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More collaboration and stronger partnership working will be key to future success, says Sir Gus O'Donnell. The global downturn, which has had adverse effects on so many people, institutions, businesses and governments across the world, makes it significantly harder for countries to stay focused on their public service reform programme. Of course, change happens, and successful organisations adapt to the evolving needs of the world around them. However, there are some periods in history where change seems to happen faster than in others, and we are in one of those now. The Civil Service, like other public sector organisations, has a decisive role to play in supporting people and businesses through these difficult times. The economic downturn is affecting different regions and communities in different ways, and people are worried about losing their jobs and their homes. The Civil Service has always been a reliable force in tempestuous times and the global financial crisis means that, now more than ever, departments have to be ready to cope with the challenges of the coming years. I was pleased to see that the latest round of Capability reviews of government departments published at the end of last month highlighted continued improvements across departments to ensure they have the capability to meet the challenges of the future. Our priority now is to help Britain act together to come through the global downturn faster and stronger – and also prepare the country for the opportunities a global recovery will bring. But the recession is a global phenomenon, and civil servants are operating on international, as well as domestic levels to meet immediate demands. The G20 London Summit on 2 April brought together leaders from the major developed and emerging economies to help determine policies which could stimulate economic recovery and reshape the global financial systems. It was the first time that an event like this had taken place in a European city, and it was US president Barack Obama's first visit to Europe [in office]. The sheer logistics involved were mind-boggling, but the event was managed successfully, thanks to excellent teamwork across the public sector, particularly from the police, local delivery partners, civil servants across government and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Internationally, hundreds of civil servants are working in embassies around the world, often in very difficult circumstances. Last autumn I visited civil servants working alongside military staff in Afghanistan. I am tremendously proud of the work they are doing there, whether it's helping eradicate the production of illegal drugs or ensuring young girls get a proper education. These sorts of Civil Service jobs often go unseen. On the domestic front, the recession is leading to increased demand on certain parts of our workforce. Jobcentre Plus is being particularly tested. Since July last year, Jobcentre Plus staff have seen a near-doubling of new job-seeker allowance claims, resulting in around 400,000 new job-seeker interviews a month. I have visited Jobcentre Plus offices myself over recent months and met remarkable colleagues who are delivering real help for people precisely at the time when they need it most. One such colleague is Chris Howard, a Jobcentre Plus adviser from Hexham in Northumberland. He found an innovative way to help unemployed people in rural communities who were unable to take up job opportunities because of irregular public transport. By working with a local charity, he was able to provide scooters and cars to allow young people to take up placements in nearby towns. Local employment partnerships have played an important role, too, helping more than 120,000 people back into work, and 70% of people find a job within six months. In other policy areas, such as skills and education, housing and regulation, the pressures on civil servants have also never been greater. But, just as we must devise and implement new polices which will support people and help kick-start the economy, at the same time, we have to ensure we emerge stronger and capable of meeting important issues in the future. Climate change, rising levels of obesity, an increasingly-diverse, expanding and ageing population, as well as rapid changes in technology and increasing public expectations when it comes to accessing information and services, are just some of the drivers that will shape the context in which we operate over coming years. And all of these will, ultimately, affect the way in which public services are delivered on the ground. Civil servants, like local authority colleagues and other public sector workers, are going to have to meet the demands that these changes will bring whilst doing more with less in terms of resources. We must strive to deliver interventions and services which work well, first time, for all groups and individuals in society. This will lead to savings as well as improved experiences for people using public services. The public must be at the heart of everything we do. If we are to respond to the challenges of public sector reform, as set out in Working together, Public services on your side, we need to narrow the gap between the way we develop policies and the method in which we implement them. It is important that policies developed in central government are sensitive to ‘place', since regions, towns and communities are different and, therefore, need different solutions. Local and central government must continue to work in partnership to improve public services and give people a greater say in how things are done, whether it's using personalised budgets to tailor-make health provision, providing feedback on GPs and childcare, or commenting on crime and justice issues in their local communities. Digital empowerment is the key to providing better public services to ensure they are simpler for those using them and are shaped around their lives. Better collaboration between those of us who work in central government departments with local government colleagues, wider public and third sector groups, as well as community representatives, will be key to delivering successful services in an efficient way. Across the Civil Service, we are already developing productive relationships with local government colleagues. At the last meeting of our top 200 civil servants, for example, we concentrated on place issues and were joined by Irene Lucas, from South Tyneside MBC, and Rob Whiteman, from Barking and Dagenham LBC, who were able to give us first-hand accounts of what was and wasn't working well in terms of co-ordination between themselves and central government, and the subsequent delivery of local services. In preparation for the meeting, colleagues and I undertook a series of visits to local authorities across the UK to see for ourselves how policies developed in central government are playing out at a local level. We found the visits extremely useful, and I frequently encourage civil servants to ‘get out' and experience service delivery first hand. As part of our Professional skills for government initiative, we now expect civil servants to gain some operational delivery experience during their career. Taking this theme further, we are developing innovative ways of building the capability required to embed this new way of working in Whitehall's core policy-making function. The recent report by the Sunningdale Institute, Engagement and aspiration: Reconnecting policy making with frontline professionals, sets out the importance of including ‘frontline experience' on an equal footing with more established sources of evidence when formulating policy. We are now actively involved in taking this forward in the way we work. For example, we are rolling out our own capability building programme which helps turn this principle into practice. This approach is based on the work conducted by a team of 15 people from across government, working with the Cabinet Office, who have helped reshape the way we design deliverable policy at the Department of Innovation, Universities and Skills. This methodology puts frontline insight and expertise at the heart of the policy-making process. In some cases, especially when it comes to tackling complex policy issues such as climate change, understanding public attitudes may not be enough. Increasingly, we will want to influence behaviour. I am pleased that Matt Tee, the new permanent secretary of government communications, has agreed to lead work to harness best practice on using insight into citizens' lifestyles and attitudes to support and encourage changes in behaviour and in the way we deliver public services. There are some fantastic examples of this sort of work being done in government already, such as the Change 4 Life programme on obesity and Act on CO2 on climate change. But I would like to see these types of behaviour-change techniques becoming core in the day-to-day work of civil servants across the organisation. If we do this, we will be in a better place to help facilitate the next stage of public sector reform – a stage in which we will move from a command and control culture driven by central targets, to a world where we understand our customers' needs and respond efficiently to them. So, civil servants, like other public sector workers, are going to have to do more with less to meet current and future challenges. Across government, our priority is to deliver public services which are world class, personalised and deliver the maximum value for every pound of investment. Working closely with our delivery partners gives us the best chance of achieving what we all want _ effective and efficient public services making a positive difference to people's lives. Sir Gus O'Donnell is the cabinet secretary and head of the Home Civil Service

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WHITEHALL

A reliable force in tempestuous times

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