for delivery of work in the economic development area, by the time February, March was upon us there was a complete rewrite in terms of the impact of the pandemic and having to move to a very different standing. You could say that was a bad year in terms of the delivery plan but in other ways it was a very positive year in the way that the department came together to deliver business support, something that was unheralded in government in recent years. I think it depends what you are measuring against, if you are measuring against those original objectives or if you are restating objectives based on changed priorities. Other areas where performance could go adrift is if you have a focus on how you achieve results. If you are achieving results in the wrong way, maybe through short-termism, if you are over budget, if you are taking excessive risk, again those could be other factors that would contribute to a bad year. In terms of breaches of public finances law or similar, those would be negatives that you would be chalking up at the end of the year and having maybe a different performance discussion either personally or with colleagues who have been more actively involved in that.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Thank you. When it comes to risk management, what would you consider to be the top 3 risks that you are managing and how do you manage them?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
There are 3 risks I would say that are at the top of the pile. Certainly MONEYVAL is one of our biggest risk elements at the moment. It is a big risk insomuch as if we are not successful with the outcome of the MONEYVAL assessment that can have a material impact on both the Island's reputation and the reputation of the financial services sector, with consequential impacts on the public finances from reduced taxation. We have a very comprehensive plan for preparing for MONEYVAL through the national financial crime workplan and that is also mitigated through political oversight in the Financial Crime Political Strategy Group. The second risk I would talk to is the security and resilience of the Island's telecommunications infrastructure. Telecoms is something we generally take for granted. You pick up the phone, you dial the number and it works, so you go online and everything comes through. It is the risk of that not happening or networks being breached. We are developing a telecoms security framework and supporting legislation. We are working to remove high-risk vendors from the Island's telecommunications networks and we are increasing our co-operation with the U.K. (United Kingdom) National Cyber Security Centre, all as factors that mitigate that risk to networks. Then finally it would be a risk in our capacity and our capability to respond to evolving changes internationally.
[15:00]
We are an Island and we have a tremendous level of autonomy in our affairs as a States Assembly and onwards into the Government itself. Being able to attract and retain the right calibre of people to help us uphold that level of autonomy in a responsible way, to uphold international standards, whether it is MONEYVAL, the O.E. C.D . (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), E.U. (European Union) directives or other bilateral or multilateral agreements that we have, it is critical that we have the calibre of people to be able to uphold that. That can sometimes be quite difficult to secure in a relatively modest population. We mitigate that through our strategic workforce planning to try to understand where we believe there will be gaps that emerge in our workforce and that we are trying to think ahead as to how we would mitigate and fill those gaps in recruitment over time and also in terms of development of our own team.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
If any of those risks look to become more critical or indeed become issues or indeed any of the risks on your corporate risk register, how would you escalate those?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
We do that through the risk register, the corporate risk register and the community risk register, that we add items to as appropriate. It would escalate from the department risk register into a conversation with the central risk team about moving to either the corporate or to the community risk. One factor that we are involved in is, for example, supply chain resilience. There is a corporate risk there for government in terms of our ability to supply services if the supply chain breaks down. Equally, there is a community risk in terms of food, pharmaceuticals and other aspects. We would escalate those sorts of risks appropriately on to the corporate or the community risk register. Again, as a means of keeping those under regular review, rather than just recording it once in the system and sort of forgetting about it, we deep dive our major risks on a quarterly basis. We take 2 major risks and we do a deep dive session as the department leadership team, and we will bring in other colleagues as appropriate, to make sure there is a thorough exposition of that risk and also that we are considering all of the relevant mitigations, and when mitigations are already in place or in action, that we are ensuring that those are being appropriately tracked through.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Thank you. I am going to hand over to Deputy Le Hegarat now.
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat :
We have talked about objective settings within the department and all levels linking back to the ministerial and departmental priorities, and I think you have answered quite a lot of questions in relation to that. How many of the employees within your area of responsibility are in scope for Connect Performance?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
All of them, other than we have a couple of secondees in from U.K. Government, so they are not full-time employees of the Government of Jersey, but all of those on full-time contracts, which is the vast majority of the department, are subject to Connect People.
