Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
What you have been saying about the public sector DT1
There is nothing particularly special about public sector worker per'se. Some are timewasters, some are excellent, just the same as in the private sector. Likewsie you get good and bad managers in both and at the end of the day the way staff are treated is down to the management methods and style.
One thing has to change in the public sector - the pensions. They are no longer supportable and should be shifted to defined contributions in the same way the private sector has. The great British public cannot be expected to subsidised these bloated public sector schemes when they are unable to pay enough into their own for a comfortable retirement..
Guest 674- Registered: 25 Jun 2008
- Posts: 3,391
Usually BAZ private sector work for profit(don't we all)
but to achieve this, they cut corners, poor pay at the bottom, staff not motivated,
little job satisfaction as they have no ownerrship of company.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
Keith, you have a very skewed idea of the private sector. There are good and bad employers and many in the middle. That is life and there is absolutely nothing wrong with profit, it is what makes the world goes round.
Having just completed a project for one of the London Boroughs, I can assure you that cutting corners and Value for Money is alive and well and in the Public Sector! Contract negotiations are savage!
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
You have a point about contract negotiation there Bern. Many parts of the public sector are very bad at it and experienced private sector negotiators run circles round them. That is no excuse though, its a reason to sharpen up these skills.
Couldn't agree more. It's no place for amateurs!!!
Guest 674- Registered: 25 Jun 2008
- Posts: 3,391
Can't say iv seen many GOOD private contractors within the councils systems, so maybe I have a biased view cos of what iv seen
Guest 686- Registered: 5 May 2009
- Posts: 556
Not everything can be specified in a contract, especially if those contracted are mobile and not permanently on-site. A simple example from my short time working as ground staff at Crabble Atheletic Ground many, many years ago: We used to mow the rugby grounds/cricket outfield twice a week during the grass growing season - on Monday and Thursday I think - but if there had been no rain for a while then mowing would have been counter-productive. The head groundsman, Johnny Danbrook and later Frank Philpott, would make the decision after an inspection. The same went for the football ground. These guys took a real pride in what they were doing and were professional greenkeepers and groundsmen. It may have seemed as though they only needed to know how to push a mower or wield a scythe but having worked with these guys I know it was a lot different in reality.
Phil West
If at first you don't succeed, use a BIGGER hammer!!
Skills of all sorts should be valued. What you say is true, but it is a common mistake of the inexperienced contract negotiator to think everyrthing has to be quantified and specified: it is only quality, review and outcome that needs specification, the means and ferquency of tasks is usually best left to the people actually doing the job so long as there is sufficient effective quality assurance and control.
Guest 674- Registered: 25 Jun 2008
- Posts: 3,391
Bern
I'm sure you speak from experience , but what i can tell you is the councils PRIVATE contractors are far from special.
As Iv posted elsewhere Im having to spend my time getting them to do even the basics, that they don't do if i don't phone up to get them back.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
There certainly is a skill on drawing up these contracts. Two approaches might be to require a road to be swept twice daily, the other would be to require a specific standard of cleanliness. In the latter case the road would be swept at frequencies determined by conditions. When I was TS Chairman we identified a set of standards so that if a road reached a particular level of littering it would need to be clean within X hours, at another level Y hours. This was backed up by photographs of the levels required. It sounds complex but it did work and I remember a certain local businessman, who is still around, taking the trouble to write to the press to congratulate the Council on the cleanliness of the streets. Unusual that!
Guest 674- Registered: 25 Jun 2008
- Posts: 3,391
Ay but contracts are not so good now, and the standards are poor
I will post on my experiences of the leisure centre soon, another eye opener
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
Then they need to up the standard of contracts... you get what you pay for.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
it is down to individuals at the end of the day.
for a few years my road and surrounding ones have been like a pigsty.
recently a newcove has been assigned here, works like a demon, still manages to engage anyone passing by in conversation, the streets here have never looked so clean.
not down to a contract, just someone committed to their job.
Guest 674- Registered: 25 Jun 2008
- Posts: 3,391
Howard
think your right, but need motivated staff, those that are down trodden and badly paid are unlikely to take pride in the job they do
As usual, it is down to management! If a workforce is managed intelligently and warmly, and their brief is clear and measurable, a team will form itself. Sadly in local authorities people are oftne promoted way past their capabilities and poor management is the norm rather than exceptional, and of course people who are poor managers will not challenge other poor managers for fear of exposing their own inadequacy. So, we continue with poor negotiators, poor managers, and that trickles down to the workforce. Unfortunately, as a manager, I have to own up and say that it is true: it is managements fault!!!!
Sue Nicholas- Location: river
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 6,019
I think you are right there Bern .Too often people are promoted beyond their abilities .I have seen this in action
It is something that irks me. If I do not perform I am accountable - if someone directly paid by taxpayers underperforms they often get booted upstairs. If people really want to compain about how their taxes are spent, rather than complain about the layers of management - which are often necessary to manage the projects and workforce effectively - they should complain about the under-performing managers, and even the underperforming grassroots staff. Weed them out and we really would have cost-effective value for money services! The sloppy nurses, over-promoted managers, poor contract negotiators, clueless locality managers - sift them out and either replace them with sound staff or don't bother - they are a liability. better without them than with them. And they drag down the reputation and hard work of the ones who do well and are intelligent and commited managers of people.