RESOURCES OVERVIEW GROUP
24 APRIL 2008
REPORT OF HEAD OF PERSONNEL AND TRAINING SERVICES
EMPLOYEE SURVEY
1.0 PURPOSE OF REPORT
1.1 The purpose of this report is to outline to Members the background to the employee survey.
1.2 To feedback to Members the key results of the Employee Survey and analysis by Strategic Planning during November 2007, based on the following three questions:
i) How well does the Borough of Poole compare to other small and mid sized participating authorities with respect to the eight factors?
ii) What were the Borough of Poole overall results and how does each Service Unit in Poole compare with the other Service Units, again with respect to the eight factors?
iii) What effect does age, length of service, gender, etc have on responses
2.0 RECOMMENDATION
2.1 To note the outcomes of the employee survey.
2.2 To consider and support planned actions as set out in paragraph 4.16 of the report detail.
3.0 BACKGROUND
3.1 The Improvement and Development Agency (IdeA) and Local Government Employees (LGE) in partnership with Best Companies ran for the first time The Times Best Council to work for employee survey 2007, which surveyed and benchmarked workplace practice.
3.2 The employee survey was completed during August and an article was subsequently published in the Times, which announced the top 20 Councils based on the survey response. 80% of those 20 Councils were smaller councils with less than 900 staff. The Council with the best overall services was Vale Royal Borough Council.
3.3 The employee questionnaire was sent out in July to 1413 employees excluding schools. This is different from the previous People Matter Surveys that went to all service unit employees. Our return rate was 56.5%, which was one of the highest responses across all Councils who took part. Our response rate for the last People Matter Survey was 59%.
4.0 THE EMPLOYEE SURVEY
4.1 The Survey identifies strengths and areas of development within the workplace based around the eight factors of Leadership, Wellbeing, My Manager, My Team, My Company, Personal Growth, Fair Deal, Giving Something Back. Scores are out of 7. Scores above 4 identify areas within Service Units where we are doing well and can celebrate our workplace practice and scores of three or less identify areas that are worth exploring in terms of improvement areas.
4.2 There were 72 questions on the questionnaire, which included 2 free format questions:
· What do you think makes this a great workplace?
· What do you think would make this a better place?
4.3 Through the analysis of the Survey we have been able to benchmark our results with 55 small and mid-sized Councils. The validity of comparisons with principally smaller District Councils is limited. 63 Councils took part in the survey nationally, which was less than the survey organisers and sponsors hoped for.
We had hoped to be able to benchmark Borough of Poole against other Unitary Authorities, but were disappointed that only 4 others took part in the survey, so the results are less statistically significant and we were not able to compare solely with more comparable Unitary Councils. It is also believed that the nature of the survey particularly attracted Councils where more favourable employee relations applied. The Audit Commission has assessed 90% of the Councils in the top 20 ranked Councils as 3 or 4 Star Authorities.
4.4 Factor Scores
Poole’s score relative to the other 55 small and mid-sized authorities in our group were highest (19th) for Personal Growth and lowest (34th) for Fair Deal (see Chart 1 below). All of our results were in the mid quartiles when compared with those Councils in our group.
Chart 1. Poole’s score and ranking for each factor
4.5 Leadership
Relative to other Councils, we were in the top half for every question (ranging between 21st and 26th). It is worth noting that there was a high proportion of neutral responses to the eight Leadership questions, indicated by the yellow areas in the ‘heatmap’ below (chart 2) and a development area in the organisation could be creating a better understanding of the senior leadership role.
Chart 2. Leadership by Question
4.6 My Company
As with Leadership, the Borough of Poole is in the second quartile for all of the 5 questions related to My Company. These questions included: -
· How proud employees feel working for the Council (Poole score 4.74)
· How much they love working for the organisation (Poole score 4.48)
· How important their work is as part of their life (Poole score 5.04)
· The degree to which they believe they make a valuable contribution to the success of the organisation (Poole score 5.05)
· Whether they feel they can make a difference in the work they do within the organisation (Poole score 4.52)
Based on these scores, we see no great cause for concern.
4.7 Personal Growth
Our position benchmarked against other Councils range from 12th (the extent to which employees are not bored with their work) to 32nd (the job is good for my own personal growth) (see Chart 3 below).
45% of Borough of Poole employees agreed that there are only limited opportunities to learn and grow within the organisation. One reason for this could be that flatter structures can create less career opportunity.
Chart 3. Personal growth
4.8 My Manager
Whilst being one of our higher scoring factors, it is one of our lowest ranking factors compared with other Councils (see Chart 1). The individual question scores ranged from 4.31 (My manager is an excellent role model for me) to 5.29 (I feel that my manager trusts my judgement) (see chart 4 for details).
Chart 4. My Manager
4.9 My Team
This was the highest scoring factor for the Borough of Poole with our overall score being 5.06. (Borough of Poole was ranked 29th in our size category). The highest scoring individual question was “I have confidence in the abilities of the others in my team” (5.42) and the lowest was “working in this team gives me a buzz” (4.31). Compared with other Councils, our highest and lowest ranking positions across the seven questions were 19th and 35th.
4.10 Giving Something Back
The Borough of Poole’s overall score for this Factor was 4.10 and we ranked 24th against other Councils. It was the second lowest Borough of Poole overall score across the eights factors. Many surveys respondents (42%) agreed to some extent that the Council is driven only by budgetary concerns and 41% of employees felt that we could do more for the local community (see chart 5 below).