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat :
How many of those have completed their objectives within Connect Performance for 2023?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
We are at 100 per cent for objectives being set and agreed with the line manager. That was the first 2 phases in the first half of the year. As at Friday, we crossed over into the employees doing their self-reviews and submitting those to their line managers for the mid-year stage. I just pulled the figures on that this morning for you, if it is helpful: 75 per cent of staff have completed that self- appraisal or it has already been discussed with the line manager and moved to the next stage. We have a relatively small number that are overdue in providing their half-year documentation in the system and there will be performance conversations then during July to close out that 6-monthly feedback with the line manager and document that into the system.
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat :
How do you measure performance and undertake appraisals for the employees who fall out of scope? Well, you have said they have not fallen out of scope, so just ignore that. How do you ensure consistency of objective setting at all levels across your department?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
That is discussions through the department leadership team looking to find commonality where we can. We have some job families within the department, so roles of sector officer, sector lead, the associate director roles in the financial services side. They would have similar objectives. They may have a slight tilt in them that you are responsible for that project versus that project but there is a high degree of consistency because they are a job family. There is a lot of consistency in the roles. They just maybe face on to different sectors of the economy. We also do consistency checks of that by being able to drill down through the system to see that objectives are being set fairly and objectively and also to see the quality of dialogue that is being recorded back into the system, both from the appraiser and from the appraisee as well.
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat :
Just out of interest, roughly how many personal objectives would each member of staff have?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
We would probably look at anything between 5 and 7 recorded in the system. I think at more senior levels that 5 or 7 may encapsulate some quite broad objectives. If I take mine as an example, it is ensuring that we deliver the Minister for Economic Development's delivery plan. You can imagine that within that there are a whole number of sector strategies and pieces of policy and legislation to develop, so that one objective will cover quite a significant proportion of the department's work.
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat :
You talked about they are just being reviewed now. How often are they monitored against the objectives? How often are monitored throughout the year?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
There should at the very least be a monthly conversation happening between line managers and those colleagues that they are responsible for. That is more of an informal conversation and check- in. By the time you get to doing mid-year reviews, there should be a no-surprises basis there. If someone is told that they are underperforming at the mid-year, that should not be a surprise. That should be a validation of the conversations that have taken place in the months leading up to it. Similarly, if they have been recognised for outstanding performance, that should not be a surprise because we should be reinforcing those good practices as we go through the year. The 6-monthly and the full year review are system-driven in part. It helps to capture in a consistent way across the organisation the objective setting, the performance commentary and then an overall rating for performance so that we can get a view across the broader organisation around the levels of performance by department, by grade and so on.
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat :
You mentioned that most of your staff are on permanent contracts but you do have people who are seconded. How do you manage and appraise the performance of those particular contractors?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
We may do that through the secondment agreement if they are in for a very short term in a specific piece of work. For example, at the meeting I have just come from, we were talking about bringing a junior barrister in from chambers in the U.K. to do a very specific piece of work. That will be a task
and finish element of work that will be inherent in the secondment agreement that they are party to. It ranges from that, which is very tactical, through to something longer term where we are rotating people in and out, from the U.K. fast track scheme or if we bring in interns, as we are with 6 interns coming to work in the department over the summer, again as part of getting practical experience of the government environment. We will set some learning objectives for them for that period of the internship as well.
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat :
Finally, just again from my perspective, do you think that there is a benefit to this Connect system that you are working to now?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
Yes, absolutely. It is a huge move forward from the M.C.M.G. (My Conversation My Goals) tool that existed previously. M.C.M.G. in itself moved on from where we were, which was really not very much in place. It was a paper-based system, I think, before. M.C.M.G. was a step in the right direction; Connect People I think drives us on quite significantly. I think the structure of it is much more familiar to what I have seen in other organisations earlier in my career, but a system itself does not bring a performance management culture. That is about how performance is discussed, appraised, how feedback is given. It is a tool that helps us capture, it is a tool that drives key activity through the year, but having effective performance management is not just about the system. It is very much about the quality of line management as well.
Deputy M.R. Le Hegarat : Thank you.
