From about 2006-2011 my main career activity was as a senior headhunter, as a result of which I met very many high achieving people who were grappling with their career choices. This post is about one of the key things I learned and used then, and which I’ve developed alongside my own career thinking. I’ve…
Category: HR
What became of the broken hearted?
There was a really good session at the Public Sector Launchpad (#pslaunchpad) last night (5th November 2013) and this blog is about one tiny offshoot of one of the conversations. The conversation was about resistance to change in organisations. A young and enthusiastic local government worker was discussing the difficulties of getting a long-term workforce to…
What sort of “no chief executive” are you?
This article was first published in LGC The growing diversity of local authorities in their local situations makes it very difficult to generalize about local government. Some are tempted to say that “all councils should always have a chief executive come what may”. This is quite interesting – clearly there are a number of local…
Recruiting for Commercialism
This article, which appeared under the name of myself and Veredus colleague Evelyn Dougherty, was first published in the MJ As we travel around the country visiting a diverse range of local authorities it is clear that “commercialism” is on the rise. We are often asked about the practicalities and pitfalls of recruiting people with…
The CIO at the Top Table?
(originally published as a Veredus blog here ) In an article this week on Government Computing I drew out some points that had emerged at the Socitm Conference in 2012 with conclusions for 2013. In particular I mentioned that: “The role of the IT profession within local authorities’ wider change agenda got some attention. Many of the people…
Career Planning into Uncertainty
Originally published on the Veredus website. I recently had the privilege of speaking to a London/South East group of the LGC Future Leaders for Local Government, about Career Management at a time of such uncertainty. This blog is intended to capture a few of the key messages, and is aimed at people mid-career. It’s a…
The Future of Local Organisational Structures
Recently published in the MJ Up to now the structure of authorities has been largely prescribed by statute or convention. Although there is more variety at District Level, top-tier authorities have remarkably common structures, often driven by the existence of certain statutory roles, not least the Director of Children’s Services. That is already beginning to…
Notes from the Guardian Public Services Summit 2010
Broad Themes Times are going to be very tough, and it will be a tough time to be a public sector leader … (but) There are tremendous opportunities to do things better, differently …(though) We will need to create space for risk-taking…. (and) Many solutions will rely on the more sophisticated use of the third sector and…
Why don’t more CEOs come out of HR?
I’ve frequently wondered why some professions or backgrounds are more strongly represented at Chief Executive level than others. Some of it may simply be that some professions offer a better grounding for that job. However it does seem to me that there may be other factors at work, I suspect that some professions are held…
jon@thanflowers.com 