Chart 5.Giving something back
4.11 Fair Deal
This is our lowest scoring and lowest ranking factor. These results are consistent with our last People Matter Survey. 50% of employees surveyed feel they are not fairly paid for their responsibilities (chart 6 below). This is consistent with the benchmarking of Borough of Poole against those other Councils in our group. See Chart 1 (Poole’s score and ranking for each factor) on Page 2 of this report for the Borough of Poole overall score and benchmarking position against other Councils.
Chart 6. Fair Deal
4.12 Well Being
Poole’s results are in the middle two quartiles for all questions (highest ranking was 18th and lowest 37th). The lowest scoring individual question related to employees feeling under too much pressure to work efficiently, however people felt happy with the balance between work and home life (4.81). However people felt positive with a score of 4.81 with the balance of I’m happy with my work and home life.
We feel that this is an area of concern for the Council, due to the high numbers of employees indicating their work is affecting their health, stress related symptoms and work life balance (chart 7). When looking at the Service Unit data, this is particularly an issue in two service units.
Chart 7. Well Being
4.13 Other Questions
6 of the 70 multiple-choice questions in the survey were not linked to the eight factors, but were instead termed “feedback questions” (chart 8).
We detect no cause for concern, although one in three respondents indicated that some people exercise intimidation to get what they want. In comparison with the other 55 small to medium sized Councils, Poole were ranked 21st for this particular question.
Chart 8. Feedback
4.14 “Free Form” comments
In addition to the questions linked to the eight workplace factors, there were 2 “free form” questions asked: -
· “What do you think makes this a great workplace?”
· “What do you think would make this a better workplace?”
Just over half of the survey respondents commented on either of these two questions.
In answer to the first question, the main positive themes were team spirit, work-life balance and the quality of line managers.
In answer to the second question about factors that would make this a better workplace, a similar number of respondents commented. The main concerns were pay, management and communication. In previous People Matter Surveys there were questions specifically about communication, however this employee survey contained no such questions, so these comments are especially useful.
4.15 Overall score, by Service Unit
Individual Service Unit responses (where available) have been provided to the Service Unit Head. Service Unit Management Teams have been evaluating the results from their service, giving particular attention to where the service unit results are different from the overall Council norms.
4.16 Management Team Consideration of Actions
Management Team have received a report and presentation on this topic. The People Strategy Group and Joint Information & Consultative Committee will also give consideration on this employee survey.
The following actions are planned and taking place: -
· Lowest scores – Identify development and action where appropriate to support Service Units with low scores in the 8 factors working from Service Unit specific results circulated to units.
· Highest scores - Celebrate areas of high scores organisation wide and Service Unit specific within the 8 factors. Loop messages have been arranged.
· Well Being - Stress and the impact on work life balance - Develop an action plan in conjunction with the Stress Group looking at the Health and Safety Executive Management Standards. Link to the work already done by the Health at Work group
· Leadership – Whilst recognising that the response seems not untypical, the People Strategy Group will consider the high percentage of employees who neither agreed nor disagreed with the Leadership questions
· Professional Growth – to look at our career development opportunities within the Recruitment & Retention Strategy as a relatively high percentage of employees indicate “limited opportunities to learn and grow within the organisation”
· Giving Something Back – to explore why a high proportion of employees believe we are driven by budgets and could do more for the local community and the response we should give to this.
· Fair Deal – To complete the Equal Pay Review
· Free Form questions - The main themes from the question “what do you think would make this a better workplace?” were pay, management and communication. When comparing the comments on Management there were as many employees’ comments indicating discontent to those who were happy.
· Communications – A number of communication actions have taken place and are planned (paragraph 4.18 refers).
4.17 Conclusions
This employee survey has given us a range of useful feedback around workplace practice and some opportunity to benchmark with other Councils although this has been limited. For the next employee survey we would intend using our People Matter Survey, however we would want to review the developments and changes to this national Survey, as this survey is mentioned in the latest National Pay & Workforce Strategy 2007 document. It may be used more extensively for medium and larger Councils in the future.
2007 was the first year that this national survey has been run. By their own admission, they had hoped for greater participation and we were particularly disappointed with the low number of Unitary Authorities taking part.
Our experience and concerns over aspects of the survey process have been expressed in a letter to Best Companies, which included: -
· Lack of clarity about resourcing requirements & deadlines for Borough of Poole survey project team
· Employment Sectors excluded e.g. employees working in the Children & Young People services did not have a grouping
· Equality and diversity concerns about questions
· Unreliable reporting during survey period relating to the number of surveys completed
· Concerns about the pricing and limitations of the web based reporting tool we purchased from Best Companies
· The discrepancy between the service expectation given and the service actually received
A discount on the fee was requested and a 50% refund has been agreed all our experiences were not unique and other Councils have also been offered a discount.
4.18 Communication Strategy
We have already communicated the high level results of the survey in the following ways: -
· 3 Loop Articles dated September 2007, December 2007 and April 2008
· Chief Executive letter to 175 Managers on 31st March 2008
· Agenda item at People Strategy Group meetings in September and November 2007 and April 2008.
· Report to Management Team on 22nd January 2008
· Consideration by the Promoting Equality and Respecting Diversity Group during April 2008.
· Survey information has been sent out to Service Units - March 2008
· Survey information considered by People Strategy Group Reps – February 2008
· Report to Resources Overview Group – 24th April 2008
· Report to Joint Information and Consultative Committee - 30th June 2008
· Results communicated to Service Units
· Service Unit Action Plans formulated and link to Business Plan and IiP
re-assessment
· Additional detailed background information relating to the survey has been placed in Group Rooms.