Deputy T.A. Coles :
Going back to your lower end, your boots on the ground employees, do you have much in the way of turnover of staff?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
I would not say we have got anything unconcerning. We recognise that we are in a very competitive labour market at the moment and that can lead to people moving from us to another employer for a few thousand pounds additional salary. I think we have moved a long way with our employer offer, away from just remuneration with flexible working, the ability to do compressed hours and so on, which I think has helped immensely with retention. We do still lose people. I think it is important within that also to look at regretted losses versus non-regretted. Sometimes you will have staff turnover because there is an edge to the performance management conversations where you are not happy with their performance but it has not yet reached a formal stage in the performance management processes that government has in place and colleagues may decide that they want to go and look at opportunities somewhere else. I think it is important to look at regretted losses and I think on that count we have had very few of those, certainly during my time in role.
Deputy T.A. Coles :
Do you have any mechanisms where you can measure your employees' satisfaction?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
The Be Heard survey really is the key barometer for that. Our last Be Heard survey was done in 2020. It was probably not an ideal time for the Department for the Economy. We had come together on a shadow basis in the spring of 2020 and we were just going through a target-operated model process. As you can imagine, that created a degree of uncertainty in people's minds around what the future may hold for the department and for them personally. I am pleased to say that for our target-operating model it was less about job savings and redundancies as perhaps happened in some other areas and much more around securing the necessary investment into the department. I would expect that when we see our imminent Be Heard survey results in the coming weeks we should see a significantly better picture.
Deputy T.A. Coles :
Do you have any feeling of where your barometer might be sat at?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
I would not like to guess. What we try to do is set the right conditions insomuch as we have encouraged colleagues to take some time away from the desk, not to be distracted, to go away and have a think as they are inputting those answers and see where we get to. We have had a number of new joiners to the team because the department has grown in size, so their views may be quite different to those who have worked in government for 10, 15 years prior to that. I expect us to see better and more rounded results than last time, so continued improvement, but I do not think it matters how good they are, there will still be actions or there will still be relative weak spots either against other departments, against the organisation as a whole or against really where you want to be as a high-performing organisation. That will form an action plan that we will take forward together in the department through the people and culture working group that we have.
Deputy T.A. Coles :
We are going to move on to the 2018 one.gov reforms and specifically the Team Jersey programme. How would you describe that impact on the culture within your department?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
I saw it as positive. At the time of one.gov being created, the department had not really come together. We sat within the Office of the Chief Executive in that first one.gov structure. We came together as the Department for the Economy during 2020. I think what I saw in Team Jersey was a very professionally led programme of work across a whole range of disciplines, from leadership right the way through all levels of the organisation. I think it linked different departments together. You would go along, you would register for a Team Jersey session but you were meeting different people from around the organisation, either at different levels of management and leadership or at some of the broader sessions. It could be a prison worker, it could be someone working in the Energy for Waste facility, a whole variety of different people coming together, but what united them was public service. Therefore, there were some really good contributions coming from different areas of the organisation as to how we can be better and the common purpose that we serve. I think it has helped to move the quality of conversations happening in the organisation between colleagues and their line managers. One of the focal points is around candid conversations and that was to help to ensure that people could channel their thoughts in the right way, they could speak quite candidly and openly without fear of reprisal, without fear of their views being attacked in some way. I think that is really important in driving the confidence that people have working within a large organisation such as the Government of Jersey. That is just one such example. Always in each of the sessions there was a takeaway: 2 degrees of change, what will you do differently as a consequence of today's session? You take that away and try to embed that into what you do each day. I have to say one of the very early sessions I attended - it was one of the town hall sessions - it was a real cross- section across government. The lady who was sat next to me, I was absolutely horrified by the personal experience that she had had within one of the other departments in government, her experience working for a relatively poor and inexperienced line manager. I am hoping that Team Jersey has helped us embed much better practices in the organisation that limits the likelihood of those sorts of situations recurring. I think fundamentally that will lay a really good foundation around our employee relations more broadly, reduce the number of grievance and other cases that we have to contend with and lead to an overall much more healthy working environment and, as a consequence, a much more productive organisation.
