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Setting up a new Local Area Agreement (LAA) in Hampshire has been a leadership challenge for everyone. While organisational boundaries are a fact of life, it is important that public sector leaders understand all the issues that face our communities, bridge those boundaries and work together to deliver the highest quality services. LAAs can help unlock the best in public sector leadership. We are entering a period of new enlightenment, where success in service delivery will depend on organisations understanding the widest concerns of their communities. This is even more challenging where we have two-tier structures. I have found that experience of district councils provides a strong foundation to meet the leadership challenges ahead, because districts are very close to their communities and service delivery is immediate; community leadership is a real-time activity. The LAA provides a framework to exercise this leadership role effectively so long as it stays focused on three priorities. Firstly, partnership—to provide the best services we must work together. This is not about the largest organisation directing the smallest. We have to understand our roles, but accept that we will have valid views on services for which we are not directly responsible. Effective leadership demands many skills that are less to do with the scale of an organisation and more about working together across organisations to benefit the whole community, which is at the heart of the LAA framework. An increasingly demanding public is becoming less satisfied with our services. Research shows that satisfaction with public services is principally driven by experiences of education, refuse collection and street cleaning, as well as perceptions of safety. Each of these quality of life issues affects another. Influencing the future direction of services that impact on quality of life is a responsibility we must accept with sensitivity to organisational boundaries, but without being inhibited by them. It is not enough to appreciate the challenges facing colleagues across the public sector. We need to welcome each other into our respective organisations, for example through secondments. Local people move across organisational boundaries and so must we. Secondly, performance must become the driving reason for the LAA's existence. The new framework is more focused on outcomes and how better performance across the public sector can improve people's lives, but there is still a risk that LAAs may be driven by process and not real results. We must avoid the trap of some of the first agreements, when hard outcomes were too often lost within the detail of prescriptive guidance that was not grounded in the experience of everyday life. A key challenge is that different parts of the public sector use separate performance models. Understanding Vital Signs in the NHS and the police's APACS framework is crucial. Thirdly, communication: engaging with our communities is often overlooked as a leadership skill. We must be able to explain to our own organisations and beyond the benefits of the LAA in clear language. The LAA process has provided a much-needed framework to discuss all these service issues. These debates will build a greater understanding of all public services and how we can really work together to break down the traditional boundaries that get in the way of good quality service. I hope this is just the start of broadening our leadership horizons. The future is exciting as long as we grasp the core philosophy underpinning the LAA. We must stay focused on providing services for the benefit of individuals and communities. Organisational boundaries must become merely a convenient way to manage and deliver services, not barriers to stop engagement or limit career development. The door to the age of enlightenment is open—it is the responsibility of all of us who lead to make sure we do not slam it shut. Will Godfrey is chief executive of East Hampshire DC

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WHITEHALL

Why we look forward to the new LAAs

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