Agenda and minutes

Venue: Conference Room 4B - Tŷ Hywel. View directions

Contact: Liz Jardine, 02920 89 8705 

Items
No. Item

1.

Introductions, apologies and declarations of interest

Minutes:

There were no apologies.

There were no declarations of interest.

The meeting opened with Management Board members signing Stonewall’s anti-bullying pledge to mark Anti-Bullying week, promising to ‘…stand up for fairness, kindness and never be a bystander’. A photograph of the Board was taken with their pledges.

 

2.

Communication note to staff - Mair Parry Jones

Minutes:

Mair Parry-Jones would draft a note of the Management Board discussion for the news page.

 

3.

Minutes from the last meeting (15 September 2014) - Paper 1

Supporting documents:

Minutes:

The minutes of 15 September meeting were agreed as a correct record.

4.

Capacity Management - Paper 2

Minutes:

Lowri Williams (Head of HR) was welcomed to the meeting to discuss the approach to the growing demands and pressures on the organisation and its capacity to meet them both currently and in the future. There was a need to create agility to tackle peaks in work, secondments and temporary appointments and to integrate programmes of work, such as youth engagement. Capacity management, as a diagnostic tool, would bring a helpful discipline in putting in place responses to build capability.

There were three options for addressing future challenges: stop doing some things; invest in additional resource; or do some things differently. The likelihood was that a combination of these approaches would be required but, in order to be certain of the correct approach, it was important to understand the whole organisation picture of activity and pressures.

The Board discussed the model of service planning proposed and concluded that it was essential, and approved the flowchart and timings. The Board stressed that it was equally important to keep the paperwork simple, but robust enough to ensure read-across between different areas. The service plans should inform the work and be developed in a way that was meaningful to teams, the way they worked and the organisation’s values.

A detailed session on capacity planning was scheduled for 24 November and HR would provide data to assist planning for bilingual staff, the impact of the flexible working policy, use of consultancy and contractors, short/fixed term posts, internal secondments and other such information. The Board highlighted the importance of balancing needs and the management of policies with the organisation’s values.

Actions:

The Board asked Lowri to review the proposed mechanism again and

·      look to simplify the service plan template so that it was not overly constraining;

·      provide guidance on what service plans needed to cover, including resource requirements for planned activities, checking they are aligned with the strategic goals, particularly in relation to requests for extra resource;

·      ensure data would be available in plenty of time to prepare for  24 November meeting;

·      Formally launch the revised recruitment/new post flow chart and business case template.

Management Board to advise Lowri of any other data requirements as soon as possible.

5.

Management of the legislative programme - Paper 3

Minutes:

Chris Warner presented a paper, prepared by the Legislative Board, on the challenges over the next 18 months and beyond of managing an increasing legislative programme and its impact on supporting service areas and staff.

The pressures were manageable but it needed a planned approach, taking into account the expectations of Assembly Members and also being dependent on the timing, content and quality of legislation from the Welsh Government.  Management Board discussed the implications of these demands and agreed that Chris should lead the work needed to identify the short and mid-to-long term arrangements necessary to manage the Legislative Programme successfully.

The Board expressed concern over the emphasis on supporting legislation, being more resource intensive than policy scrutiny, as prioritising legislation over policy could be potentially detrimental to the Assembly’s scrutiny role. It was agreed that concerns in relation to improving legislation should be flagged with the Presiding Officer and others as appropriate. It was also emphasised that the Assembly must adhere to the commitments made in the Official Languages Scheme.

Actions:

Chris Warner to provide the Board with a clear picture of the additional resources required so that they could be considered.

6.

Review of strategic priorities and organisational change - Paper 4 and annex

Minutes:

Anna Daniel facilitated a workshop that involved the Management Board reviewing all the commitments for projects and other organisational change initiatives, in order to have a complete picture of planned activities across the organisation. These commitments were based on the Commission’s plan to deliver the strategic goals and priorities.

Board members considered the relative importance and priority if these and gave their input on whether it could all be delivered successfully within the resources available.  This work would continue through the Strategic Transformation programme and the capacity planning work in November.

Claire Clancy thanked Anna for the work in preparing the session and its value as an exercise in giving visibility to all that was going on and how it fits together.

Actions:

·      Anna Daniel to collate conclusions to share with Management Board for members to agree and commit to; and

·      a further meeting to be arranged in due course to continue discussions, particularly around governance.

 

7.

Any other business

Minutes:

The next Management Board meeting would be held on 20 October.