[15:15]
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
You spoke earlier about people leaving the organisation and you used the term "regretted losses and unregretted losses". That is a concept that I want to explore a bit further because it is not something that we have heard from other chief officers. Can you explain to me what you might define as an unregretted loss?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
I think if you look at staff turnover overall, you would have a number for staff turnover. Most organisations would be in a 5 to 10 per cent average figure. You can see in certain cases they would be higher because they are going through a period of intense change. For me, a regretted loss would be seeing a high performer leaving the organisation because they feel their future is better served somewhere else, so you are really losing a key element of the department, of the function. An unregretted loss would be someone, for example, that we have been through a performance management process with where you have been through the performance discussions, you have been through coaching and support to try to help get performance to the level that is required, but you have eventually had to go to a point of going through the performance management process and setting a performance improvement plan. If someone is leaving at the end of that, there has been support and there has been opportunity to demonstrate capability in the role, and if that has not been forthcoming I would not see that as a regretted loss in the broader scheme of things. We still need to deal with that in terms of empathy and equity to ensure that those employees are dealt with fairly as they are leaving the organisation, but if that is then allowing us to replace that individual who was not performing with somebody who can come in, either somebody who can be promoted into the role or somebody new coming in from outside, it gives an opportunity to get the performance in that specific post to the level that it needs to be at.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Okay. Can you just explain what support, if any, you might get from central government for you to manage those kinds of situations?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
I touched, in the context of Team Jersey, on the candid conversations aspect. That is around helping to develop a more mature organisation to have discussions both ways from line manager to colleague and vice versa. Obviously we use Connect People as the baseline for setting objectives and for tracking performance through the year. There is the opportunity within that to put continuous performance management elements in, areas of very positive delivery or behaviour versus those that are perhaps more limiting by nature. As I said, we should not be getting to a 6-month stage and then saying performance is not where it needs to be. That should not be a surprise in any conversation, so it should have been coming through in monthly one-to-one conversations in any event. The central support then that is available would be working with colleagues, people in corporate services, with our H.R. (human resources) business partner or with the people hub to ensure then that any subsequent performance improvement plan is consistent with the organisation's templates and also that it is fair on all parties, it is fair on the colleague that you are setting an adequate timeframe for performance to improve, that it is an obligation that sits on both sides. There is a responsibility on the line manager to be supportive, to coach, to develop, to train, to encourage the colleague to maybe think about other roles in the organisation that they might be better suited to. All of those factors need to be considered so that we can do this in a way that is empathetic and, of course, fair. In doing so, we hope to get the right performance outcomes in terms of that colleague coming up to the level of performance that is required. If not, then it is looking at other roles around the organisation. By doing all of that properly and fairly, we limit the likelihood of a more contentious situation developing at a later stage.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
I think I might have some more questions on that but I may well put that in writing.
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy: Yes, no problem.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
It might well not be for you but another chief officer as well. Obviously in terms of your position, you are Chief Officer, Department for the Economy. You are also a member of the Executive Leadership Team. How does the Executive Leadership Team operate? Can you give us a bit of a flavour of that, about how you work with the rest of the team?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
Yes. I would say we have a good leadership team that can challenge each other constructively with the intention of developing the best outcome or solution as a consequence of that challenging conversation. The kind of areas that we will focus in on ... typically we meet on a fortnightly basis. Sometimes it may even move to weekly if there is a lot of business to go through. It can be a little bit of a clearing house for strategic issues before they go to the Council of Ministers. For example, it may be the financial report that is going to report department financials against budget. That will be discussed at E.L.T. (Executive Leadership Team) typically ahead of it going to the Council of Ministers maybe the following week. For other items perhaps of policy and legislative development that have obviously been commissioned by the Minister but are then coming back round to be presented to the Council of Ministers and on to the States Assembly, again there will quite often be a further discussion at E.L.T. before it goes to that final stage of the Council of Ministers to iron out any remaining creases that might exist at that point in time. Separately, we will also take a step back and look at strategic issues such as risk. We will look at the efficiencies programme. We will talk through some of the key risks together and what our approach to those is organisationally. For example, last week we were briefed on cybersecurity by Fiona Capstick and colleagues around the risk to the Government sustained through cybersecurity risks. We will then look to support whether it is M. and D. (Modernisation and Digital) or other areas as appropriate and try to prioritise efforts where we can, particularly financial resources where those hotspots might be.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
