One of the biggest tasks in implementing the new unitaries will be maintaining morale in those authorities scheduled to disappear.

A district council chief executive facing the prospect of his or her job disappearing is hardly likely to be a motivational leader, and yet this is precisely the time when such skills are needed.
Much of the onus will be on HR managers to ensure staff remain committed and secure despite the impending upheavals. As it happens, public sector HR heads meet this week at their annual conference in Brighton, that of the Public Sector People Managers' Association, where the topic is expected to be top of delegates' agendas.
Incoming president, Phil Badley, although HR chief at a metropolitan borough, understands that the uncertainty in two-tier areas facing reorganisation is a key challenge for HR managers. He says: ‘My advice is to get in early. You need to be talking about the impact on people and how to deal with potential job losses, as well as how to build a new organisation. And you will need to build alliances.
‘Without question, there's a leadership role for HR heads in communicating to staff what will happen and offering support.' The challenge is not only for those areas expecting reorganisation, but also for councils which bid for it, and were refused.
HR managers will need to rebuild optimism and enthusiasm. And then there is the drive towards joint working, a process which will become more urgent in two-tier areas.
‘I believe we need to be looking far more closely at how we deliver HR services within and across organisations,' says Phil. ‘Reducing the cost of delivering support services is an aim for most councils.
‘An HR function which does not demonstrate value for money and strategic impact is failing. As a profession, we must do more to break down the traditional barriers that exist between councils, and in some larger councils, barriers between departmental HR teams.
‘If we do not look to bring about the change, someone else will.
‘Plainly, there's a move towards shared services and towards working with your neighbour, even outside two-ter areas, says Phil, who himself was directly involved twice in the last 1990s reorganisation. He joined Stockport MBC in 2001 as assistant chief executive. Last autumn, he was part of a strategic team which reviewed the future shape of the council, and led to the HR function becoming part of a new business services directorate formed to drive  transformation throughout the council.  He is now its assistant director. Indeed, his theme for the conference is about transformation.
Phil has been actively involved with the PPMA, previously SOCPO until last year, for seven years, and helped set up the national OD programme which launches next month, supported and funded by the Leadership Centre and the IDeA.
‘The programme will provide a top-class development opportunity for the 50 or so participants over the next year. Importantly, it will also build a cohort of senior people within our profession who will be able to support colleagues in other councils who need help with influencing strategic change,' he says.
But handling reorganisation is one of many issues to be tackled this year by HR managers. ‘For many of us, pay and pensions will continue to be significant,' he says. ‘Many councils are still wrestling with the issues surrounding single status. 
‘Recent case law seems to have complicated relationships with the trades unions, a number of which seem more concerned about litigation from members than sorting out a local deal.' His concern is that the single-status issue is diverting attention from the key task of transformation.
PPMA has also been actively involved in the national review of the Pay and Workforce Strategy, a revised version of which will be launched during the next few weeks.
The Lyons review last week supported the idea of sub and city regional networks working across boundaries with strategic powers. Inevitably, this has implications for staffing.
Phil continues: ‘At the level of the LSP, there is an increasing expectation that we will work across traditional boundaries to tailor a multi-agency approach to the local provision of public services.
‘We have an important role in influencing the nature and shape of these arrangements as the impact on the management and deployment of employees is critical to future success.'
Either way, it looks to be a busy year for HR managers. n