When you are prioritising those resources, because obviously you do all have different objectives to meet and you are have got finite resources, what methods do you use? How do you sit around the table as a group and prioritise that?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
There may be an issue, for example my head of business management in the Department for the Economy was looking for a personal development opportunity. We know that there is a lot on the slate over at C.Y.P.E.S. (Children, Young People, Education and Skills) at the moment and, therefore, there is an ability to second a really high performing member of my team across to Rob Sainsbury's leadership team at C.Y.P.E.S. to help with a specific project there. That is something where Rob will benefit from having that extra pair of hands and that extra intellect as part of his leadership team for the next 6 months. It will benefit my direct report from her having exposure to a different leadership team and also having a dedicated project to deliver. It is those sorts of areas tactically where you can move people around. That has also allowed us to bring somebody in also on a development secondment from another department so that they can again work with a different leadership team and learn some different skills. When it comes down to money, that is more challenging because we have ministerial heads of expenditure ultimately, so it is not within my gift to say: "To Health, here have half a million pounds" but that is where we tackle things like efficiencies together. By delivering the efficiencies programme, we clear headroom within the wider budgeting cycle for extra funding that is required in certain priority of areas that the Council of Ministers will determine and that might mean that we are having to find efficiencies in the Department for the Economy but may not get the same amount of money back in terms of additional spending because the balance of priorities may be weighted more towards Health or Education or Justice and Home Affairs. It is having that collegiate view that we all have to do our bit to run an effective and efficient organisation that then allows resources to be properly prioritised where the greatest need happens to be.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
I understand the efficiencies programme has now been rebadged as the value for money programme.
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy: Yes.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Has the Treasury Department given you a definition of what value for money is?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
There is 2 aspects to that. One of them is looking to see can we drive some efficiencies just by taking some value off the top and all agreeing to some collective savings but, secondly, can we then look at structured opportunities to save or to be more commercial in the work that the Government are doing? I have got to say from a Department for the Economy perspective there is not a lot in that area where we can start, for example, charging out for our services, but we know, from having looked at this for some time, on a cross-government basis you would have areas: for example can you commercialise the hospital laundry and start to take in laundry from hotels or other operators as a means of utilising the latent capacity that exists there and earning a commercial revenue from that? That would be an example of where we would be able to find value for money, we use our current assets more effectively, more efficiently and create a return for government.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Thank you. Does anybody have any further questions on performance management before I move on to tracker recommendations? No? Okay. As you are aware, there are outstanding recommendations that we have on a tracker for P.A.C. (Public Accounts Committee) and also the Comptroller and Auditor General recommendation. I have in front of me recommendation 29, which is: "As the Government becomes more dependent on digital technologies, policy attention should be given to the importance of digital inclusion." The recommendations tracker did not specify a target date for the implementation of this recommendation. What is your target date for implementation?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
The formal response to that in a policy sense will come within the digital economy strategy. That is being developed at the moment, led by Deputy Alex Curtis and through the digital economy team within my department. The digital economy strategy will be published in quarter 4 of this year. Part of the thinking around that is very much around digital inclusion. That is already established within our policy thinking day to day, for example around the work that we have done on wholesale broadband prices, both in terms of the cost regulation through the J.C.R.A. (Jersey Competition Regulatory Authority) but also in terms of the underlying products like bitstream to help to ensure that more differentiated product pricing is available to households, that not everyone wants a gigabit of broadband or is prepared to pay for a gigabit of broadband but they may want 100 megabits and that can be provided at a cheaper price by one of the telcos. We did not want the wholesale pricing of that by Jersey Telecom to get in the way of better offers being available and better choice being available for consumers. It is those sorts of areas that help to include people, ensure that they are not left behind. We had similar work during the pandemic around working with telcos to see 4G broadband and other vouchers available, particularly for low income households to ensure that when children were at home and having to still do schoolwork that the families had adequate access to broadband to help to facilitate that. It has very much been part of our thinking. It is around being digital first rather than digital only, so using digital as a preferred channel but not necessarily the only channel, because if it was the only channel that risks disenfranchising some members of our community.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
What consultation has been undertaken to date with stakeholders in relation to digital inclusivity?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
There are 6 stages planned. We are at stage 4 of that at the moment. That has been discussions with organisations like Digital Jersey, Chamber of Commerce, Consumer Council and others. There will be a formal public consultation that will go live later in the summer and that will capture a wider range of views before we start to then converge on a final version of the strategy for publication by the end of the year.
Deputy T.A. Coles :
I am not sure if you have got any comments on this, or if it is even a question, to be honest, but it just happened that I had a gentleman turn up to a constituency surgery today, a pensioner who is on income support and has to pay full price for his broadband. This also links into a constituent of one of our fellow party members who received a letter where they were starting to claim their pension and were only able to apply online. As part of the inclusivity strategy, one person has been told they can only apply for their pension via online and somebody is having to use income support to pay for their broadband to be able to engage with the Government. I do not know if you have any comment.
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
They are not my areas of direct responsibility. I would hope certainly for being able to claim the pension that there would be other options open to that constituent. I would be very surprised if online was the only version. It might be the preferred way for that department of government for Islanders to engage with them but to my mind that should not be the only way. There should be the ability to call, to write or to arrange an appointment to go in and to do that face to face as well. As you will be aware, one of the one.gov changes that was probably less well received was the eventual shuttering of La Motte Street in terms of you had to have an appointment to go in. We are hoping that when we move to the new Cyril Le Marquand House towards quarter 3 of next year, that will be a much more open way of being able to deal with government, but clearly we cannot just sit tight and wait until then. We need to be making improvements in the meantime. If there is more details that you are happy to send to me over email, I am happy to pick those up with the relevant colleague and see how we can help. In terms of the other one around the broadband pricing, it is exactly with that in mind that we have tried to ensure that the wholesale pricing by JT - because JT has the wholesale network, they have the fibre access to every premises in the Island - is to regulate the price at which they sell access to that down to other operators like Sure and Airtel.
[15:30]
The J.C.R.A. have worked very hard to drive that price down. They have done a lot of work with JT to understand their cost base and to get to a regulated price for that service. Then we have also worked over the top of that to ensure that it is not just the Rolls-Royce service of 1 gigabit. It can be a much slower speed or it can be less download capacity over the course of a month and that allows for cheaper packages to be offered. There is, however, a challenge that I think we have inherent in Jersey as a small jurisdiction where many Islanders want high quality connectivity services and that does come at a cost and it is not a cost that is defrayed as easily as if we were in a much bigger market or centre of population.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Thank you. With regard to the recommendation that we were discussing, what K.P.I.s (key performance indicators) exist, if any, in relation to the implementation of it?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
Other than delivering the digital economy strategy within the committed timeframe, which will be part of the performance objectives, the strategy itself will have key performance indicators in it. Those ultimately will be set and approved by the Minister, by Deputy Curtis , in a final version of the strategy. It is probably something I will follow up with you, I think, in writing in terms of exactly where we are at and what sort of measures are planned to be in there so far. As I say, we will be consulting on that later in the summer.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Okay. For clarity, what is the current target date for the completion of the digital strategy?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
The commitment I think we made in the April 2022 executive response was that the digital economy strategy would be delivered by the end of 2023. The 6-week public consultation is due to go live at mid-August. That will take us through until the end of September. Any redrafting that is required and approval of the Minister will take place in October and we are looking at launch late November, early December. It is very much the back end of the year in terms of the digital economy strategy being published.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
You are expecting to meet that target?
Chief Officer, Department for the Economy:
Yes. I spoke to Deputy Curtis this morning ahead of coming here today.
Deputy L.V. Feltham :
Okay, that is good to hear. Does anybody have any further questions? You will be happy to know we have come to the end of our question plan a little early. Thank you for coming along to the hearing today. Thank you to the supporting officers as well. I will draw this hearing to a close.
[15:32]